Like What Ya Did There
Posted on May 16, 2008 at 12:05 pmThe Tennessee Democratic Part deftly melds Bob Corker’s admissions about his 2006 Senate campaign with the actions of the Tennessee Republican Party yesterday in a nifty little release:
Sen. Bob Corker today dubbed his own 2006 campaign advertisements against U.S. Rep. Harold Ford, Jr. “grotesque.” Now, do the junior and senior senators from Tennessee have the courage to halt the Tennessee Republican Party’s deplorable tactics asked Tennessee Democratic Party Chairman Gray Sasser.
“TNGOP Chairwoman Robin Smith and company have tarnished the reputation of the entire state with their grotesque political attacks: they have perpetuated lies about a candidate’s religion, they have attacked a candidate’s wife, they have equated the war in Iraq to a religious crusade, and they have defied the request of Senator Lamar Alexander to remove at least one of those claims from their website,” Sasser continued.
“It’s high time for Senators Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander to put a stop to the Tennessee Republican Party’s shameful tactics; they are beneath the dignity of voters- Republicans, Democrats, and Independents- in the state of Tennessee.”
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Going Against The Way Things Go Down
Posted on at 9:25 amKatie Allison Granju wonders whether Bill Hobbs is making a mess of things by mixing his roles as insurgent neoconservative blogger with that of of his day job — Communications Director of the Tennessee Republican Party:
My guess is that state GOP insiders are getting increasingly uncomfortable with this stuff. After all, everyone knows there’s a role inside political parties and campaigns for the Karl Rove guy - that guy who quietly and stealthily drops the bombs on behalf of the party or campaign, without getting party leaders’ hands too dirty by tying their names directly to the attacks. But that guy generally keeps a very low profile. You probably don’t know his name, or even where his office is located. He’s the party hitman, and like all good hitmen, he keeps his head down and moves through crowds unnoticed.
Bill Hobbs certainly breaks the mold of the traditional party spokesman and there is no doubt that he has his detractors who hold true to the old ways but there is one thing you must admire about Hobbs: his stubborn resistance to conformity.
Let’s face it, most of us, in the face of criticism, when confronted by the disdain of the “powers that be”, will back down. We will relent. We will conform. We will adapt to the wishes of those more powerful than us.
Even if we believe we are doing right, even if we are confident that the path we have chosen is the one of ultimate success, that twinge of doubt along with the cacophony of criticism will cause our confidence to wilt. We will go with the flow, we will not buck. We will convince ourselves that the reward is simply not worth the risk.
There is a well-worn, traditional way to be a party spokesman. We all know what it is. Bill Hobbs knows what it is. But Hobbs, he has a different way. And when people tell him he is doing it wrong and that he cannot go against the “way things work” he says, “Screw that mess” and follows his own path.
Say what you want about the man’s ideology, say what you want about the man’s tactics, both of which may be abhorrent to you but what you cannot say is that the man lacks courage. Bill Hobbs has looked into the face of adversity and power and risked annihilation because he believes he has a job to do and he’s gonna do it, no matter what anyone says.
How many amongst us have done that? Not many, I imagine.
SEE ALSO:
Newscoma
Enclave
Crone Speaks
Southern Beale
Living By The Gun
Posted on May 15, 2008 at 6:52 amBill Hobbs reports on progress in “civil rights” in Georgia that has been denied Tennesseans:
Georgians with handgun carry permits will be able to carry their concealed guns on public transportation, in restaurants that serve alcohol and in state parks under legislation signed by Gov. Sonny Perdue today.
Similar legislation in the Tennessee was killed in the state House a few weeks ago. The fingerprints on the murder weapon belonged to House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh. Accomplices are all the allegedly pro-gun rights Democrats who elected him Speaker.
TNGOP Engages In “Class Warfare” Over Budget
Posted on May 7, 2008 at 2:39 pmGOP Communications Czar Bill Hobbs throws a little dust on the Governor for announcing employee layoffs for workaday bureaucrats while leaving his top dog political appointees’ pay raises intact:
“Upper management making out like bandits and getting lavish party facilities while the rank-and-file stand to lose everything.Gov. Bredesen promised voters he’d run Tennessee like a business. We didn’t know he meant Enron,” said Hobbs.
Revenue Commissioner Stands By iTunes Tax Legality Despite Letter Ruling Arguing The Contrary
Posted on May 6, 2008 at 11:05 amTerry Frank posts this morning that “the fat lady has not sung” when it comes to the iTunes tax. She asserts that the Tennessee Republican Party had not jumped the gun when they asserted that the tax on digital downloads was a new tax contained in the now introduced technical corrections bill. At issue is a March 12 letter ruling currently circulating in anti-tax circles issued by the Revenue Department’s legal counsel and approved by the Commissioner himself that would seem to contradict recent reports in the media that digital downloads are taxable in Tennessee since the start of the new year.
Two weeks ago, after a Waller, Lansden, Dortch and Davis email was posted online sounding the alarm of the new tax coming down the pike, it was subsequently pointed out that Apple and other online music retailers were already collecting taxes on music downloaded online.
At the time, Revenue Commissioner Reagan Farr stated to various media outlets that the Tennessee Republican Party and Waller Lansden were in error. The new technical corrections bill now before the General Assembly was not instituting a new tax but simply clarifying language in the Tennessee Annotated Code that already authorized the taxation of downloaded music.
The Commissioner explained that the tax was authorized by code changes in the previous year and that an iTunes song was considered “pre-written computer software” [T.C.A. §§ 67-1-102 (60)] that then “performs the task“[T.C.A. §§ 67-1-102 (17)] of playing on your iPod.
However, a March 12 letter ruling by the Revenue Commissioner [available here] would seem to tell a different story.
In the letter, the Revenue Commissioner and counsel state that while songs preloaded on machine sold to consumers are taxable, songs delivered electronically are not taxable:
Tenn. Code Ann. § 67-6-102(80) (Supp. 2007) 2 defines“tangible personal property” to include property that can be “seen, weighed, measured, felt, or touched.” For example, music sold on a compact disc, or CD, is subject to the sales and use tax because the music is sold on a tangible storage medium. Music purchased on a tangible storage medium has always been subject to the sales and use tax…
…Music is non-taxable only if it is delivered electronically. Accordingly, charges for the music services and packages provided by the Taxpayer that relate to music on a tangible storage medium are taxable as sales of tangible personal property, while charges related to music delivered electronically are not.
The letter, as is clearly stated on the document itself, is binding only for the specific case addressed. However, the arguments contained within and the code and definitions cited as to how digital downloads are to be taxed would seem to contradict the reasoning Commissioner Farr previously gave Post Politics as to why digital downloads have been taxable since January of this year.
In a letter to legislators obtained by P-squared, the president of the Software Finance and Tax Executives Council, Mark E. Nebergall, states:
We believe any out-of-state firm collecting sales tax on such sales does so in error and is likely, in the wake of the March Revenue Ruling, to stop collecting taxes on future sales and could seek tax refunds for erroneously collecting taxes on past sales. In fact, some SoFTEC members are in the process of implementing changes to their systems to stop collecting sales taxes on sales of downloaded products to Tennessee customers. Firms erroneously collecting sales taxes risk consumer class action lawsuits.
Commisioner Farr, when contacted by Post Politics explained that the March 12 letter ruling had been revoked. He could not say when the revocation had taken place but that the taxpayer in question had been notified and given ample time to adjust to the revocation.
“We have a six to eight month turn around on letter rulings and this specific ruling was drafted before the new changes took effect in January. It was modified shortly thereafter [but before revocation] to reflect the new law but before we had really taken a good look at the changes. It is unfortunate that the ruling was ever released.”
Any companies ceasing collection of tax based on this revocated letter ruling would be in error according to Farr. Farr went on to emphasize, revocation aside, that letter rulings are, in fact, not broadly applied documents to be used to interpret tax law by any party other than the taxpayer addressed.
The Department of Revenue releases two different types of rulings, Letter and Revenue. A Revenue ruling is the type of document that can be interpreted as Revenue department policy, a letter ruling cannot and should not be Farr explains.
Farr said there has been no Revenue ruling on the specific case of iTunes downloads but maintained that he feels “very comfortable” with his position that iTunes songs are prewritten computer software that performs a task and thus taxable.
SEE ALSO:
Bill Hobbs
As American As A Taco: TNGOP Praises Cinco De Mayo
Posted on May 5, 2008 at 11:42 amThe Tennessee Republican Party celebrates Cinco De Mayo as a reminder of the importance of protecting a peoples’ culture:
“Celebrating ethnic and cultural pride within the context of the American story is as American as baseball, apple pie - and tacos - and Cinco de Mayo has grown in popularity here as more Mexicans have decided to join the American story,” said Robin Smith, chairman of the Tennessee Republican Party. “We honor the national pride displayed on this day of festivity and the importance of protecting a nation’s heritage and culture in order to ensure its ongoing freedom.”
Of course, the Tennessee Republican Party hasn’t always been so high on expressions of ethnic and cultural pride.
In a press release, which was uniformly derided by Tennesseans of all political persuasions two months ago, the Tennessee Republican Party chastised Barack Obama for wearing ethnic garb when visiting a foreign land and chided his parent’s decision to give a young Barack Obama an Arabic middle name.
RELATED: TNGOP spokesman cites study reporting half of all Mexicans in America as illegal aliens.
SEE ALSO:
Sean Braisted
KAG
Fool Me Once…
Posted on April 25, 2008 at 6:23 pmOne of the interesting things that came out of yesterday’s iTunes tax revelation was that it was also revealed to a wider audience that the Department of Revenue apparently shares drafts of the “technical corrections bill” with a few good tax attorneys before sending it on to the legislature.
Bill Hobbs, for one, is not depending on one of those lawyers springing a leak again next year like it did this year:
A simple open-records request for copies of the draft should suffice next year to short-circuit the Revenue Department’s plan to craft new tax policy under the watchful eye of only a few hand-picked tax attorneys.
Tax policy proposals should be crafted in out in the open, where the public - who, after all, pay the taxes - can see what is happening.
Keyed Off On Tennessee’s Digital Download Tax
Posted on at 7:56 amBoth the City Paper and the Knoxville News Sentinel write up the TNGOP’s rallying cry to prevent a new digital download tax and the subsequent revelation that the tax is already being collected:
As for the confusion perhaps caused by the Tennessee Republican Party, spokesman Bill Hobbs said he doesn’t now “dispute” that iTunes sales are taxed.
Hobbs said he based his description on a memo from the law firm of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, which called the section of the technical corrections bill the “Digital Products/iPod tax.”
“It’s probably an unfortunate choice of a headline, but Waller Lansden called it that, and I just keyed off of what they wrote,” Hobbs said.
Click here for yesterday’s Post Politics report on the issue.
No New Tax: Tennessee Already Collecting Revenue From Digital Media Downloads
Posted on April 24, 2008 at 3:11 pmIt turns out that the Tennessee Republican Party and the rest of the anti tax crew were a little late to the party on this digital tax scare. Tennessee currently taxes digital downloads, such as songs from iTunes, and have been since the beginning of this calendar year.
A Waller Landsen email yesterday on the technical correction bill currently being drafted by the government started people talking when Instapundit linked to a section in the draft called the Digital Products/iPod Tax.
The Bill contains sweeping legislation that would subject downloaded sales of digital media, including music videos, motion pictures, news and entertainment programs, music, ringtones, electronic books, etc. to the retail sales tax. Under current law digitally delivered goods are not taxable unless delivered in a tangible form.
The Tennessee Republican Party, in the form of Bill Hobbs, whipped up a frenzy about this impending doom both in a press release and a blog post warning folks about the long reach of Johnnie Q. Tax in their digital library. Turns out however that tax is already being collected on your downloads as noted by Nashville Is Talking.
Department of Revenue Commissioner Reagan Farr tells Post Politics that the State of Tennessee began to collect revenue from digital media starting January 1, 2008. Companies such as Apple are currently charging taxes on downloads to consumers in the state of Tennessee and the Department of Revenue is collecting them.
The Department does not have any numbers for the amount of tax being collected on downloads because the Department keeps no records on line items, an iPod bought in the Apple Store in Green Hills is no different than a song downloaded by a Tennessean via iTunes.
Because Apple maintains property or payroll in the state they are subject to the sales tax where a company like Amazon, who does sell traditionally tangible products to Tennesseans, is not subject to tax.
Farr concedes that even though current law subjects downloads to sales tax that the code “needs cleaning up.” Right now, for instance, the Department of Revenue makes no distinction between tangible personal property and intangible personal property.
Downloads are considered tangible personal property by the State. According to Farr, under Tennessee code an ITunes song is considered “pre-written computer sofware” [T.C.A. §§ 67-1-102 (60)] that then “performs the task“[T.C.A. §§ 67-1-102 (17)] of playing on your iPod. It is thus taxable under Tennessee law.
Farr looks forward to fashioning a more modern definition of software that makes makes clear that downloaded songs, books, or movies, while intangible, are the digital equivalent of tangible personal property.
UPDATE: A statement and a linkable PDF timeline of the changes in the code that resulted the tax levy beginning this year, courtesy of the Department Of Revenue.
SEE ALSO:
Rex Hammock
The City Paper
Tom Humphrey
Terry Frank
Glen Harness
TNGOP Updates
The Government Wants To Tax Your IPOD?
Posted on at 9:46 amBill Hobbs warns us that the state may be set to start taxing activities most of us take for granted:
Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen’s Department of Revenue is planning to tax your iTunes downloads, and all other digital media you purchase online and download including music videos, movies, news and entertainment programs, music, ringtones and electronic books. Under current law digitally delivered goods are not taxable unless delivered in a tangible form - if you buy software online and receive it digitally, there’s no sales tax, but if you also request and receive a copy of the software on a disk, there is.
SEE ALSO:
P-Squared
Terry Frank
Pith
TNGOP
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You Wanna Talk About Adultery? Are You Sure?
Posted on April 23, 2008 at 7:45 amCommenting on his personal blog, TNGOP Communications Director Bill Hobbs states that he cannot believe that Rep. Stacey Campfield didn’t make a very obvious retort when berated before the Judiciary Committee during discussion over a bill allowing men to opt out of child support payments for children determined not to be theirs:
Briley, you’ll recall, was the very married father of four who, according to press reports, cheated on his wife and had an affair with the Tennessee Trial Lawyers Association lobbyist while she was shepherding legislation through the House Judiciary Committee that Briley chaired.
Campfield managed to hold fire and not blister Briley with the response Briley so richly deserved, but I’d have loved to have heard him respond, “No, Rep. Briley, I don’t believe adultery is ever appropriate. Do you?”
Is It Safe?
Posted on April 18, 2008 at 2:57 pmThe Tennessee Republican Party celebrates the fundraising success of its recruited from another district candidate for Congress while accusing the incumbent of already looking to the future:
“Lincoln Davis has his eye on the Governor’s Mansion its fancy new ballroom, not on the job of representing the people of his district,” said Bill Hobbs, communications director for the Tennessee Republican Party. “As a result, his fund-raising is lack-luster and his seat is not safe.”
A Rob Reversal
Posted on at 10:05 amBill Hobbs calls out Rep. Rob Briley for a bit of hypocrisy this morning.
It seems despite his protestations about public judicial selection committee meetings, the Representative from East Nashville sponsored a bill that Hobbs says would have done the opposite:
Briley’s defense of closed-door meetings for the commission is a flip-flop from last year, when he sponsored legislation - House Bill 1338 - that would have required all meetings of the Judicial Selection Commission to be open to the public.
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The End Of The Old Ideologies
Posted on at 7:02 amJim Grinstead reports feeling like there are no conservatives or liberals anymore, only men who seek to stir the pot.
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Post Politics: 14 April 2008 - Afternoon Edition
Posted on April 17, 2008 at 11:35 amSteering into the storm: Bill Hobbs unleashes yet another polemic press release concerning Barack Obama.
The risk of re-segregation: Issues of race color the student assignment in Metro.
If Nashville wants to build a new convention center, it will first have to shift at least $11 million dollars of expenses back to the city’s general fund – most of which currently subsidize the Sommet Center. But we’ll worry about that later.
Congressman Jim Cooper confronts the problem of separating the worthy and the unworthy potential seekers of assistance in shaping policy on the present housing crisis.
Putting baby in a corner: Two journalists say Phil Bredesen essentially gave up Congressman Lincoln Davis’s confidential thoughts on his superdelegate vote.
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Post Politics: 2 April 2008
Posted on April 8, 2008 at 9:38 amAl Gore confidant Roy Neel dismissed speculation that Gore might step up as a compromise candidate at a fractured Democratic Convention during a “Kitchen Cabinet” meeting of Nashville progressives.
Our Gannett-owned daily fell prey to a bit of April Fool’s mischief by a local progressive radio duo’s farcical press release about a joint venture with conservative talk maven Steve Gill.
Tennessee Republican Party spokesman Bill Hobbs was told to cough up $200 to procure a copy of a tape capturing the construction going on at the Governor’s Executive Residence. Department of Finance and Administration spokeswoman Lola Potter subsequently relayed to Hobbs that the state has no obligation to release the tape to him under open records laws as the tape is in the possession of the contractor.
Salemtown blogger Mike Byrd reports that police tell him that they are investigating alleged prostitution by residents of the Union Rescue mission.
Former School Board member Kay Brooks discusses the departure of incumbent Marsha Warden from the District 9 race for the board. Councilman Eric Crafton has picked up papers to run for that seat. Alan Coverstone, a blogger and an economics and government teacher at Montgomery Bell Academy, has also picked up the necessary papers to make the race.
Two bloggers from the left side of the aisle note and take issue with the appointment of an attorney who resides in Belle Meade, a satellite city not subject to Metro zoning laws, to the Metro Zoning Board of Appeals.
And finally, a blast from the past. While our Governor has as of late struck a pose as an impartial, uncommitted superdelegate in search of closure in the Democratic race for President, he did not always seem as such.
In 2005, Phil Bredesen had this to say about the imminent Hillary Clinton campaign for President:
“People love her or they hate her and I don’t know in the end how all that plays out. But I sure hope there are other people who would step forward.”
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