Smoking Ban Smoke Screen

FoxNews ^ | 11/20/2003 | Radley Balko

[talleyman]

Notice to the Posting Police: I searched before posting and did not find this. (I also close my cover before striking.)

[Unicorn]

BTTT

[MissTargets]

bump

[Steely Glint]

This is just more selfish smoker nonsense. Wah, I should be able to smoke anywhere I want and to be able to damage the health of others against their will. Wah.

Try some facts. Smoking damages the public health. Public health is regulated. Every existing privately-owned bar and restaurant is America is ALREADY regulated by the government for public health reasons. Government regulation of places to eat and drink goes back to medieval times in Britain, and to early colonial times here in the U.S. (Yes, it predates Hillary, Hitler, and Communism.)
Yes, the government can legally stop people from damaging the public health by smoking in restaurants, just as it can stop the restaurant from serving rancid meat. Yes, it's had that authority for centuries. No, you DON'T have a right to damage the public health and to injure others with toxic and carcinogenic tobacco smoke. You want to kill yourself by being stupid, fine; improve the gene pool all you want. But smokers have no right to damage the health of others and thank God that the government is protecting the public health in this way.

Any true conservative knows that his rights end when they begin to injure others. No true conservative would support smoking in public places because it damages the health of non-smokers against their will.

Only the most selfish of people would ever demand the right to damage the health of others for the sake of their own self-destructive pleasure.

[Prodigal Son]

If I want to smoke in my private property that's none of your affair. If I own a private business and allow smoking inside, you need to go somewhere else- not force me to change what I do on my property.

[motzman]

From your profile...

I'm a disgruntled middle-aged VFW member with a limp who has a lifetime grudge against Communists and Leftists.

LOL!

[Phantom Lord]

Government regulation of places to eat and drink goes back to medieval times in Britain, and to early colonial times here in the U.S.

Did you know that in England anyone can open a restaurant without any type of license?

This is just more selfish smoker nonsense. Wah, I should be able to smoke anywhere I want and to be able to damage the health of others against their will.

No smokers say that, and no smoking ban opponents say that. We say that it should be the decision of the business owner (or property owner if the space is rented) if they allow smoking or not. And banning smoking in restaurants and bars is not the end of the line for the Nicotine Nazis.

Several towns have tried to ban smoking IN PRIVATE HOMES! Others have banned smoking OUTDOORS in some areas. NY State is currently considering a bill to ban smoking in YOUR CAR! And NY States current smoking ban does ban smoking in Company Cars!

Thats right. NY States smoking ban is so restrictive that if you are provided a company car by your employer it is ILLEGAL for you to smoke in it, even if your employer has no problem with you smoking in it.

[Katya]

Total BS...even the World Health Org report could not conclusively link second hand smoke to any disease. Of course the media will not discuss the WHO report, because banning the legal use of tobacco products is the new GUN control.

Go ahead DC, ban smoking. Virginia's bars will see a boon in business. Howard county and Prince Georges county will gain from Montgomery County, Maryland's smoke bans.
Who loses? The small non-chain bar owners and their employees. No one was frequenting these mostly blue collar establishments who didn't already smoke. The local papers are already reporting that they're laying off employees and some business's report they will probably close by the end of the year.

[Independentamerican]

Like playing God do you ?? I think that everyone should have a choice in the matter. There are several smokefree bars all over the state of MD. If you do not want to go to a place where you may be subjected to second hand smoke then just DONT GO !!. It is that simple. It would be different if non smokers did not have bars or restuarants that they could visit due to smokers but that is not the case. Whats next outlawing BEER or ALCOHOL in a bar. They pose dangers too you know !!

[Orangedog]

No true conservative would support smoking in public places because it damages the health of non-smokers against their will.

Your views of a "true conservative" are so far off they would have to be raised several levels just to reach the level of being wrong. No one forces non-smoker to spend money or go inside a business that allows smoking. You are more authoritarian than conservative. You would rather use the power of the state to impose conditions on everyone that you deem to be acceptable than patronizing businesses that see things as you do.

[Steely Glint]

Smokers who want to continue inflict their carcinogens and toxins on unwilling non-smokers love to lie about the regulation of secondhand smoke. They love to claim that secondhand isn't harmful (a lie), that the government has no legal right to regulate bars and restaurants (another lie), and that banning smoking in places open to the public is somehow Socialist, Nazi, or "nanny-statist" (yet another lie). The truth is that they HAVE no valid arguments. Zero. Zip. Nada.

YES, SECONDHAND SMOKE IS HARMFUL TO HUMAN HEALTH

The following government agencies have all declared secondhand smoke/environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) to be a toxic and carcinogenic health hazard:

The Surgeon General
National Academy of Sciences (NAS)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
National Toxicology Program
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)

Smokers will loudly claim that the EPA's 1993 risk assessment that classified ETS as a "Group A" carcinogen was overturned. It wasn't. What happened was that representatives of the tobacco industry filed suit against the EPA relating to the findings of its ETS risk assessment in a tobacco-producing state (North Carolina), before a judge (William Osteen) who - what a coincidence - turned out to be a former tobacco industry lobbyist. This judge somehow managed to rule - despite evidence to the contrary - that the EPA's finding that ETS caused lung cancer was invalid. However, this ruling was utterly vacated by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth District on December 11, 2002, rendering it null and void. Despite what some people will try to tell you, the EPA 1993 risk assessment was NOT overruled: the attempt to invalidate it was what was overruled.

Cigarette smoke has been shown to contain over 4000 chemicals and at least 40 known carcinogens. There is almost total consensus in the medical community and in the biological research community that secondhand smoke is hazardous to human health. Medical schools, teaching hospitals, and university medical research institutes all know and teach the hazards of secondhand smoke. In an amazing coincidence, virtually every public figure who maintains that secondhand smoke isn't a health hazard mysteriously either turns out to be a smoker or to have some kind of political or fiscal connection to the tobacco industry. Go figure.

In 2000 Philip Morris, one of the leading tobacco companies, let the cat out of the smoking bag. On its website, Philip Morris posted "...there is an overwhelming medical and scientific consensus that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and other serious diseases..." and that "There is no safe cigarette." That's right, a tobacco company admitted that. It's no longer deniable.

SURPRISE, THE GOVERNMENT ALREADY REGULATES BARS AND RESTAURANTS

Arguing that the government has no right to regulate bars and restaurants for health-related reasons is an act of total ignorance given that every existing bar or restaurant in the United States is currently subject to governmental health-related regulation. Yes, that's right: they are all already regulated for health purposes. Yes, every single one of them. Anyone who claims otherwise is either ignorant of the food and drink business or is lying.

DARN, THE REGULATION OF PLACES TO EAT AND DRINK PREDATES ALL MODERN POLITICAL SYSTEMS

Smokers love to call the government health regulation of places to eat and drink "Socialist," "Nazi," or "nanny-statist." These are acts of simple ignorance, as inns and taverns have been regulated by the English government since medieval times. Here in America such government regulation started well over 300 years ago, in the early 17th Century - which is, of course, long before anyone ever heard of Karl Marx, Adolf Hitler, or Hillary Clinton. Blaming modern political ideas for acts that date back to medieval times is just silly. But then, of course, any defense of public smoking is silly, as no one can *seriously* defend anything that deliberately inflicts carcinogens and toxins on unwilling victims.

[Steely Glint]

"Your views of a 'true conservative' are so far off they would have to be raised several levels just to reach the level of being wrong."

LOL, wake up. Any true conservative knows that his rights end at the point where they begin to inflict real damage onto others.

If you really think that you somehow have the right to inflict damage on others then YOU are the authoritarian. No true conservative would ever think anything like that.

[Orangedog]

The truth is that they HAVE no valid arguments. Zero. Zip. Nada.

Opinions vary. Yours happens to be more in line with authoritarians than conservatives.

[Great Dane]

Try some facts. Smoking damages the public health.

Smoking damges the health of the smoker, second hand smoke isn't a danger to anyone.

[Orangedog]

Any true conservative knows that his rights end at the point where they begin to inflict real damage onto others.

And, again, where is there a law requiring non smokers to go inside or spend any money in an establishment where the owner of that establishment allows smoking? There isn't. You like to ignore that inconvenient fact. What right do you think you have telling any business owner that he MUST cater to every non-smoker in the world when there is no law or regulation requiring non smokers to go inside his bar? Keep on posting...your authoritarian stripes show through with each of your posts.

[Phantom Lord]

Still waiting for a response to #7

[Jotmo]

Sigh...

Your argument only works if the non-smoker is FORCED to dine/drink/barhop with smokers. Which, their not. It seems to me that you can't grasp that simple, yet important, distinction. This is the case even if there were no bars/restaurants that were non smoking. Is dining out a right?

Now you may be surprised to know that one study (that I've herd of) has shown that pipe smokers live longer on average than non smokers. Shocked are you?

Should we then require that all people smoke a pipe? It's for the public good after all.

No doubt you'd dismiss this study as a load of crap, and your certainly entitled to do so. So which "study" do we rely on to make laws "for the public good"?

I've got an idea. Lets just let the property owners and costumers decide for themselves.

No?

Oh that's right. They aren't capable of making those kind of decisions. We, who know what's better for them, must not allow them that choice.

How could I forget.

[talleyman]

But how do you really feel? Don't hold back, now.

Just so I'm sure I understand you, you're free to choose an establishment that bars smoking, but I'm not free to choose one that does not. Right. I'm sorry, sir, the Taliban section is over to the far left...

BTW, what risky behavior do you engage in that should be prohibited, hmm?