Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 17:20:57 -0500
From: reason@free-market.net ("Jeff Taylor")
Subject: Reason-Express: REx29, v4
To: ReasonExpress@free-market.net (Reason Express List Member)
Welcome to REASON Express, the weekly e-newsletter from REASON Magazine.
REASON Express is written by Washington-based journalist Jeff A. Taylor and
draws on the ideas and resources of the REASON editorial staff. For more
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REASON Express
July 17, 2001
Vol. 4 No. 29
1) Sickly Suspects
2) Satellite of Greed
3) Vol Pols Lose Tax Battle--Again
4) Quick Hits
- - Police State Prescription - -
Happenings in the small southwest Virginia town of Pulaski should give pause
both to drug warriors and anyone who thinks that licensing powerful drugs is a
simple thing.
Residents of Pulaski will have to provide fingerprints at the area's six
pharmacies to get the painkiller OxyContin. Local police say the drug is the
object of rampant prescription fraud that fuels a booming black market.
"Anything that will stop the flow onto the streets we'll be happy with," said
Detective Marshall Dowdy of the Pulaski police. "This is a seemingly
never-ending battle."
Indeed, it is a battle that has been waged since earliest human history. Ever
since the first semi-rotten, half-fermented fruit produced the first alcoholic
buzz, man--or at least a goodly chunk of the population--has sought out one
form of altered consciousness or another.
So it is no surprise that OxyContin, which comes in a time-release pill and is
similar to morphine, has become the source of a relatively cheap high in rural
areas far from urban drug supplies. Nor is it a wonder that people with
chronic pain seek the drug--it is a very effective painkiller. Doctors readily
prescribe it precisely because it isn't morphine.
But now OxyContin use is being stymied by fears of its abuse. A patient may
have good reason to want to avoid giving his or her fingerprints to the drug
store, all but declaring to the world that they are a likely drug abuser or
con artist.
Perhaps a solution is not to treat painkillers like controlled substances, but
to treat currently controlled substances more like standard painkillers. This
would not only ease many of the troubles of the standard drug war, but allow
sick folks to keep both their medicine and their dignty without state
interference.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A44111-2001Jul10.html
- - Sky High Taxes - -
Good tax collectors find new things to tax. Los Angeles County Assessor Rick
Auerbach may turn out to be taxman of the century if he succeeds in slapping
property taxes on several satellites.
The eight birds orbiting the equator are worth $100 million each to Hughes
Electronics, which happens to have offices in the count. That's enough to
make Hughes owe L.A. County a multi-million-dollar tax bill, Auerbach claims.
Auerbach counts satellites as taxable movable personal property--like boats,
construction equipment, and ice-skating costumes. But Hughes says that
geostationary birds are stationary, hence, not movable, and, it follows, not
taxable.
The matter seems destined to end up in court. But don't bet against the tax
guys. For years California had no compunction about reaching over state
borders to tax the pensions of former California residents. Only an act of
Congress stopped that.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/state/la-000056553jul10.story?coll=la%2Dnews
%2Dstate
- - Trouncing the Tax Man - -
Career politicians usually have a stubborn streak. How else can they be told
year after year that used car salesmen are held in higher regard than they are
and still come back for more?
But Tennessee pols appear to be positively mule-headed. Several times in
recent years they have attempted to pass a state income tax. Each time they
have been beaten back by public opposition.
It happened again last week as hundreds of demonstrators swarmed the capitol
building, spurred on by radio talk show hosts, the emerging last line of
defense against rapacious government.
Lawmakers had discussed a 3.5 percent income tax that would allow, or so the
story goes, less reliance on sales taxes. But the history of taxation shows
that even if new levies are offset by initial cuts in existing taxes, the
taxes almost always grow to result in a bigger overall tax burden in the end.
Thanks to their alert citizens, and little thanks to their legislators,
Tennessee remains one of nine states without a state income tax, a competitive
"handicap" that state politicians are convinced they must fix.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,29445,00.html
QUICK HITS
- - Quote of the Week - -
"We make drugs called embryos, I guess, so now we have to be regulated by the
FDA as though we are Pfizer or something." Jamie Grifo, a fertility doctor at
New York University Medical Center, on new FDA demands that fertility doctors
fill out an Investigational New Drug application any time they mix male and
female genetic material.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43947-2001Jul10.html
- - Windows Shut - -
New Mexico settled its antitrust problems with Microsoft. The firm will pay
the $100,000 or so the state has alreadyspent on the case and has promised to
give computer makers more freedom in customizing Windows installs.
http://www.dallasnews.com/texas_southwest/417230_microsoft_12e.html
- - Mommy State - -
A 7-year-old California boy with a brain disorder finds relief from mood
swings in marijuana muffins. The state says that's a misapplication of medical
marijuana laws and amounts to child abuse. Local officials could take the
child from his mother as a result.
http://www.sacbee.com/news/news/local01_20010711.html
- - Union Gaps - -
The National Education Association says that charter schools must operate just
like other public schools. Anything that would be forbidden in the wider
school system--same-sex academies, for-profit operation, non-certified
teachers--should likewise be banned from charter schools.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,29241,00.html
REASON NEWS
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