Sen. David Vitter saves the day. For the guns, that is.
The battle for America's worst state
rages on.
In a 7-2 vote, the Louisiana Senate’s Committee on Revenue and Fiscal Affairs decided that for a three-day weekend at the beginning of September the state would eliminate its sales tax on firearms, ammunition, knives and ATVs.
But during the same meeting it decided not to have a similar tax break for school supplies purchases at the end of the summer, or hurricane safety tools for next year’s hurricane season.
The tax holidays cost the state about
$4.3 million in lost sales tax, which is only a tiny fraction of Louisiana's expected deficit but which was deemed too much for the state to bear. The part about school and hurricane supplies, I mean—the
gun sale is sacrosanct.
State Sen. Neil Riser, a Republican, justified the decision because of the business the tax holiday generates for gun and hunting stores.
And after all, doesn't that one tax holiday pretty much cover the other two? What does your child need most, at the beginning of the Louisiana school year? A gun. What will keep the floodwaters from pressing up against your front door when the levies break? A gun.
A letter from Sen. David Vitter (R-TheDiaperThing) asking that the gun sale go on apparently sealed the deal for state senators. He's running for governor, and apparently is keener on keeping the support of Big Gun than he is Big Hurricane Preparedness.