Public Comment Forum

From: The Seattle Times | Editorial

Cigarette smuggling continues to cost Washington state hundreds of millions in lost tax revenue each year. Lawmakers should consider ways to harness and capture some of these evaporating tax dollars.

By Seattle Times editorial board

The state of Washington continues to lose an astounding amount of tax revenue to a little-discussed problem: cigarette smuggling.

This type of tax evasion costs the state hundreds of millions a year. Yet it often fades into the background during budget debates, which can get held up by disagreements on how to spend smaller amounts of money.

From: Opednews.com

Going up in Smoke in Pakistan

By MAGDA LIPAN

There is enough evidence in public domain to show that the Islamist terrorist outfits, many of them based in Lahore, Peshawar, and Karachi, derive their financial muscle from the drug trade. Official patronage has been helping them to thrive and survive even as drug addiction has become what sedate Karachi daily, Dawn, terms as a silent epidemic.

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