Because they are our Future. Anyway, this was buried on page 4C, under the weather forecast. Judge Tracy McCooey has decided that the phone company will just have to keep on collecting a fee from all of its customers in order to pay for telephone service aiding the deaf and blind. The only difference is, now that money will go not to telephone service for the deaf & blind—their equipment is all paid up, thanks to careful management—but to the education fund. And this makes good sense, because the education fund sure needs that money! So just shut up, okay?
Says Jay Love (R-Montgomery), who sponsored the brilliant bill transferring the money: “I certainly felt like when we passed that bill that it would withstand any legal challenge, and I’m glad the judge agreed.” Uh-huh. I can’t imagine why the PSC even sued.
The possibilities here are limited only by the human imagination, guys. How about…a fee added to all grocery bills, to pay for those electric wheelchair carts for the disabled—except we’ll use it to pay for court clerks. Or a energy conservation study fee added to your electric bill—hey, that could pay for prison expansion! This is going to revolutionize taxation in Alabama, already the lowest-taxed state in the country. With any luck, we can put off actually addressing our financial shortfall and developing a sensible, fair tax system to deal with it…well, maybe forever.