State, Local Tourism Taxes Keeping Americans Home?

In addition to the piss poor economy in the United States at the present time (pardon my French), it appears that the U.S. Chamber and travel and tourism industry have yet to also discover just why occupancy levels are down, and more and more Americans are staying at home during normal vacation periods.

And that would be that the taxation rates now in the travel and tourism industry in many major U.S. cities, especially those that depend on tourism for a great deal of their tax revenue, has increased in leaps and bounds during the past two decades.

Many are exceeding the benchmark taxation rates which most Americans are willing to pay of 10%.

This "passing on" of the taxation which has been levied by state and local governments on rooms, meals and assundry related taxes has hurt this industry, although appears the corporate types of most of the major U.S. chains have yet to realized just why so many are choosing "cheaper" destinations, camping or purchasing or renting RVs instead of visiting those much ballyhooed hotel discount trip planning sites.

California is the largest advertiser bar none of its tourism industry, with the Governor and Hollywood types even participating as was evident during the recent Winter Olympics.

Although it is truly unbelieveable also the liberal political mindset in this particular state.

Many of those beach communities throughout California have banned both smoking, and pets on most public beaches in the interest of safety and health concerns.

Which knocks out an entire major segment of the population insofar as choosing California as a vacation destination, rather than the mountains (those which are not suffering drought conditions) or other locales.

I wonder what will be next in the Golden State.

Banning sun bathing on the beaches (after all, skin cancer is the most prevalent form of cancer and far exceeds that of second hand smoke, thus the biggest health risk to the sun worshippers of all).

So U.S. Chamber, before wining and dining the members of Congress and local and state governments for your next hotel development project, or loss at the public's expense since it appears there continues to be literally hundreds of new hotels now in the works, you might just step back and re-evaluate your corporate policies in order to attract Mom, Dad and the kids rather than your corporate clientele.

Since it appears your economies favor the "corporate" also, and not the citizenry, since those AAA discounts don't apply to the taxes passed on to the average American family.

Avoidance of the paying of usury is one biblical precept that many, at least of the boomer generation, still practice whenever possible.

Hence the number of "tea party activists" that identify themselves also as Christian, and this is a basic tenet of that religion, and several others found in this country.

Not to mention those who, in order to reduce their household budgets to be able to afford their mortgages and necessities at this point, do not include vacations or discretionary travel outside business or necessity at all.

Since in many states this is a "transaction privilege tax" on the commercial entity which is being passed on indiscriminantly to the public, please consider this simply a heads up from one who has been amazed due to business related travel at rates approaching 15% added additional taxes for overnight stays in many cash hungry states added to those predominantly large corporate chains wishing to "capitalize" on the public in historically tourism heavy states even with higher and higher base rates such as those found California, Inc.

There are very valid reasons that most states are seeing fewer and fewer return visitors.

At least the U.S. family variety, after also factoring in those astronomically high Disney passes for your average family of four into the mix.

Which industry also in many instances has been financially subsidized by the American public through federal, state and local tax benefits, subsidies and other freebies or "give mes" both during construction, and thereafter.

How Many Blondes On Fox?

With all the news and cable channels lately struggling to retain viewship and also ratings in order to score ad revenues for Rupert Murdoch, Ted Turner and the other media moguls in New York, Hollywood, and beyond due to the "globalization" also of our media industry, it appears that a new drinking game might be in order to replace the "Kevin Bacon" game of the former dorm and college set.....

How many blondes on Fox?

Maybe it is just me, but it does seem to be that Rupert Murdoch has a marketing ploy here that I guess either seems to be working, or he must believe it does in order to promote both his politics, and his station and that is to pair his rather off the wall "political analysts and commentators" such as Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck with a blonde as eye candy for the young, old and middle age male viewers.

I wonder what Fox's stats actually are for female viewers, the major consumers?

I would bet not in the ballpark, and most of those ad agencies and government contracts paid for and billed to Americans for their social welfare and "public service" announcements are not at all reaching their "target" markets. Kids and women.

But it is also good for increasing the wallets of those U.S. Chamber members, and also our national debt with all those "grants" they are indirectly receiving such as the "association" of Fortune 500 members who just received a 100 million grant to "educate" the public on free markets and globalization at taxpayer expense.

The same organization and Chamber members getting all that taxpayer revenue for the "Just Say No" to drugs campaign and "Click It Or Ticket" screams about citizen welfare while lobbying for more and more "freebies for their corporate members and while running ads promoting terrorism on the public. They have even begun using that ploy against each other in the "terrorism" tactics in order to jack up those ratings and ad revenues. But their partnership with the governmental taxpayer funded "Ad Council" their benefactors is what is truly incredible. Not watchdogs, but governmentally funded participants.

So this is conspiracy to terrorize.

The egg frying on the sidewalk was a great one, and now the meth ads.

And did you also noticed how many supposed "lawyers" are "legal analysts," a great many of which is clear have never read our Constitution, or at least have forgotten their high school government classes. And wonder how many of those have actually ever practiced law at all for any length of time?

Or how many former educators, such as Bill O'Reilly, are used to "educate" the public in matters for which apparently he hasn't a clue and is the ultimate example of the dumbing down in our educational system. His staff most likely used the word "bloviate" at one point, and Bill, the great educator, had to look it up and was just thrilled with what he learned and is engaging in the primary teaching tool used in our classrooms.

Repetition.

Only it is repetitive propaganda both in America's schools, and on its media that seems to be the method behind the madness on the Hill.

But don't get me wrong, CNN has their formula for terrorism also, and Keith Olbermayer's apoplexic outbursts during the Bush Administration in his terrorism tactics were also quite incredible. It's amazing how silent he has been on Obama, who is just as much a big government, big business (AND corporate union) backer as Mr. Bush, if not more so, and those Fortune 500 and Chamber members and their globalizism. In fact, CNN is one of them also. Maybe with CNN, however, the game should be "How many Obama worshipers and devotees on CNN?"

So drink up LSU, ASU, UCLA and NYU. How many blondes are there on Fox?