Sales Tax Question – Moon of Alabama

July 13, 2007

Sales Tax Question

While I have been around the block a few times, this business model is new to me.

State Rep. Bob Allen (R), Florida, is co-chair of the dying McCain campaign. Via TPM a snippet from an arrest report where a plain-cloth police officer notes:

"Allen engaged me in a conversation in which it was agreed that he would pay me $20.00 in order to perform a ‘blow job’ on me."

So the customer is paid for receiving the service? Well, there are all kinds of dumb business ideas.

But which side pays the sales tax attached to such a transaction?

Posted by b on July 13, 2007 at 11:51 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Bernard,
quite a few people are asking the same question: So who’s the john ?

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 13 2007 12:13 utc | 1

traditional hookers must be shaking their heads and muttering about how dumb men are.
so the republican party is the party of enterprise and business?

Posted by: dan of steele | Jul 13 2007 12:29 utc | 2

@2
they are also desperately hoping this does not become a trend among female republicans.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 13 2007 13:20 utc | 3

And who gets to pay the income tax on it, or would a gift tax be more appropriate?

Posted by: Ensley | Jul 13 2007 13:48 utc | 4

Yes, it’s harder to figure out who picks up the tab and tax. We already know who got the tip.
groan.

Posted by: Bob M. | Jul 13 2007 14:13 utc | 5

“tax attached to such a transaction?”
If the condom don’t fit I recommend cellotape instead of tax.

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jul 13 2007 14:39 utc | 6

I guess you can deduct the cost of the condom and the tissue from the $20. Cost of doing business. Net profit is now $18, unless you buy one of those fancy ones with ribbing and ticklers.

Posted by: Ensley | Jul 13 2007 14:42 utc | 7

excess liquidity or not, its always smart to withhold
terrible, terrible !

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 13 2007 15:08 utc | 8

you guys are funny.

Posted by: annie | Jul 13 2007 16:16 utc | 9

Not to mention the cost of the emissions certificates…

Posted by: ralphieboy | Jul 13 2007 18:11 utc | 10

It brings to mind the tale told in “Hell’s Angels”, by the late Hunter Thompson: gay men would offer to pay the Angels for giving the Angels a blow job.
NOTE: to any Hell’s Angels reading this: I do not, repeat, do not intend to imply that Hell’s Angels are in any way Republicans, Congressmen, or especially Republican Congressmen.

Posted by: Peter VE | Jul 13 2007 18:25 utc | 11

Silly question, in general there is no sales tax on services in Floriduh!

Posted by: weasel | Jul 13 2007 19:52 utc | 12

in general there is no sales tax on services in Floriduh
Damn you weasel – you are trying to steal the joke … but there are some Florida Sales and Use Tax.
So if Rep. Bob Allen is spending revenue for his mouth use doesn’t he earn use taxes?

Posted by: b | Jul 13 2007 20:02 utc | 13

so now we know why he prefers to go by “bob”, eh?
and some people still say the rethugs all suck. heh.

Posted by: b real | Jul 13 2007 20:07 utc | 14

doesn’t he earn use taxes?
No he has to pay use taxes because he was “using” another person…
some people still say the rethugs all suck.
double entendre there b real?
aaaaaaaaaacccccccccckkkkkk

Posted by: Bea | Jul 13 2007 20:30 utc | 15

Hmmm… that would explain this:

“I remember little Bobby Allen,” recalled elderly Titusville resident Dolores Chalmers. “He used to give me $20.00 a week to mow my lawn.”

and this:

“It was the weirdest thing,” testified Jack Abramoff. “Bob Allen gave me $2,000 for his vote in support of the casino deal.”

Actually, the AP story seems to show that the buyer/seller relationship was oriented in the more usual way. However, the AP writer must have been snickering as he/she wrote, and Allen’s word choices as quoted in the story are, to say the least, intriguing:
Florida lawmaker plans to fight prostitution charge:

A Republican state lawmaker charged with offering to perform oral sex for $20 on an undercover male police officer vowed Thursday to defend himself in court and said he would not resign from office.
“I am filing a not guilty plea. I am vigorously going to fight this,” State Rep. Bob Allen, a co-chair of Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s campaign in Florida, said at a news conference. “I am not resigning my office because the people elected me and want me to do a good job. I am going to do a good job for them in finishing this term.”
Allen called his arrest “an ugly and unpleasant situation that has been thrust on me and my family.” The lawmaker had sponsored a failed bill that would have tightened the state’s prohibition on public sex.
[…]
Veteran’s Memorial Park was under surveillance when Allen was seen coming in and out of a restroom three times, said police Lt. Todd Hutchinson. Allen, 48, then approached an undercover officer and was arrested.
He has been charged with solicitation for prostitution, which has a maximum penalty of one year in jail. Brevard County jail officials said Allen posted a $500 bond.
While being transported to jail, Allen told WFTV Channel 9 that the situation was “a very big misunderstanding.”

“In fact,” exclaimed Allen, “it was the biggest misunderstanding I’ve ever seen!”
A police official, speaking off the record, admitted “Yeah, he really did offer money to perform the BJ on the officer. But we changed it around when we wrote up the charge. We figured, it’s humiliation enough for him to be exposed as yet another publicly moralistic Republican sex perv hypocrite, without being really, really stupid to boot.”

Posted by: OkieByAccident | Jul 13 2007 20:56 utc | 16

we really shouldn’t pick on bob when he’s down, ya’ll, and resist the obvious cheap sucker punch
any chance that this arrest is part of the tricks being played on mccain’s campaign? rove really f’cked w/ him last time he ran, remember. lots of things seem to be going wrong for him this week, including being outted for soliciting from the senate cloakroom & “electioneering on govt property”

Posted by: b real | Jul 13 2007 21:58 utc | 17

After all the recent (since 1994) Republican hypocrisies (Newt, Livingston, Hyde, Foley, and the porno of Scooter and of Lynne Cheney, just to list a few,) I think any prosecutor who wants a career boost should just investigate any Republican candidate of whatever crime they are railing against or running against. This clown ran and wrote against public lewd and lascivious acts, and homosexuality. So of course he’s hanging out in men’s rooms. Vitter in Loiusiana ran on one-man/one-woman marriage, and is getting Tail In Two Cities (ba-doom boom.) There’s also that preacher in Colorado, president of the Nat’l Evangelicals, who was getting hummers and meth on outcall. I think this trend establishes a reasonable suspicion over all Republicans, for more investigations.
But to get back to the original question of sales tax. I’m not sure an illegal act is taxable. But with Republican ‘free-marketeers’ all transactions should be legal, and no taxes should be paid.
When reviewing this case, I am, as always, reminded of a good line, this time, one by George Carlin:
“Selling is legal.
F***ing is legal.
Why isn’t selling f***ing legal?!”

Posted by: Cal Damage | Jul 13 2007 22:44 utc | 18

@ b real,
You’re right of course, this is beneath us. But it’s so richly deserved. I would be more willing to consider your “set up” theory if Jeb was still the governor…
@ Cal Damage,
Actually, many states have required that a tax stamp accompany sold marijuana (and other illicit drugs), thus allowing additional charges to be filed when the stamp was absent. In some states, these laws were successfully challenged on either double jeopardy or self-incrimination grounds.
On the Federal level:

At its inception the United States encouraged the agricultural production of hemp for its tensile strength in making cloth, ropes and sails and it wasn’t until after WW2 that the US stopped licensing farmers to grow hemp and 1969 before its taxation ended.
The federal government had originally included marijuana among the substances to be regulated by the Harrison Act of 1914, but opposition from the drug industry is generally believed responsible for its exclusion from the act. It seems marijuana was used by turn of the century drug companies in creams and ointments that they manufactured. There argument was that marijuana is non habit forming and thus not a narcotic.
The Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 classified marihuana a controlled substance and imposed an annual occupational tax on medical practitioners requiring them to display a Special tax stamp to prescribe marijuana products. Needless to say most doctors and dentists stopped using products covered by this law.

I wholeheartedly endorse your first observation! Given their position on profiling minorities, muslims, etc, how could Republicans possibly object in light of the clear correlation?

Posted by: OkieByAccident | Jul 14 2007 0:32 utc | 19

seized assets tied to illegal dealings typically end up on the auction block. But this $20 bill is in a docket for now awaiting trial. After which it presumably passes on to the state of Florida’s treasury.
this has to be the king of twenties ever. Its likely destined for early retirement on someones wall after it goes for an exorbitant price on ebay.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 14 2007 1:37 utc | 20

I think any prosecutor who wants a career boost should just investigate any Republican candidate of whatever crime they are railing against or running against
…or after
Republican State Rep. Exposed Himself to Female Employee, Chased Her Screaming, “Suck It”

Another Republican sex scandal. Rep. David Almond (R-NC) is forced to resign after a “personal complaint” comes to light.
At least this one, North Carolina Rep. David Almond had the decency to resign almost as soon as word of his inappropriate behavior came out. The North Carolina House Republicans are trying to keep his transgression a secret, but they did force him to resign. An insurance agent, Almond was serving his second term in the House. Impeccable DWT sources tell me he exposed himself in front of a female employee and chased her around the room yelling “Suck it, baby, suck it.” It is unclear whether or not there was physical contact. She filed a personnel complaint.

Posted by: b real | Jul 14 2007 4:15 utc | 21

b real @ 17, that is wicked!

Posted by: dan of steele | Jul 14 2007 7:13 utc | 22

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