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Flap’s Links and Comments for March 2nd from 14:05 to 14:10

March 2, 2011 /

These are my links for March 2nd from 14:05 to 14:10:

  • California Still Barking Up the Wrong Tree for Taxes – The Amazon tax is back for debate. Again.  Despite court rulings that the thing is unconstitutional, despite proven records of failure in those states who have tried it, California’s Democratic leadership is again proposing the online tax.

    None of the excuses for this wasteful proposal make sense. Some retailers claim that taxes are needed to even the playing field between brick and mortar stores that do collect tax, and online retailers who do not. After all, that is why our local WalMart is suffering, right? But a recent LA Times article shows that retailers such as WalMart are hurting, not because they compete with Amazon, but because they have scaled back their merchandise offerings, forcing customers to look elsewhere to complete their shopping lists.  In fact, WalMart is not losing customers to online retailers so much as they are losing their customers to even lower priced offerings such as dollar stores. 

    Meanwhile, retailers like Amazon, using technology to streamline delivery processes, and offering a wide variety of items,  just posted major increases in sales. In this video from CNN  executives claim Amazon shows 26-40% growth, from the same time last year, with 15,000 employees hired in 2010. And yet, California’s Dems want to effectively slap one of the major employers in the US who is actually offering good paying jobs, with benefits.

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    But, California Democrats in the state legislature have never met a tax they did not like – even if it does not involve capturing that much revenue.

    To the LEFT, it is more about punishing people in the marketplace in search of a social justice "fairness."

  • Koch Brothers Receive Praise From Obama Administration – Progressives may have decided that businessmen and libertarian political benefactors David and Charles Koch are the latest harbingers of the vast right-wing conspiracy, but they could be shocked to learn that several Koch Industries subsidiaries have been working closely and productively with…the Obama administration.

    Specifically, it’s with Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency that Koch Industries has been playing nice. In Texas last fall, for instance, the Koch-owned Flint Hills Resources helped forge an agreement between the EPA and the Texas Commission on Environmental Equality in a regulation dispute. The move got the company praise from the EPA, calling the agreement a “model for other companies.” (…)

    The EPA under President Obama has also praised Koch subsidiaries Georgia-Pacific and Invista for their cooperation with the agency. Georgia-Pacific even won an award from the EPA in 2009. Leftists may complain that these right-wing bogeymen are unfairly challenging federal environmental regulations so they can “keep pumping out pollution for free,” but it seems the Obama administration has a lot of positive things to say about the brothers Koch.

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    The Koch Brothers are businessmen and it is in their interests to NOT pollute the environment and alienate/poison their customers.

    The LEFT is laughable in their conspiracy theories regarding the Kochs