We live in a democracy, and when you have conditioned society to assume everything is taxed, then yes, taxing vices like alcohol and tobacco are easier to stoma

We live in a democracy, and when you have conditioned society to assume everything is taxed, then yes, taxing vices like alcohol and tobacco are easier to stomach. I would be less opposed to it if every single dollar extracted from the vice was put to whatever society decided to do about the vice (police, treatment, etc.). But taxing the vice is a source of revenue for the ever-expanding state, and therefore society doesn’t actually want the vice to stop, rather they want it to grow in order to expand their revenue. I don’t want the government to fund anything a citizen wouldn’t fund themselves. If it’s useful, then someone will make a business to provide it. If it’s desirable without the profit motive, then allow a charity to develop. I see charity funded by free citizens as a form of market solution. What drives me crazy are giant government bureaucracies that are totally removed from the democratic process that fund things no one voted for, that we can never seem to defund.