fee

the new budget proposal is out. you can feel the glow of wonkish excitement in the air. it's almost like christmas, except that in this case santa robs from the poor and gives to the military.

there's actually a lot of funny things about this budget, but this morning i am fascinated by how the president is insisting that he can bring down the deficit (largely caused by his past tax cuts) without raising taxes. it won't work, there simply aren't enough cuts that could be made to make it work. but who's counting?

but here's another funny bit. there are tax increases in this budget bill. they're just not called tax increases. take this for example:

Airplane passengers would foot an increasingly large share of the cost of providing airport security under President Bush's $32.2 billion budget for the Department of Homeland Security.

Fees for a one-way flight would jump by $3, to $5.50, or to $8 for a one-way flight that has more than one stop. The higher fees would mean that passengers would be paying for about 90 percent of the cost of the aviation security program that the federal government took over after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, up from about 60 percent today.

The higher fees would generate about $1.5 billion in extra federal revenue. The budget represents a 3.2 percent increase from this year's $31.2 billion Homeland Security Department budget.

did you see the tax? don't be fooled because it's called a "fee." this "fee" is well within the normal definition of a "tax" because the government is requiring an extra charge that goes to the government in a transaction that is otherwise between two private parties. that is what a tax is. calling it a "fee" is a misnomer.

this is not a "fee." a fee is when the government charges you for a government service. for example, if you file an application for a passport, the government charges a fee. but if you buy a pack of cigarettes the extra charge imposed by the government is a tax. just like what this budget is proposing for airline passengers. say it all together now: tax

for the record, i'm not necessarily against this new airport security tax. there are actually plenty of things in the budget that i think are dreadful ideas (like eliminating amtrak), and this is not one of them. but i do think it's funny how the president just can't get himself to say the T-word. as if lying about it is somehow better.