Roy Blunt: “I thank my colleagues for recognizing me to make a few comments. I agree with everything that has been said. I believe…”

“I thank my colleagues for recognizing me to make a few comments. I agree with everything that has been said. I believe this is the fair thing to do. I think it is wrong for government to penalize some businesses over others. I think it is wrong, frankly, to have laws on the books that we know aren't being enforced. To have laws on the books that you know create law violators is the wrong thing to do. And frankly, in almost every State where--as Senator Durbin pointed out, in his State and my State, which is next door to his State, you are supposed to pay this tax. People just don't do it. I think last year in Missouri we had about 300 people pay this tax in the entire State. I would bet, more than the collective tax they paid, that more than 300 people bought something over the Internet in the State of Missouri last year. So this is a tax that is on the books, it needs to be collected, and we ought to see what we can do to make that happen. States that don't have a sales tax don't have to collect it. States that don't want to participate don't have to participate. But with all of the technology now available, with the $1 million exemption for businesses that want to sell a few things over the Internet--or maybe they want to sell everything over the Internet, they just don't sell very much--I think the objections that are reasonable to this have been more than met.…”