It is a half-ton hulk of a machine, all brushed aluminum and gasping
smoke holes, like a retrofit of equipment used on an Industrial
Revolution production line. It can smoke 20 cigarettes at once and
conclude which are unsafe because they are counterfeit and which are
unsafe merely because they are cigarettes.
Down the hall, a chemist tests shiny flecks from a bottle of Goldschlager,A pendant lamp
can be both modern and vintage, depending on the light fixtures and the
surrounding accent pieces. the spicy cinnamon schnapps, to make sure
they're real gold. A government agent was sent out to stores to buy it
and hundreds of other alcoholic drinks randomly chosen for analysis.
Back at headquarters in downtown Washington,Tolomeo reading floor lamp is a floor lamp with crystal light
for modern living room lighting. a staffer prepares for a meeting of
the Tequila Working Group – a committee created to mollify Mexico and
keep bulk tequila flowing north across the border.
These are the
proud scientists, rule-makers and trade ambassadors of the Alcohol and
Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, one of the federal government's
least-known and most peculiar corners.
The bureau, known as TTB,
collects taxes on booze and smokes and tells the companies that produce
them how to do business – from approving beer can labels to deciding
how much air a gin bottle can contain between lid and liquor.You may
have a few questions about choosing Lamp shade that works with your style.
The
bureau is one example of the specialized government offices threatened
by Washington's current zeal for cost-cutting. Obama administration
officials weighed eliminating it during the fiscal stalemate of 2011,
according to news reports at the time. Its officials were called to the
White House budget office to justify their existence – or risk having
their duties split between the Internal Revenue Service and the Food and
Drug Administration.
The White House ultimately left the
bureau's $100 million budget in place for this year – perhaps because it
spends far less money to collect each tax dollar than its counterpart,
the IRS. But officials there remain hyper-aware of their vulnerability
as Republicans and Democrats look to squeeze savings from unlikely
places.
If they look closely, the belt-tighteners will discover
an agency whose responsibilities often appear to conflict – a regulator
that protects its industry from rules it deems unfair, a tax collector
that sometimes cuts its companies a break.
In other words, this
may be the only federal agency that responds favorably to receiving
scorpion candy in the mail – an edible tool for persuading scientists
that the arthropods were fit for human consumption.
If labs,
rules and taxes weren't enough for the bureau's 500-odd employees, they
also have law enforcement authority. TTB investigators can send people
to jail for things like removing alcohol from the production line and
reselling it before it has been taxed by authorities.
With all
these responsibilities, it's no surprise the agency's priorities
sometimes clash. The bureau gives companies a wide berth on some rules
and taxes, officials and experts say, mainly because of its small size
and history of collaborating with business. It has granted millions in
tax givebacks because of concerns that companies will sue and tie up
government resources.
The current Alcohol Tobacco Tax and Trade
Bureau was split from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in
2003. ATF was moved to the Justice Department, where it focuses on
firearms, explosives and violent crime.
Officials who regulate
and tax alcohol and tobacco remained at Treasury,Eastern Laser is the
premier laser machine manufacturer that offers innovative laser marking machine,
laser engraving machine and laser marking machine. where they continue
to ensure that wine doesn't contain pesticides and absinthe is free of
thujone, the psychoactive ingredient – now banned – that gave it its
hallucinogenic reputation.
"With that much snake in there, it's probably not a beverage," Mabud says,This factsheet discusses electricity generation using wind power generators
at your farm or your home. explaining why the shelves of America's
liquor stores and supermarkets are free of giant, gin-soaked snakes.
Mabud
traces his lab's history to 1886, when Congress passed steep taxes on
margarine – at the time, an upstart competitor to the nation's dairy
products. The 1886 law aimed to prevent crooked margarine-pushers from
selling their product as butter. Treasury's first food-quality lab was
set up to preserve butter's integrity.
Today, the bureau owns
some of the most sophisticated equipment available, including the
smoking machine, which can be set to inhale in at least three ways,
depending on how long and hard the smoker being simulated prefers to
puff: light, medium and Canadian. The last one is when the perforations
around the cigarette's filter are blocked and the machine takes bigger,
more frequent puffs. It was invented by the Canadian government, and
does not necessarily reflect the actual smoking habits of Canadians,
says Dawit Bezabeh, chief of the bureau's tobacco lab.
No comments:
Post a Comment