We keep hearing from the Antis how successful California's smoking ban has been, In contrast, here is a valid dollar-and-cents reference to U-Haul standard rates for those relocating into California and those leaving it. The rental rates speak for themselves. Based upon the natural laws of supply and demand, it seems to cost a lot more to leave CA than to enter it. Explain that one, tobacco control!

The Illinois state legislature is pondering a statewide smoking ban; then there is this no-smoking in cars with kids stuff.

The U-Haul rates out of Illinois are twice what it costs to rent coming into Illinois.

More leaving than want to move in. More taxes to make up the loss.

Below are excerpts from a column from last year.
______________________________

http://www.venturacountystar.com/vcs/opinion_columnists..._223_4587296,00.html
Latest gold rush headed in the wrong direction
By George Sjostrom
April 1, 2006

There are some among us who seem hell-bent determined to destroy what's left of California's eggshell economy.

Reiner has led a group of Hollywood liberals whose sole purpose in life is to raise our taxes. In the 1990s, he helped to pass a 50-cent-per-pack increase in the state's tobacco tax, ostensibly to pay for children's healthcare. Last year, he sponsored a ballot initiative that imposed a one-point income tax surcharge to pay for mental-health subsidies.

Now, Reiner and his friends have put an initiative on the June ballot that would add a 1.7 percent increase on incomes over $400,000, with the money to go to fund universal preschool. All of these efforts seem well-meant, but the collective results spell disaster.

What's happening is a tax and regulatory culture that is being exploited by every group with a pet cause. The victim is California's economy.
California's corporate income tax rate at a flat 8.84 percent is the highest corporate tax rate in the West. This is a clear deterrent against business moving into California and a clear incentive for business to move out. Add to that the fact that California's general sales and use tax rate is 6.25 percent, well above the national median of 5 percent.

Our steeply progressive personal income tax has an effective top rate of 10.3 percent, second highest in the nation. Add to that, tax renegades like Reiner, who are determined to drive business and industry out of California.


The liberals use their pockets of personal wealth to promote special causes and to tax the rest of us to pay for them. Their goal is to tax and regulate us into becoming a socialist society. Unfortunately, they are succeeding.

California is now second only to New York among states with the highest marginal income-tax rate. .

Raising tax rates even more is absolutely the wrong answer.
Time after time we have found that raising tax rates diminishes total tax revenue.
According to the Census Bureau, during 2005, 239,416 more native-born Americans left California than moved in. And figures from the state finance office show the number of Californians reporting million-dollar incomes fell from 44,000 in year 2000 to 25,000 just three years later. And these fleeing rich guys have taken with them $9 billion a year in what would otherwise be tax revenue.

The upcoming June primary initiative now proposes another tax increase, this one aimed at incomes in excess of $400,000. If this proposal succeeds in driving even more wealthy taxpayers out of the state, you and I will be left to fund the deficit.

If anyone believes that this debate is just political rhetoric, I suggest a simple test. Pull up U-Haul on your computer and compare rates to and from any U.S. location you choose.


For example, as of Wednesday, the rate for a 26-foot, four-to-five bedroom capacity truck one-way from Simi Valley to Des Moines, Iowa, is $2,756. That exact same truck headed into California instead of out, from Des Moines to Simi Valley, is $1,995.

Take that same truck size headed for Houston North, Texas. The rate from Simi Valley to Texas is $3,221 The rate from Texas to Southern California is only $1,225. U-Haul says that the higher east-bound rates are a direct reflection of demand.
Who are you going to believe, anti's or U-Haul?

Rob Reiner's filmmaking career seems to have taken a nosedive and I can't help but wonder if his neo-communist leanings have something to do with it.

Reiner, a rabid anti-smoker, has made some of the great films of the past 30 years including "Misery", "This is Spinal Tap", "The Princess Bride", "When Harry Met Sally", and "A Few Good Men" (Four of those five films feature smoking and maybe "The Princess Bride" does too. I don't recall at the moment).

It's been over ten years since Reiner has made a film worth talking about. It's a shame. The guy was a truly gifted filmmaker and had transcended his "Meathead" image from years on "All in the Family". "This is Spinal Tap", IMHO, is one of the ten greatest comedies of the past 50 years.

I don't usually watch the show "South Park", but a few years ago, they skewered anti-smoking and Rob Reiner. (The creators of "South Park", I believe, are Libertarians).

I wasn't able to find the part of that episode with Reiner, but here is a funny 2 minute clip of "South Park" mocking anti-smoking.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-32372714912608...q=south+park+smoking

I still laugh about "This is Spinal Tap" over 2 decades later. That was a great movie.

Here's a little more from that South Park episode:

link