It looks like election year in the city is getting more interesting by the week, now that a former leader of the City Council, Thomas Ognibene of Queens, plans to challenge Mayor Bloomberg in a Republican primary over Republican principles. Mr. Ognibene has these principles – of limited government, modest taxation, and small business – clearly in mind. Not only is Mr. Bloomberg clouded on them at times, but his problems are compounded by the sense of many New Yorkers that their billionaire mayor doesn’t care about people like them or, at the least, fails to understand their problems, a point underscored by last month’s Marist College poll.

Both these drawbacks are perfectly captured in Mr. Bloomberg’s excesses in respect of the excise on cigarettes. To ring in the new year, the mayor had his minions at the Office of Tax Enforcement send out some 3,700 letters to smokers who, in the past two and a half years, have engaged in the perfectly legal practice of purchasing cigarettes online. The mayor’s gumshoes are seeking the cigarette taxes that online retailers don’t collect from consumers. Some tax bills, according to reports, reach $9,900. The letters warn that if Mr. Bloomberg doesn’t get his money within 30 days, the Finance Department may charge interest along with penalties of $200 for each carton.

Not since New York State troopers fetched up writing down license plate numbers at Ikea in the tax haven of New Jersey have voters been treated to such a ham-fisted attempt by a politician to reach into their wallets and take their money. “The tone of the letter is so threatening. I didn’t even know I was doing anything wrong,” Manhattan resident Sheila Hansen, who received a demand for $900 in back taxes, told the Daily News. “How dare they ask for $900 in 30 days? Do they think I’m [Mayor] Bloomberg?” If she doesn’t pay, Ms. Hansen’s penalty could reach $12,000. “It might be like a quarter for him, but it’s not a quarter for me,” she said of Mr. Bloomberg.

Another target of Mr. Bloomberg’s crackdown, a utility worker from Queens who was interviewed by the New York Post, faces a $1,005 bill for purchases made since July 2002. The worker, Andrew Hoffer, hopes to work out a payment plan. “I had a feeling of violation,” he told the Post. “Internet purchases are traditionally considered private and secure. This just doesn’t seem right to me at all.” Mr. Bloomberg, for his part, says he has no sympathy for those New Yorkers now faced with his hefty tax bills. “The law says you have to pay taxes,” the mayor told reporters last week. It seems to be a case of the law being the law but also, as the famous phrase puts it, an ass – and an ass with its teeth on your wallet.

To make matters worse going into an election, the city’s finance commissioner, Martha Stark, is threatening that this is going to be a way of life for those purchasing cigarettes over the Internet under a Bloomberg administration. She calls the cigarette tax crackdown “part of a new, long-term effort.” She says the city must “level the playing field” for New York’s brick-and-mortar vendors who must collect the tax directly from consumers. The obvious way to level the playing field would be to reduce the excise charged on cigarettes in bodegas so it is equal with the Internet. One can’t escape the impression that equity has little to do with it and that, in truth, the Bloomberg administration was simply being opportunistic, after discovering the names of some city smokers during its lawsuit against three Internet-based retailers.

Why stop there? To be consistent – and make sure the city doesn’t keep missing out on “lost revenue” – the mayor would have to start collecting use taxes on all sorts of goods New Yorkers buy outside his jurisdiction to avoid taxes here. That’s what Governor Cuomo was trying to do 11 years ago in New Jersey’s Ikea parking lot – that is, just before New Yorkers voted him out of office. If the Bloomberg administration were really interested in leveling the playing field, the mayor would need to add thousands and thousands of troops to his army of tax collectors. For no matter what they sell, online vendors without a physical presence in New York can’t be forced to charge New York taxes to their consumers.

No one, certainly not these columns, wants to encourage New Yorkers to break the law. But the fact is that New Yorkers don’t want the mayor policing their out-of-state shopping, and tax revolts at election time are as American as apple pie. The mayor’s strategy is to try to scare New Yorkers into turning over the tax themselves. “Mayor Bloomberg is watching you,” the Finance Department’s letters seem to say. It’ll make a terrific campaign slogan. The mayor’s camp sneers at the idea that Mr. Ognibene might be able to deny him the Republican line, but surprises happen in politics. If one happens here, Mr. Bloomberg will still be able to run on the line of Lenora Fulani’s Independence Party. She loves taxes.