If you haven't already guessed, I'm talking about Congress. When it comes to providing a guiding light on complex issues, this collection of 535 candles in the wind can't match the glow of a lone bug zapper. A couple months back, the House and the Senate endorsed a bill that would help state prosecutors enforce local liquor restrictions against online retailers. In so doing, they seemed to be saying the Net wouldn't be allowed to undermine the democratic authority of state and local laws. Morton Downey Jr. Before the final version of that bill has even passed, Congress is preparing to abandon its common sense approach in the coming debate over enforcing sales tax laws online.
Nobody likes sales tax, of course, but everyone has to pay it.
As you might expect, this happens about as often as teen-agers turn on National Public Radio. This means cities and states stand to lose lots of tax revenue as more people start shopping online. Local stores, meanwhile, will continue losing customers to the Web because they have to comply with sales tax laws their online competitors can evade. Congress could resolve this unfair situation by forcing online retailers to collect sales tax. Instead, it passed a law last year banning new Net-related taxes for three years and creating a committee to study the issue.