John Stark
.44 mag
https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/taxes-have-made-new-york-into-an-empire-of-cigarette-smuggling-avoidance-evasion-flavor-revenue-hochul-f2b11e15#cxrecs_shttps://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/taxes-have-made-new-york-into-an-empire-of-cigarette-smuggling-avoidance-evasion-flavor-revenue-hochul-f2b11e15#cxrecs_shttps://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/taxes-have-made-new-york-into-an-empire-of-cigarette-smuggling-avoidance-evasion-flavor-revenue-hochul-f2b11e15#cxrecs_s
I am not an advocate for legalizing hard drugs like crack/cocaine, meth, heroine, fentanyl, and so on. The stuff is poison. Supposedly we have an FDA and consumer protections and so on, such that people can't be poisoned to death, quickly or slowly, by lethal chemical and pharmaceutical products sold on the open market.
However, I'm also painfully aware that the Prohibition against these drugs has done nothing but create massive black markets and organized criminal cartels, along with all of the attendant bribery and corruption of public officials and officers, and has had a terribly corrosive effect upon our nation and its culture.
That being said, we're talking about a legal product here: tobacco.
Its been legal here since before the nation was founded, and has been a staple US crop for centuries. Its deleterious to the people who use it, usage comes with real health care costs that go beyond the user, and so on. Still, its a legal product. I understand that cigarette smuggling is the natural direction a market is going to take in a situation like this, but GEEZ.
I don't think the real nub of this article is simply the fact that NY doesn't know how to govern itself wisely.
My read on something like this is that the black market for this legal product is growing so large because people in power want it to grow, and are making bank on it on the sly. Cui Bono eh? Who benefits? Along with Quid Quo Pro. Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
Who in the power structure of NY government, business, and finance, is getting their skim from the smuggling of a legal product?
If you know there will be an illegal market along with the legal market, why not buy into that, suborn it, control it, and profit from it? Two birds, one stone, control of the legitimate and illegitimate markets. THAT is a monopoly on business on steroids.
These are the questions, on a whole host of topics, that we must get answers to if this state is ever going to rejoin the United States, instead of being a rogue state that is in flagrant violation of the law. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. The scope of corruption here in NY is not beyond my imagination, but I'm afraid it is beyond my imagination how it could ever be fixed at this point without extreme prejudice.
I am not an advocate for legalizing hard drugs like crack/cocaine, meth, heroine, fentanyl, and so on. The stuff is poison. Supposedly we have an FDA and consumer protections and so on, such that people can't be poisoned to death, quickly or slowly, by lethal chemical and pharmaceutical products sold on the open market.
However, I'm also painfully aware that the Prohibition against these drugs has done nothing but create massive black markets and organized criminal cartels, along with all of the attendant bribery and corruption of public officials and officers, and has had a terribly corrosive effect upon our nation and its culture.
That being said, we're talking about a legal product here: tobacco.
Its been legal here since before the nation was founded, and has been a staple US crop for centuries. Its deleterious to the people who use it, usage comes with real health care costs that go beyond the user, and so on. Still, its a legal product. I understand that cigarette smuggling is the natural direction a market is going to take in a situation like this, but GEEZ.
I don't think the real nub of this article is simply the fact that NY doesn't know how to govern itself wisely.
My read on something like this is that the black market for this legal product is growing so large because people in power want it to grow, and are making bank on it on the sly. Cui Bono eh? Who benefits? Along with Quid Quo Pro. Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.
Who in the power structure of NY government, business, and finance, is getting their skim from the smuggling of a legal product?
If you know there will be an illegal market along with the legal market, why not buy into that, suborn it, control it, and profit from it? Two birds, one stone, control of the legitimate and illegitimate markets. THAT is a monopoly on business on steroids.
These are the questions, on a whole host of topics, that we must get answers to if this state is ever going to rejoin the United States, instead of being a rogue state that is in flagrant violation of the law. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. The scope of corruption here in NY is not beyond my imagination, but I'm afraid it is beyond my imagination how it could ever be fixed at this point without extreme prejudice.
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