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A s the lame-duck session of Congress goesinto its last weeks, nearlyevery elected official is cel-ebrating the holidays byattaching their own orna-ments, or amendments, tothe sessions Christmas treewhich might survive.

One of these amendmentsis the Marketplace FairnessAct which was attached toS. 3254 DefenseAuthorization Bill by U.S.Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL). The amendment would allow states to collect sales

tax from out of s ta te inter-net retailers. Although theamendment did not survivethe first vote, there is stillthe possibility the amend-ment will be resurrected inthe coming weeks.

Many state governors,due to mounting state budg-et deficits, are commendingthe amendments passage.

Ohio Governor Kasich hasnot made a public statementon the issue. According tothe Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in Ohiothere was an estimated $343.6 million dollars inuncollected taxes fromonline retailers.

This highly controversialtopic brings to debate mul-tiple issues. With Congressscouring to f ind any way toraise revenue and to funnelmoney to the sta tes - theinternet sales tax is an easytarget.

The U.S. Supreme Court

has already ruled on theissue of taxpayers rightsand the states ability tocollect taxes. The highcourt ruled in the1992 Quill decision preventing statesfrom requiring retailers tocollect sales taxes if they donot have a physical pres-ence in the sta te . With thedevelopment of the internet,the ruling has subsequently

been applied to onlineretailers.

The possibility of the tax being an amendmentattached to a bil l with noreal relation is high. A new

tax should be given carefulconsideration through com-mittee hearings and floor discussion rather than shov-ing it through Congressduring a lame-duck session.

I f the new tax wereapproved it would requireimmediate collection in 45states not currently requir-ing internet sales tax collec-tion. Today, nearly 60 per-cent of small retail opera-tions have an online pres-ence. Most of these small

businesse s hire an account-ant dur ing tax season or dotheir taxes themselves.

The requirement of a fed-eral internet sales tax would make this quite a difficulttask. Not only are there9,600 different sales tax

jurisdictions in the United States which are constantlychanging, the retailer will

be requ ired to fil e in each jurisdiction where they havesold a product in.

Ultimately, this will be amess for online retailersand small business who uti-lize internet sales. Also, themove will raise costs for online consumers. Staytuned.

OPINION Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or aspeech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a re- The First Amendment to the United States Constitution4 Thursday, December 13, 2012 Springboro Sun

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Letter to the Editor Policy

Thats a phrase I havent heard inyears. I asked a nine-year-old

the other day if he was experi-encing any problems with his CRT.

He said, Whats a CRT?I said, You know, a cathode ray tube.Is that one of those time machines I

saw in a movie a couple of months ago?he responded.

I thought for a second and said, Yes.I didnt wantto get involved ina longdis-sertation about the invention of the cath-ode ray tube and how television wasinvented back inthe dark ages of the 20thcentury.

My question today is: After Christmas this year will everyone in theUnited States have a flat screen televisionand computer monitor? We bought our f irst in 2006 when our old 27-inch

croaked one weekend and the t iny 19-inch bedroom CRT just wasnt gonnawork in the big room. And what a stealwe got.

A flotilla of 32 inchers had just arrived f rom China and they were only $595,down from close to $900 a few monthsearlier. I couldntbelieve how light it wasI actually carried it out of the store usingmy right hand only. The other day I told Lucy we should have wa ited they r egoing for $178-198 today. Lets see, noTV for six year s would have saved usroughly $7,200 in cable bills, p lus the$400 difference in price. Wow, we could

be spending a weekend in Maui nextmonth.

Customer service for that great deal

s ix years ago was and stil l i s availablethrough China only. Thats r ight, you

have to call China if you need help and its not toll free. Fingers have beencrossed for six years and so far so good.

I havedubbed 2012 the year of the flatscreen. Whats next? Probably a 1/16 of an inch flat screen that you can make anysize you want. Fill the whole wall in theden, basement, man cave. Roll it out and

stick it to thewall.In themeantime, wellsuffer with our high definition 50-inch,60-inch and 90-inch flat screens that are,gosh, over an inch thick and just so cum-

bersome. Be patient, America, things willget better.

I keep hearing about this ciscal f liff that were all going to go over on Dec. 31at mid night. Does anyone have a nydetails on how far down the fliff well begoing? Ivegot a few bucksI can send in,if thatll help. Maybe wecould all send ina few bucks. I hope that the ciscal peoplecan get their act together in the comingyear. Im not a ciscal person, just not mycup of tea or background. I did ski someof Michigans finer fliffs growing up, soI do relatein that area. Willthere be a cis-cal fliff party if everything levels out? If you hear of any, please email me. I want

to be there for the festivities and excite-ment.

Are you happy that 12/12/12 is finallyover?The next time all the numbers will

be the same is in 3001 when 01/01/01comes around. Did they have any partieslas t night to celebrate the f inal occur-rence of the month, day and year all

being the same in double digits? Im suresome one somewhere has a really bad hangover today and is wondering what,why, when and where. Of course, nextweek isthe big Mayanparty on 12/21/12.I knowa lot of folks planning tobe atthatone. The real par ty, the one that makesmore sense then any thing else in thewhole world is the birthday of our Lord and Savior on Christmas Day, Dec. 25.Thats my favorite celebration every year.

If youd love to attend a contemporary

musical celebration of Christmas thatstotally amazing, come join Lucy and I atthe South Campu s of Chr is t Unite d Methodist Church, located in the DaytonChristian Schools campus on the corner of Spring Valley and Washington ChurchRoad in Miami Township. Two serviceswill be available this coming Sunday,Dec. 16. The family candlelight servicewith children performing will be at 5:30with holiday refreshments at 6:30 and thesecond candlelight serviceat 7:30. Pleasearrive early for the7:30 serviceand enjoythe refreshments and fellowship first.Lucy and I attended South Campus as aguest of Pastor Wayne Botkin two yearsago this Christmas and fell in love withthe people, the music and the mission.

Youll love it, too.mergewright@yahoo.com

Can you check out my CRT?MERGE WRIGHT

By Don Wr

ight

TimesColumnist

W e are about to see our already large government groweven larger as it seeks to manage ever larger slices of our lives. That means deficits will continue and thelarger government will try to manage by playing an even bigger partin the national economy, as the Federal Reserve has been doing and will continue to do after the fiscal cliff.

Anyone who has a bank savings account alreadyknows what this means. Your money sits there gaining afew pennies while prices goup by dollars. What thismeans is that the value of the

dollar floats this way and that way as the FederalReserve board adjusts monetary policy this way and that way to suit

perceived needs every six weeks or so. The Fed does this by quanti-tative easing that keeps interest rates low and gives savings institu-tions incentives to buy treasury bonds rather than lend the moneythat you and I have less and less incentive to put into savingsaccounts.

We read stories about a weak dollar or a strong dollar and theeffect on imports and exports. How does an importer or an exporter

plan for the future? This partly accounts for the growth of hedgefunds funds that hedge against future changes in the value of thedollar. What we need is a stable dollar, and the traditional system for establishing that is the gold standard, as none other than ThomasJefferson advocated. He wanted our money to use a decimal systemrather than the confusing British pounds, etc., and to represent anunchangeable standard of value.

U.S. history is replete with arguments, policy shifts and emergen-

cies that caused betrayal of the Jeffersonian vision. But we stayed more or less true to the concept of a gold standard into the post-World War II world. The gold standard is associated with all of theeconomic expansions, according to Steve Forbes in a recent ForbesMagazine article.

Then we led the way in going away from gold in 1971 because itwas easier to manage the economy without it. This is government-speak for we can spend and borrow and maybe pay it back some-time, possibly by printing more dollars. Who needs gold for that?

Yet Jefferson and the other Founders, having weathered theContinental dollar debacle in the Revolution, knew that making thedollar accommodate government budgetary failures was a gravedanger to economic freedom, an invitation to the kind of fiscal gam-ing that our financial institutions are doing now, and a disservice tothe founding ideals. Free market economist Friedrich Hayek warned in 1960 that those alarmed by the growth of government should payspecial attention to monetary policy. Too bad President Nixon didnt

pay attention in 1971.

Joining Forbes as a gold bug is Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, who said earlier this year, Moneywhose future value is unpredictable cannot serve its most important

purpose, to provide a common rule to equate goods, services and labor. When social transactions are undermined, people lose trust inone another, and the vacuum must be filled with the power of gov-ernment.

Washington is currently in the hands of economists and politicianswho strongly disagree and they believe Forbes and Ryan are right-wing extremists who want to turn back the clock to the robber

baron era. But who are todays robber barons but politicians whowant more and more of our money because (gosh, would you

believe it?) a dollar doesnt go as far as it used to.Judy Shelton, senior fellow at the Atlas Economic Research

Institute, puts it this way: Our discretionary monetary policy has brought about a rupture between financial intermediaries [i.e., bankset al] and the actual engines of productive growth, with high financeoperating on a different track than the organic economy. She likes

gold.So it looks like our choice is between right-wing extremism and paper dollars which might even be worth the paper they are printed on.

Is gold standard

talk comingafter the cliff?

WilliamH. Wild

Guest Columnist

A ccording to FeedingAmericas Map the MealGap project, 132,200 (17.8 perce nt) of th e 740,900 individualsliving in Montgomery, Greene and Preble counties in the Miami Valleyare food insecure and 40,000 (30 per-cent) of those are children. And according to the U.S. Census Bureau31 percent of Dayton residents are liv-ing below the poverty level. The poor and the food insecure individualsarent whom you might think theycan be people just like you peoplewho may have a job, but just cantmake ends meet.

On a daily basis our neighbors facethe harsh reality of hunger and food insecurity, having to decide between

putting food on the tabl e and pay ingrent or utilities. The state of hunger right here in our own backyard is stag-gering. In an area where generationsof my family, our team members and our guests have resided and grown our

business, we mus t come toge ther tofight hunger for the greater good.

I regularly visit our 65 pizzeriasfrom our Centerville location toBeavercreek to Huber Heights,Englewood and Kettering- meeting

with guests and team members, listen-ing to their stories, celebrating their successes and sometimes hearing their unfortunate struggles. While manyfamilies who frequent our pizzeriascan, at the time, afford a hot meal, Ihave heard of worse times when put-ting food on the table was a strugglefor them, their families or friends.

During this holiday season,LaRosas is once again proud to sup-

port The Foodbank in the MiamiValley to fight hunger right here inour own backyard. Serving more than70,000 people annually, The Foodbank nourishes thehunger relief efforts of the communitythrough the acquisition and distribu-tion of food to the hungry throughoutMontgomery, Greene and Preble coun-

ties. The Foodbank provides 358,000meals per month from its Customer Connection Center in Downtown

Dayton and is the only Foodbank of itskind in the area. Throughout the holi-day season, each of our pizzerias will

be s elling Buddy Cards (our popula r 2for 1 discount card) for the benefit of The Foodbank. We will donate $5from the sale of every $10 BuddyCard directly to supporting TheFoodbanks missions and the nourish-ment and comfort they provide tothose who truly need help in our com-munity. Ultimately, our contributionwill help suppor t The Foodbanksannual goal to distribute six million

pounds of food to meet the r egionsgrowing demand.

Heres how you can help:- Purchase a LaRosas Buddy Card

at any LaRosas pizzeria now throughDec. 31. For a full list of locations,visit www.larosas.com/find.

- Donate to The Foodbank in theMiami Valley. For more information,visit www.thefoodbankdayton.org.

Food brings people together and can build a community. No ch ild, pe rsonor family should go hungry. Please

join me and the LaRosas family in thefight against hunger. Together we canfeed our neighbors in need.

LaRosas feeds those in needMichaelLaRosa

CEO of LaRosas

Internet sales tax a complex possibilityBy RobScott

Times Columnist