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Mostly when I think of weird shit I think of California..
Chicago is apparently trying to move up in the world of dumb shit.
News article here!
Basically they want to tax guns and ammo to make them too expensive for criminals to use.. because we know they go buy their guns and ammo legally.
Using their reasoning, they should tax the sale of drugs on the street too. Don't forget to add the sales tax to that 8 ball that you just sold!
Poor journalism and a shitty idea.
It's clear what their true intent is.Quote:
Officials in Illinois' Cook County are eyeing a so-called "violence tax" on guns and ammo -- a move aimed at curbing violence and closing the budget gap, but one that's drawing a rebuke from the gun lobby.
MyFoxChicago.com reports that homicides in Chicago are up 25 percent this year, and some officials in surrounding Cook County are looking to use such a tax to curb the number of guns in circulation.
But NRA lobbyist Todd Vandermyde told the Chicago Sun-Times it's "just another example of the blame game."
"Chicago and Cook County has a gun violence problem, Chicago's got a high high school drop-out rate, they've got a drug problem, they've got a gang problem, but they want to make legal gun owners, guys like me, the scapegoat," he said.
The Sun-Times reports that Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle is leading the charge for the tax, though the specific amount is unclear.
Preckwinkle Chief of Staff Kurt Summers told the Sun-Times that while it wouldn't "popular" with the gun lobby, "it is consistent with our commitment to pursuing violence reduction in the city and in the county."
Summers said gun violence costs the government in a number of ways, including the $143 a day it costs to keep someone in jail. Further, he said it costs $52,00 on average to treat a gunshot victim without insurance in the taxpayer-backed local hospital.
But Vandermyde said the tax would end up "jacking up the price of guns and ammunition" on people who can't afford it.
A Cook County proposal in 2007 for a bullet tax was ultimately defeated.
(1) Revenue
(2) Gun control
This isn't about reducing violence except as a possible distant side effect.
This taxation thing is way out of control.
WTF! I thought the criminals just got their guns and ammo from the Federal Department of Justice.
Sounds like a road and bridge tax. How many firearms/ammo are used in crimes were purchased legally?
I have found this to be a fairly scholarly source to debunk a lot of anti-gun rhetoric.
www.gunfacts.info
If they pass it, it'll just move gun and ammo sales out of cook cty to the burbs. Probably most of it's out in the burbs already.
Those poor inner city yutes having to drive way out to stock back up :(