Yesterday, the Iowa Supreme Court decided an issue that really is not of much interest to most of you, but which has made me chuckle when I think of the hard-core Tea Party activists and their corporate masters at Fox News.
The court ruled that Iowa may properly impose a state tax on the royalties that KFC makes from its Iowa franchisees, rejecting KFC's contention that KFC must have a physical presence in Iowa or Iowa cannot properly tax KFC.
http://www.iowacourts.gov/...
While this ruling at first seems rather irrelevant to most of our lives, it does place the Teabaggers and their corporate masters in a logic trap (not that logic or being hypocritical ever bothers them, but follow me below).....
Remember that the Teabaggers are WAY concerned with states rights and are now even trying to get the 17th Amendment repealed so that we no longer have direct election of U.S. Senators. This is, allegedly, because Congress really needs to pay more attention to the needs and desires of state legislatures and stop busting the budgets of states with unfunded mandates. (Actually it is so the Senate will generally be more Republican, but ignore that for a sec.)
One argument against Obama's health care law? It is an improper use of the Commerce Clause and improperly usurps rights reserved for the states.
So, of course, the Tea Party should be standing up and cheering that Iowa has ruled that it may exercise its 10th Amendment rights and tax a big out-of-state corporation like KFC, right? They should be really happy that the federal government's Commerce Clause authority was read narrowly so that the state's rights could be preserved, right? So the coffers of Iowa could once again be replenished, free from federal meddling???
Well, yeah, but then there is the fact that the Tea Party masters at Fox News are not going to get on TV and argue that anyone has any right to tax a large corporation. Want to make money in Iowa? Go ahead -- it is state tax free! Plus there is that whole "corporations are the same as individuals" rule that they somehow pushed through in Citizens United. So now corporations are like some sort of individual cloning device -- if only I have rights, they might be a little too limiting for me, so I might need to create 10 or 20 corporations that not only help me exercise my rights, but which have their own NEW rights.
So what are my good Tea Party and GOP acquaintances suggesting today?? That Mitch McConnell "protect" KFC by passing a federal law that says that states may not tax KFC's royalty income. The source of the federal power to protect corporations in this manner? The Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Summary:
- Want to make sure people have health care coverage: can't use the Commerce Clause, that is communism or socialism or whatever the buzz word is today; it also burdens state budgets and takes money away from the states.
- Want to pass a federal law that says that state governments may not tax large corporations who make money from the acts of their franchisees in that state? Want to take hundreds of thousands of dollars away from a state that has specifically passed a law intended to help balance their budget? Well, go right ahead! Certainly. That is exactly what the Commerce Clause is intended for!
Yikes.
Happy New Year.