Shocker: Fannie Mae PR Flak Behind Byron Dorgan’s Proposed Tax On Tourists

Makes sense. As Common Sense North Dakota has been pointing out with those radio ads North Dakotans have been hearing (you know, the ones that got so under the skin of the state Democrat party), Dorgan was a recipient of a significant amount of Fannie Mae campaign contributions. It’s not at all surprising that Dorgan would be working with an old buddy from Fannie Mae to create yet another welfare program for rent-seeking corporations.

A former Freddie Mac public relations guru who helped generate the mortgage meltdown that sent the U.S. economy into a tailspin last year is behind this year’s campaign by Walt Disney, Anheuser Busch, American Express, Orbitz and other corporate heavyweights to charge foreign travelers and U.S. taxpayers to subsidize advertising for their already immensely profitable industry.
Heart of the proposal is a $10 per-entry fee charge on foreign visitors to the U.S., with up to $100 million of the resulting revenue being used to fund a new entity known as the Corporation for Travel Promotion (CTP) associated with the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Taxpayers would put up $10 million in start-up funding for the CTP and its board of directors would be named by the Secretary of Commerce, drawn from travel industry executives. The Commerce Department would get 25 new employees and an $80 million boost to its personnel budget as a result.
For camouflage, the proposal allows the tourism industry to hold a voluntary referendum whether it is to be assessed a “matching” contribution of 20% of the entry fees collected. That would mean smaller tourism industry members who cater to domestic visitors would subsidize the biggies who cater to foreign visitors.

As the nation struggles with a recession, as Americans are already facing big future tax hikes to pay for the debt and deficits Obama and the Democrats have already run up this year, and as Democrats push a massive new tax on everything with the cap and trade carbon tax (not to mention a massive new government health care program that will add to our tax/debt burden) Dorgan wants subsidize the advertising budgets of Disney and American Express?
Wonderful.
Something tells me that this bill won’t be something Dorgan brags about when he inevitably dons the flannel shirt to come back to North Dakota and campaign next year.