"It is the sense of the House of Representatives that Congress should not impose any new burdensome or unfair tax collecting requirements on small online businesses, which would ultimately hurt the economy and consumers in the United States," according to the text of the nonbinding resolution.

The resolution is aimed at countering a bill offered by Rep. Bill Delahunt, D-Mass., that would close a loophole from a 1992 Supreme Court decision that said retailers are not required to collect sales taxes from customers in states where they do not have a physical presence. It would allow states who joined a multi-state compact aimed at simplifying state tax rates and rules to mandate that online and catalog retailers collect sales taxes from remote sales.

Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., is working on a bill similar to Delahunt's measure and is hoping to attract bipartisan support for the measure before introducing it, a spokeswoman said.

"New Hampshire's small businesses and entrepreneurs already have to compete with giant retail chains selling cheap foreign imports," Hodes said in a statement. "The last thing they need is a new tax that will increase costs, expand regulations, and drive them out of business."

New Hampshire itself doesn't impose sales taxes, though online businesses based in the state could be required to collect taxes from customers who live in states with sales taxes under Delahunt's bill, a Hodes' aide noted. On Hodes' claim that the bill would impose a "new" tax, an aide to Delahunt disputed this, saying it only would ensure that online firms collect the same state sales taxes that brick-and-mortar retailers collect now.

Hodes' resolution was offered on the same day that Delahunt, along with Gov. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., and state Rep. Chris Rants, R-Iowa, former speaker of the Iowa House, held a news conference with representatives from state and local groups as well as the National Retail Federation to rally support for Delahunt's bill. They say states are set to lose an estimated $23 billion by 2012 in sales taxes because of the loophole.

Delahunt argued that the bill is "at its core about fairness, simple fairness." Rants added that states are "not asking the federal government for a handout" but the ability to "collect the taxes we're owed."

But Steve DelBianco, executive director of NetChoice, which includes online firms such as eBay, Expedia and Yahoo, said in a conference call that the $23 billion figure is exaggerated and that the cost and difficulty of having to collect sales taxes from thousands of jurisdictions and answer questions from customers and state tax officials would pose a significant burden for small online retailers in particular.

Huckabee currently ranks low among the Republican presidential candidates but has been gaining ground in some polls and has been the subject of favorable media coverage lately. Today, Club For Growth President Pat Toomey, a former House Republican from Pennsylvania, issued a "memo to the media" designed to remind people of Huckabee's record, and Internet taxes is one item in the memo.

This is the last item on the list, but it's there nonetheless: "Internet Taxes, 2004: Huckabee opposed a congressional moratorium on state taxation of Internet access (Bond Buyer, 02/24/04)."

Under current law, the prohibition is set to expire Thursday. Lawmakers voted 402-0 to add seven years to the moratorium -- more than double the three-year periods approved in 1998, 2001 and 2004 -- and to clarify the services covered under the statute.

The action came five days after the Senate voted to expand the four-year moratorium that the House had passed earlier this month. "It's high time that Congress passes this important legislation and gets it to the president's desk for his signature," said Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas.

Read this afternoon's edition of Technology Daily for more details on today's debate.

There are just two days left until the current Internet tax moratorium expires. Collectively, until it is extended, we will all have to endure more bad Halloween jokes predicting the looming specter that awaits us if Congress doesn't complete its work.

But this issue isn’t a joke. Extending the moratorium is a global competitiveness issue. The Internet must remain free of regulatory barriers that could adversely impact our U.S. companies as they try to compete internationally.

The legislation passed by the Senate on Thursday night is an improvement over the previously passed House legislation. First, it's a seven-year extension versus a four-year extension. And second, the Congressional Research Service voiced concerns that the House-passed language didn't adequately exempt certain services, like instant-messaging, from taxation.

The leaders in the Senate, and also Sens. John Sununu, R-N.H., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., are to be commended for bringing this legislation to a vote on Thursday night. Now the House needs to pass this bill and send it to the president.

Platt is the vice president of government and political affairs for TechNet.

The Senate worked its traditional magic of compromise Thursday as it passed legislation to extend the Internet Tax Freedom Act for seven years.

As it did so, it attempted to address the ridiculous assertion of Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., that e-mail and like services are likely to come under attack by greedy state and local tax authorities. Okay, a compromise is a compromise, but when you look at the language it may be more restrictive than intended. It's a solution looking for a problem.

Sen. John Sununu, R-N.H., passionately believes that the Internet Tax Freedom Act should be made permanent. On that point we are crystal clear. He was willing to compromise on a seven-year extension to move the matter forward and protect Internet access from taxation. Good for him.

But, a seven-year extension puts the matter squarely in an election-year cycle. Is that a good idea? Shorter is better.

The U.S. House will have to carefully examine the Senate's work and make some choices between the two bills. Local government fully supports the House-passed bill and would like to see that prevail, but this is Washington, D.C., and we all know that something will get worked out.

Hopefully, it's in the best interest of all the people, and the state and local governments that represent them.

Arnold is the deputy legislative director for the National Association of Counties.

Remember Bill 602b? That legislation, which you probably heard about in a message forwarded to you by a well-meaning relative or friend, would have placed a five-cent tax on e-mails.

It was a hoax, of course. No such bill ever existed. But now comes word that the Internet tax bill just passed by the House actually would allow such taxes to be imposed.

According to a Congressional Research Service memo sent yesterday to Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., the bill’s definition of "Internet access" would allow taxation of "many more products and services" than the existing moratorium. Including, CRS said, taxes on e-mails.

As the days tick down to Halloween -- and the formal expiration of the Internet tax moratorium -- there’s a strong feeling of deja vu in Washington. It’s like we’ve all been through this before.

We have. In 2004. And 2001. The periodic last-minute extension of the moratorium has become a regular feature of Washington’s political life. Which leads many to wonder: Why not just make the tax ban permanent?

The arguments for restrictions on state and local taxes are strong (they are summarized in a new Heritage Foundation paper just released this week). But still, policymakers seem reluctant to take the plunge toward permanence, with the House voting last week for yet another temporary extension.

Opponents -- such as Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander -- have argued strenuously against anything more long-lasting. With the Internet changing so quickly, it doesn’t make sense to write Internet tax policy into stone, they argue.

But it’s hard to believe that many are actually convinced by this. After all, with nine years’ experience with the moratorium, this is hardly an experimental policy. And Congress always keeps the option of changing things if the needs arise. Just look at the amount of tinkering that goes on with the rest of the tax code.

The bill, H.R. 3678, would bar states and localities from imposing such fees until Nov. 1, 2011. The dissenting votes were cast by Democrat Anna Eshoo of California, who authored a bill for a permanent ban, and Republican Michael Turner of Ohio.

A spokesman for Turner confirmed late in the day that his boss supports the bill and accidentally voted "no" on the legislation. "He has to go to the House floor and correct the record," said the staffer, who called the accident "regrettable."

Turner may have been distracted by a particularly busy day on Capitol Hill. He appeared at a midday ceremony to honor an Eagle Scout, whose flag request led to the Architect of the Capitol reversing his policy and deciding to allow "God" on flag certificates.

Bravo Rep. Anna Eshoo! She was just on the House floor saying that the House of Representatives could do better.

Rep. Eshoo has led the bipartisan charge to permanently extend the Internet tax moratorium on Internet access taxes, and prevent the imposition of duplicative and discriminatory taxes on e-commerce. If this extension were allowed to expire, broadband penetration in the United States would likely suffer.

TechNet member companies know that our country must strive to maintain a competitive landscape that allows their quick response to address global challenges. Keeping the Internet free of regulatory barriers to competition is important for our competitiveness. If Eshoo's bill were to be called up -- which we would strongly support -- it would no doubt pass by huge margins, as it did in previous votes in the House.

That being said, the moratorium expires on November 1. The high-tech sector would rather have an extension than risk the moratorium expiring. The members of the House Judiciary Committee are to be commended for moving this legislation forward.

It is our hope that the U.S. Senate will act quickly on this bill and then send it to the president for his signature before the moratorium expires.

Platt is the vice president of government and political affairs for TechNet.

It was interesting to listen to the debate over H.R. 3678 on the House floor this morning because the arguments for a permanent ban on Internet taxes were so shallow and misinformed.

The bill under consideration does three important things: It is clear, it is flexible, and it does no harm. It’s clear because the new definition more accurately reflects the Internet of today, not the Internet of 1998. It is flexible because we cannot predict the Internet of 2011 and we need the ability to review that new world at that time. It does no harm because it does not remove existing taxes that generate millions of dollars for the states that were grandfathered (there are very few local jurisdictions that impose such taxes).

Per the debate this morning, there is no evidence that taxes on Internet access have had any effect on adoption of broadband. Does anyone really believe that an additional dollar on a $30 bill from an Internet access provider is going to keep customers from getting the service?

The world of the Internet is about NOW, and decisions about investment in the Internet or physical plant to provide access, or the services carried over the Internet are not going to be affected by taxes on access even if they were imposed.

State and local government associations have shown a willingness to compromise on this matter and negotiate with telecom interests over the definition of Internet access. They have moved away from an insistence in eliminating the moratorium outright. This bill gives all of us a chance to revisit this in a few years and make better choices for the future.

Arnold is the deputy legislative director for the National Association of Counties.

We're calling the feature Net Tax Talk, and the idea is to engage our audience in a virtual debate about one of the hottest technology-related items on Congress' agenda at the moment.

Consider former Mercury News columnist Dan Gillmor the inspiration for this feature. A few years ago, he wrote a book called "We The Media" and that gave voice to the idea that readers actually know more than we journalists do. That couldn't be more true than at an inside-the-Beltway publication like Technology Daily, where our readers are key players in the stories we write.

That being the case, we have decided to open the blog so those sources can go beyond the snippets of insight and wisdom from them that we are able to share in our regular editions.

The Internet tax moratorium is set to expire Nov. 1, and as Congress debates whether to extend it four, six or eight years, to make it permanent, and to extend or curtail certain exemptions, we will be asking stakeholders in that debate to share their thoughts here.

We've reached out to a few potential guest bloggers already -- the first will go online later today -- but others are welcome. If you are a player in this debate and have some insights or opinions to share, you can contact me at dglover@nationaljournal.com.

We're looking forward to taking this debate about the Internet to the medium that inspired it. -- Danny Glover, Editor