Now every state is different, but most places I've lived (and there have been quite a few) have exhorborant taxes on telephone services. Here in Northern Virginia, my local telephone plan costs $29.99. After taxes and fees, my monthly bill topped $50. That is over 40% in taxes and fees alone. It's no wonder then, that consumers are turning to cell phones and internet devices for local phone service.

Naturally, consumer freedom has state and local governments worried about losing all that cash. U.S. Congressmen, who had largely supported an internet tax ban throughout the 90s and early 00s, are locked in heated debates over whether or not the ban on internet taxation should be extended.

The debate helps illustrate precisely what is wrong with tax and spend government, and their willing accomplices in the media.

States facing soaring budget shortfalls say that they could lose as much as $9 billion in the next three years if they cannot collect taxes on Internet access and telephone calls, an increasingly popular alternative to traditional phone services.

It's attitudes like this that really piss me off. When consumers chose one product that has less taxes than another product, government bureaucrats whine that they are the ones losing money. (As if it were their money to begin with.) Government law-makers then try to level the playing field by passing punitive taxes on competing service providers.

The same attitude permiates attitudes about taxation of businesses. When businesses choose states with lower tax rates, or heaven forbid nations with lower tax rates, they are said to be shirking their civic duty to pay higher taxes at home. I don't know about you, but I don't have a duty to pay any higher tax rate than is required by law. If I can find a set of goods and services that minimize the taxes I pay, I'm going to use them.