Tea Party Favorite Rubio's Vote on Taxation "with" Representation

As a reaction to the British Tea Act in 1773, the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773 was all about the emotionally charged issue of "taxation without representation."

Prior thereto the British passed the Sugar Act of 1764 which raised the duties on sugar imported into the colonies. This, in combination with the Stamp Act of 1765, soon resulted in the British collecting ten times as much revenue from the American colonies as they had before 1763.

Senator Marco Rubio of Florida is a Tea Party favorite and a great spokesman for limited government. However, in the spirit of "What you do speaks so loudly I can't hear what you're saying," let's look at Senator Rubio's position on taxing U.S. bound sugar imports today.

A Tale of Two Conservatives has the modern day "tea party" story of "taxation with representation:"

"One test for economic conservatives is whether they are willing to oppose constituent business interests looking for government favoritism. On that score, two recent contrasting votes by Jim DeMint of South Carolina and Marco Rubio of Florida are instructive.

Last month the Senate easily voted to reauthorize the Export-Import Bank, 78-20, a vote that was never much in doubt given the backing from business lobbies and the White House. But it's still worth saluting the 20 votes in opposition—19 Republicans and independent socialist Bernie Sanders—and especially Mr. DeMint, a rare case of a Senator voting for principle against the biggest interests in his home state.

"Boeing is the largest beneficiary of Ex-Im bank taxpayer loan guarantees and it has a new plant to turn out 787s in North Charleston. General Electric and Caterpillar have major plants in South Carolina and get Ex-Im help too. Mr. DeMint went so far as to lead the charge against Ex-Im, much to the annoyance of Chambers of Commerce in the Palmetto State. . . . Mr. DeMint says he voted as he did because he's concluded that "we've created a culture in Washington that has almost every major business in the country with its nose in the trough."

That includes the sugar lobby, which last week narrowly defeated a bipartisan attempt at reforming its egregious quota program that gouges American consumers to benefit a mere 5,000 or so farmers. The Senate voted 50-46 to table Senator Pat Toomey's reform bill, but the reform would have passed if not for the votes of 16 GOP Senators. . . .

The usual sugar beet and sugar cane state suspects dominate the list, but one name leaps out—Mr. Rubio, the freshman from Florida who won his seat in 2010 while running as a tea party favorite in opposition to the crony capitalism and government meddling of the Obama Administration.

Mr. Rubio nonetheless voted against consumers and for the big sugar-cane producers . . . . Mr. Rubio thus voted to the left of the 16 Democrats who joined 30 Republicans in supporting sugar reform. Unlike Mr. DeMint, the Floridian was not a profile in courage on this issue, or even a profile.

The political habit of favoring big business is bipartisan, as the sugar and Ex-Im Bank votes show. If Republicans want the political credibility to reform middle-class entitlements, they had better be prepared to eliminate corporate welfare too. Kudos to Mr. DeMint for understanding this."

Why Politics Sucks and Why Taxpayers Get the Shaft

Consumers don't seem to count for much when special interests are involved in the legislative process. And believe me, they are.

Neither do taxpayers count for much when we aren't paying close attention to what our "public servants" are doing to us.

Sugar costs for consumers remain shamefully high because of duties charged to sugar importers by legislation. These duties in turn enable Florida producers to jack up their prices without fear of competition.

One big reason our forefathers fought for our nation's independence was to prevent Britain from taxing us without our having a voice in that taxation policy.

Well, now we purportedly have a voice, but special interests, aka factions, have intervened to hold sway over too many of our legislators. Shame on you, ,Marco Rubio.

What Mr. Rubio did in voting for the sugar legislation is totally contrary to what he says to the American people.

And that's another great example of why politics sucks. And it's a longstanding and sickening bipartisan approach.

Finally, far too many American businesses are willing and anxious to happily feed at the government trough while simultaneously railing against the evils of big government. What a crock.

Thanks. Bob.