Oh, the stupidity...
Feb. 27th, 2009 09:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fairyruneI heard a story on the radio this morning about a "tea party" they're trying to hold in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
Apparently, some people there are upset about the increase in sales tax, so they wanted to dump tea into the Cedar River, Boston-style. The morning DJ's were telling this story because those people in Cedar Rapids were told that they could not, in fact, dump tea into the river without a permit since it's considered a pollutant. Instead, they will be dumping water from buckets labeled "tea."
The DJ's were pointing out how stupid THAT was. I'm baffled by it for another reason.
The Boston Tea Party was in protest of taxation...without representation. Last I heard, we had fixed that problem over two hundred years ago.
In my opinion, these people are marring the memory and spirit of the original event. This article explains that "...[This]group opposes a 1-cent local option sales tax to go before voters Tuesday. The tax would bring in an estimated $17 million to $18 million a year for the city for five years, with 90 percent going to housing assistance, including buyouts, for hundreds of people whose houses were destroyed in the June 2008 floods."
What the hell is so unjust about that? The good people of Cedar Rapids elected the officials who are proposing this tax. It's not anything like the American colonists and King George III. The colonists had no say in that situation at all; no one was speaking for them in England. Duly elected officials discussing a small tax designed to help the people they were elected by is nothing worth protesting.
This is stupid on so many levels it makes my brain hurt.
Apparently, some people there are upset about the increase in sales tax, so they wanted to dump tea into the Cedar River, Boston-style. The morning DJ's were telling this story because those people in Cedar Rapids were told that they could not, in fact, dump tea into the river without a permit since it's considered a pollutant. Instead, they will be dumping water from buckets labeled "tea."
The DJ's were pointing out how stupid THAT was. I'm baffled by it for another reason.
The Boston Tea Party was in protest of taxation...without representation. Last I heard, we had fixed that problem over two hundred years ago.
In my opinion, these people are marring the memory and spirit of the original event. This article explains that "...[This]group opposes a 1-cent local option sales tax to go before voters Tuesday. The tax would bring in an estimated $17 million to $18 million a year for the city for five years, with 90 percent going to housing assistance, including buyouts, for hundreds of people whose houses were destroyed in the June 2008 floods."
What the hell is so unjust about that? The good people of Cedar Rapids elected the officials who are proposing this tax. It's not anything like the American colonists and King George III. The colonists had no say in that situation at all; no one was speaking for them in England. Duly elected officials discussing a small tax designed to help the people they were elected by is nothing worth protesting.
This is stupid on so many levels it makes my brain hurt.
