AN INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY EDITORIAL ON the Philly blogger-tax plan: “We would concede that Philadelphia might have a case if it spent money in some way to protect or facilitate blogging and bloggers. But it does neither. Bloggers aren’t driving on city streets. They don’t need fire or police service. Nor do they require, as some say a for-profit business does, a bureaucracy of regulators, inspectors or paper pushers who need compensating. They don’t even create trash that has to be collected. They can get by on their own. Philly bloggers, as well as tax watchdogs and speech guardians outside the city, are understandably upset. If city hall can tax speech, it can tax anything. What — and who — is next? Should Philadelphia get away with this, other cities will surely follow. Constitutional rights are small hurdles for covetous lawmakers.”

Related thoughts from Dan Riehl.