"One Of The Happiest Places In The World" -- Unless You Chew Tobacco
Bhutan has the reputation as "one of the happiest places in the world." Meanwhile, Bhutan just jailed a monk for three years for carrying $2.50 worth of tobacco without paying the duty.
I think tobacco chewing is pretty disgusting and I despise tobacco smoking. I especially hate breathing in tobacco smoke. But, if you want to smoke and you aren't directing your smoke into my lungs or my living space, and if I don't have to pay for your health care after you get emphysema and/or lung cancer (this is a fantasy at the moment, that the rest of us wouldn't have it socked to us), have at it!
The story, from AFP:
Sonam Tshering was caught in January carrying 48 packets of chewing tobacco which he said he had bought in India before travelling back home to the Himalayan kingdom.Bhutan banned the sale of tobacco in 2005 and tightened up its law further last year to combat smuggling, requiring consumers to provide valid customs receipts for their cigarettes.
An eight-page judgment from a district court in the capital Thimphu said that Tshering had violated the Tobacco Control Act of Bhutan 2010 because he had not paid duty for the tobacco.
The Kuensel newspaper and the Bhutan Observer said that the judge opted for the minimum punishment, a three-year prison sentence.
"I should be punished, but the penalty could have been lighter, as I wasn't aware about the act," said a tearful 23-year old Tshering afterwards, according to Kuensel.
In the words of some ancient legal doctrine, ignorance of the law is no excuse.
In the words of Amy Alkon, the more laws you pass, the easier it is to jail innocent people who pose no danger to society.
via ifeminists
Where I live, we have sky high tobacco taxes (so I've pre-paid my medical care). A tobacco farmer got pinged here a while ago for smoking his floor sweepings - literally - after he'd sold his crop. The charge was tax evasion, as I recall he got fined something like $50k for the kilo or so of tobacco they found in his house. And that wasn't punitive, just the tax assessed plus interest.
Yes, I get the argument that if they didn't do that lots of farmers would "accidentally" tear bales and so on - but he wasn't selling it to anyone. Seemed like a witchhunt to me.
The worry is we actually have a thriving black market in "chop-chop", loose unprocessed tobacco, estimated at about 5% of the market. Bloody awful stuff some of it is too, but it's cheap. When you get *legal* drugs being sold under the counter, maybe the regulations and taxes are a bit tight?
Ltw at March 6, 2011 4:26 AM
A tobacco farmer got pinged here a while ago for smoking his floor sweepings - literally - after he'd sold his crop. The charge was tax evasion, as I recall he got fined something like $50k for the kilo or so of tobacco they found in his house. And that wasn't punitive, just the tax assessed plus interest.
No way. Where do you live? Bhutan II?
Amy Alkon at March 6, 2011 8:06 AM
Bhutan is one of the happiest places on earth? Oh yeah, it's BusinessWeek that wrote that.
Those 80,000 people in Southern Bhutan who disappeared in the 90's must have been the unhappy ones.
Eric at March 6, 2011 9:01 AM
No way. Where do you live? Bhutan II?
Australia - generally a nice place, but our government does love its sin taxes. $18 for a 25 pack of smokes now.
Ltw at March 6, 2011 2:38 PM
I always wonder if Bhutan is so happy, then why are there so many Bhutanese immigrants in my neighborhood? According to stats I saw in the local paper, most of them are here for "economic opportunities" or "political reasons."
Melissa at March 6, 2011 5:15 PM
When they said "Ignorance of the law is no excuse", the Jews had not much more than tradition and the 10 commandments.
They didn't have 40,000 federal laws, not to mention state and local regulations and laws.
Now ignorance of the law is the norm, not the exception. Moreover, case law is referred to as "making new law" for a reason, because precedent modifies the perception of how a law is interpreted.
The Miranda case for example, a Mexican illegal committed a rape while in the U.S. he was arrested, and the police lied and told him that he did not have certain rights. He confessed, was convicted, and a lawyer took up his "cause" if you will, and the end result was that the Miranda warning, named after a convicted rapist in the country illegally, was born.
It wasn't written into law that the police must advise people of their rights, it was mandated first by precedent.
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Side note, in the early history of preImperial Rome, the law was not made known to common people, in fact it was kept deliberately secret. A person would simply be arrested for violation of it when the authorized and informed persons observed a transgression. It took years of work to change that system and make the law known to the persons of the city. Most of these have not survived, but interestingly enough, it was apparently written in a Rhyming format so that all people could easily memorize the laws under which they lived.
Imagine having so few laws that we could memorize them with nothing more difficult than a nursery rhyme.
Robert at March 6, 2011 5:18 PM
Offtpoic but anyone else tried the new IEv9?
lujlp at March 6, 2011 9:36 PM
Ltw (if you're still returning to this thread): What are your taxes on gasoline in Oz? I saw an Australian movie some years ago, and the cars appeared to be smaller than in America.
mpetrie98 at March 7, 2011 3:08 PM
"Bhutanese immigrants in my neighborhood?" I have never seen any Bhutanese immigrants in America...only Nepalese.
I guess at the outset, it seems harsh, but we have no idea what prison involves in Bhutan and maybe he has a special type of prison for him because his offense is not a violent crime. For all you know, it might just involve him being made to pray even more than normal(maybe he has to pray continuously for 12 hours a day) because he is a monk(who wants tobacco :-)). Can't comment till all details are known.
Redrajesh at March 8, 2011 2:03 AM
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