Star One Smart Blog's

A new federal tax on cigarettes is putting pressure on smokers to quit. But, you've gotta pay for Obama's S-CHIP legislation somehow.

The federal tax increase affects all tobacco products, but loose tobacco is facing the most significant change — from a $1.10 per pound tax to a whopping $24.78 per pound tax.

Let the whining begin...

But it’s simply unfair to place the entirety of this burden on the shoulders of tobacco users through such a massive tax increase. According to the Center for Disease Control, 20.8 percent of all American adults smoke, but 30.6 percent of adults below the poverty line are smokers. This means that this massive tax increase disproportionately impacts the individuals who are least able to afford it. Lower-income individuals also have the greatest difficulty in reducing their use of tobacco because they cannot easily afford products like nicotine patches that might help them overcome their addictions. And according to the American Lung Association, about 20 percent of college students smoke. These taxes, then, also fall to cash-strapped college students for whom smoking is an addiction — not something they can just give up due to rising costs.

Oh, come on! Who else should pay for children's health programs?

Smoking is maddeningly difficult to quit. Obama can't; just look at our illustrious butt-sucking president. Here we have the Smartest Man in the World, relying on the notion that smokers must continue smoking no matter how onerous the tax burden, to fund a piece of his liberal agenda. Fine.

I've already quit.

Suck on that, O!

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An alternative: Electronic Cigarettes!