More of the Crazy Same

This is really becoming unbearable, not to say unbelievable.

Let’s say that you love St. Bruno or Condor pipe tobacco. I know, those are English-bred tobaccos, not sold in this country. Just in Merry Old England.

I have and do smoke both St. Bruno and Condor. Love both as a diversion. And this afternoon, I chanced to have a chat with Matt Hoffar, who moderates pipechat.netne.net, a very good pipes, tobacco and cigar forum chat site.

A recent post on the forum site had this to say: “Well that is that, no more ordering tobacco from the UK and having it shipped overseas. The credit card companies are anti through and through and they are the reason why now. Every etailor’s site I visited has a posting somewhere stating that they will no longer ship tobacco to the U.S. because of the bloody credit card companies.”

Hoffar assures me that is firmly the case. Imagine that? The historic home of pipes and tobaccos will no longer send pipe tobacco to one of its former colonies via credit card.

Oh, I get it. They are still upset over losing the war!

Not really. This is simply a case of Big Credit, i.e. Wall Street, joining in with the antis to stop tobacco products purchase through credit cards.

Maybe someone should contact the U.S. Department of Commerce and note our balance of trade with England. Here is what I found when I Googled “America’s balance of trade.” We exported some $18 billion to the United Kingdom and imported a little over $17 billion as of May, 2009.

In other words, if I am reading this correctly, we took in more than we spent. That’s good. However, we are way, way in debt. It is a dollar amount that I cannot accurately imagine. It goes like this: $11,675,475,436,054.06

Again, if I am reading this correctly, our trade deficit for May is a minus $24 billion. Ooops. That means we spent way more than we have and are in the hole for $24 big ones with a capital B.

Now, I am certainly no mathematician, economist, etc. I have a great deal of trouble with two digit figures on my bank account, let alone digits that run from here to New York and back.

Let’s just say that the U.S. is spending more than it has. I think everyone will agree on that point.

My point is this: Why on earth would we be drawing back from tobacco from England at a time when we need the taxes from those sales?

Now, before you go calling me a snobbish pipe smoker (I happen to enjoy OTC stuff as well as the next guy), I’m just saying that importing pipe tobacco is just a tiny blip on the screen when it comes to taxes, import fees, federal excise taxes, etc.,  but it is better than no blip at all.

I believe we have lost our collective minds. We are giving in to the anti-smoking crowd, who are, by the way, raking in tax funds from all sources to keep themselves alive. Make no mistake, taxes on tobacco are going to non-profits, which beat the drums loudly to do us in and to keep their drums banging.

They know something that perhaps we aren’t seeing: They understand that pipe tobacco is not going to go away anytime soon, not when you consider the amount of tax dollars tobacco hauls in. The best figures I can find are that tax revenues  just from cigarette tobacco alone in 2007, brought in $6.9 billion.

Now, that is not even a drop in the government’s budget bucket. It doesn’t even rate as a drip. But, it is a significant amount of outside tax revenue coming in from consumers as a gimme. It just walks through the front door, and governments lap it up.

You try replacing $6.9 billion in your budget!

And, I know, that figure is two years old. It’s the best I could do. There is no doubt but that figure has risen already, and will continue to head for the heavens. And, it always hits the people who can least afford it.

So, I checked out a few of England’s pipe tobacco exporters, just to see. Here is what UKtobacco.com had to say: We would like to apologize to all our customers in the United States of America. Due to new legislation imposed by our credit card acquirer, we will no longer be able to accept credit card payments for Tobacco, Cigars or Snuff on this web site. We appreciate your custom but have to abide by rules set by credit card companies. If you would like further information please email us and we will do our best to help you. We will be happy to supply all the other products on this web site as the ruling only applies to the purchase of TOBACCO LEAF PRODUCTS when accepting payment with a CREDIT CARD. Thank you for your understanding on this matter.

Then I checked out My Smoking Shop in the UK at http://www.mysmokingshop.co.uk/index2.php?mod=category&man=140&cat=69

Same message as before.

Then I went to an old standby, Dan Tobacco’s web site. It’s all in German. Used to be you could get it in English as well. I guess we are out of favor in Germany as well. I realize that I can get Dan tobaccos from many a fine U.S. retail tobacconist. But Dan also sold some spiffy brands you will never see in the U.S. I ordered sparingly of (1) shipping costs from Germany and (2) the wife, who does our books. She knows better than to turn the checkbook over to moi!

Matt told me he has stockpiled about 300 pounds of tobacco. Wow! I thought I had a cellar. It’s puny by comparison.

And, my friends, perhaps that is the only answer. Stockpile, stockpile, stockpile. We are in, indeed, dreadful times. We think more of rock stars than teachers and philosophers. We put more emphasis on football than education. We think that all tobacco is the same.

I read a story the other day about a World War I soldier. When he arrived home in the U.S. after the war in 1918 in France, he did not get a G.I. Bill. That didn’t come until 1944. Then he had to go through the Great Depression and Prohibition.

I also recall my grandfather Brown asking a rhetorical question once: “Who says I can’t have a drink?”

It was not a good idea to mess with my grandpa when he was drinking.

And today? The government and anti-smoking crowd, hived up with Wall Street and Big Credit, are trying to take away the individual privilege of smoking my pipe.

I wish my grandfather were around. He’d light his pipe. Puff it a bit. Look you in the eye. And ask his rhetorical question: “Who says I can’t smoke my pipe?”

Just before the shooting started.