THE HOUSE OVERLOOKS GULF-SHORE LIQUOR STORES

As most of you have likely heard, the House of Representatives passed a bill giving $7.1 billion in tax-relief to the hurricane damaged Gulf Coast. Sounds good, right? Well yeah, until you get to the part where they specifically excluded liquor stores along with casinos, massage parlors, golf courses, racetracks, tanning stores, and probably anything else deemed decadent by the Republican dominated House. Never mind the fact that suppliers and distributors have been contributing almost $15 million to mainly Republican congressional campaigns. Do donations not count for anything? Many conservatives wanted the exclusions believing that helping those damaged businesses would be “virtually impossible to defend” while other arenas like food stamps and student loans saw major spending cuts. "This is horrible tax policy," said Frank Coleman, spokesman for the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States. "Many small, family-run liquor stores lost everything in the hurricanes. This is just piling on."