Aloha,

Let's be honest, the headlines are depressing. One Fellow Moai recently said, "If I have to live through financial hardships, I'm doing it drunk!" And who can really blame her? When you get home from work, assuming you still have a job, a fine cocktail can be just what you need to get through the evening news.

Unfortunately our leaders have no sympathy. In the halls of power we hear a lot of rhetoric about tax cuts but meanwhile taxes on alcohol are rising as legislators in places like Kentucky, Arkansas, New York and California look to balance their budgets on the backs of the average drinking man and woman. Recent headlines report on tax proposals that would raise excise taxes on beer, wine and/or spirits by 300 percent, 600 percent, even 1900 percent!

This is an old story in the United States dating back to the 1791 excise tax on whiskey which was passed at the urging of Alexander Hamilton. The reason given? To reduce national debt resulting from the American Revolution. The truth? Hamilton was quoted as saying the tax would help with "social discipline" and increase the power of the new government. The population was not sold on the idea and the result was the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794. Eventually the tax was repealed in 1803 during Thomas Jefferson's anti-Federalist "Revolution of 1800" after he was elected with strong support from farmers who opposed the tax.

But the Federal government and the states are still fond of alcohol excise taxes to this very day so the double whammy of luxury and sin taxes means that when you buy a bottle of rum 59% of the price is taxes and fees.

Wait a minute. Luxury? Sin? Our precious rum is neither. It is a necessity! If beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy then rum is proof that life is worth living.

Big Booze is fighting back with a bewildering array of anti-tax web sites and the Moai are all for it. Best wishes to the beverage alcohol industry and their lobbyists!

http://www.axetaxesnotjobs.com/
http://www.stophospitalitytaxes.com/
http://www.rollbackthebeertax.com/
http://www.sinkthedrinktax.com/

Enjoy. We'll be over here with our tikis and our rum.

Keep the torches burning,

—Tagata Maori Rogorogo