Internet Sales Tax May Get Amazon.com's Support (TechNews.com): "The sales tax project has drawn bipartisan support among lawmakers as well, even from traditionally anti-tax Republican lawmakers who say it's not fair that main street stores are required to charge sales taxes while their online competitors are not. "

Umm, possibly "Main Street Stores" need to pay taxes because they use and require lots and lots of services, such as police and fire, and require public parking and sidewalks, and that sort of thing. For the most part, online retailers already collect sales taxes on sales to the states in which they reside. So, for instance, Amazon collects sales tax in Washington State, and LL Bean does very well by the state of Maine.

This, my friends, is the sin of coveting, plain and simple. The government wants this money for its own sake, not because the money goes to pay for things demanded of the community by the retailers. Online commerce creates a great deal of revenue indirectly, by increasing the number of and wages for delivery men, to take one example. Employees of retailers pay income taxes. Goods manufactured and sold within the US via ecommerce are more competitive in many cases than other US made goods, because the distribution costs are paid entirely and directly by the consumer, and so the price-point competitiveness is improved. But over the last few decades government has decided more and more (excepting only 8 years or so in the 1980s) that your money is yours only at the toleration of the government, and only after it has taken what it desires.