Posted on 01/05/2006 6:57:14 AM PST by SheLion
Articles, editorials, op-eds and published letters in the pages of many of New Jersey's newspapers have been heavily lopsided in support of the effort to ban smoking in bars and restaurants. Each article or commentary seemingly has been designed to leave the reader with the perception that the supportive evidence presented is undeniable or that no contrary findings or opinion even exist.
Any claim that exposure to exhaled or sidestream smoke poses a threat to life is "indisputable" is false. There are studies and scientists who dispute it strongly. When New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg claimed his ban would save 1,000 workers' lives, the president of the American Council on Science and Health, who vehemently opposes smoking, wrote, "There is no evidence that any New Yorker — patron or employee — has ever died as a result of exposure to smoke in a bar or restaurant." Dr. Richard Doll, the scientist who first linked active smoking to lung cancer, said in a 2001 radio interview, "The effects of other people smoking in my presence is so small it doesn't worry me."
These statements, among many others, are based on the results of studies that found no long-term health risks, and even on studies that claim to find risks, because the science is so weak.
Since smoking bans are premised on protecting nonsmokers, this nonsense to ban smoking should stop right here. It is not a public health issue. However, the anti-smoking crusaders cloud the issue by also dragging in misapplied majority opinion. It's constitutionally unethical for the majority to tyrannize the minority.
But more importantly, polling the public to determine a private establishment owner's fate is indecent. No customer or employee — each free to be there or not — should be able to dictate the house's rules. And for the "my way or the highway" anti-smokers who don't get it, we mean smokers shouldn't either. Only one person's vote counts — the owner's.
The case that workers shouldn't have to leave an environment they don't like or hours that fit their personal needs is nothing more than emotional blackmail. Slavery ended a long time ago. No one is forced to do anything they don't like.
For the lawmakers who believe economics is the determining factor, New York City's sales tax revenue for bars and restaurants did not rise 8.7 percent, as claimed by agencies Bloomberg dispatched on the one-year anniversary (March 2004) of the city's ban. Not only were the figures distorted by including places like McDonald's and Starbucks as restaurants, but smoking was banned in 95 percent of restaurants since the 1995 smoking ban law. What pre- to post-ban restaurant tax revenue comparison was there to make? In all cases (notably bars), it's a no-brainer that sales tax revenue was artificially low immediately following 9/11. To compare the post-ban year to those figures is dishonest.
In April, the New York State Department of Taxation released a much more official review of sales tax revenue. When one compares the pre-ban year to the post-ban year, bars in New York City lost more than 3.5 percent. Statewide, as confirmed by a report in the New York Post May 2, sales tax revenue "dropped or remained relatively flat since the smoking ban went into effect July 2003."
Junk science, tyranny and cooked books is pitting neighbor against neighbor and has ruined or will ruin individual livelihoods. Unbelievable. Don't do it, New Jersey.
A note of disclosure: Our organization has no ties to the tobacco industry nor do we speak on the behalf of the hospitality industry.
Audrey Silk
FOUNDER
NYC CITIZENS LOBBYING
AGAINST SMOKER HARASSMENT
BROOKLYN
Really? Missouri must have more stringent laws of rights of residents. They are allowed to smoke in an indoor designated area and also to drink alcohol in their rooms.
I do that too.
The fear, loathing, and hatred is palpable.
I also employ that tactic to clear the fat folks out of the candy aisle at the grocery store.
Apparently very dangerous, also.
Fixed Obstructive Lung Disease in Workers at a Microwave Popcorn Factory --- Missouri, 2000--2002
This is a fairly recent nanny-state development. I've been smoking off and on since I was 9.
The government should just step back from the tobacco industry. The government should renege on the tobacco settlements. The government should stop collecting taxes and stop placing warnings on cigarette packs. Everybody knows that smoking is hazardous. Being told this the ten thousandth time is not going to have any effect.
Let the tobacco industry try to devise a warning sufficient to protect themselves from the plaintiffs attorneys. The attorneys would sue the industry out of existance in a few short years without government protection. Why the government steps in to prevent this natural event from occuring is a mystery. Maybe it has to do with all that tax money.
You dry clean suits after every wearing? Sorry, I can't afford that, and I hear it isn't good for the suits. I don't even launder my dress shirts after every wearing-- that's what I thought undershirts were for. But maybe I am a slob.
But ease up, man. I am not against smoking, I just don't do it myself. I oppose smoking bans, except in limited situations. I favor letting the market control the situation.
I do notice that many on the smokers' side get pretty touchy if you don't let them have their cigarettes anywhere they want. Must be a pretty tough addiction.
Obviously so.
When the first smoking restrictions went into effect in Delaware back in 1993 (or 4) a gazebo was built on the grounds of the state run nursing home.....it was enclosed, heated int he winter, A/C'd in the summer and was for the smoking residents.
When the new law went into effect in 2002 that building was included, because it was enclosed. The Administration of the Home (what we all called it in Delaware) applied for an exemption for it.........the application was DENIED.
The Home is run by the Department of Health and Social Services.....HSS built that building........HSS denied the use of it for smoking.
Good for you, but IMHO, you should have started much earlier.
Not in all states. We have heard horrible stories where old people in wheel chairs go outside their nursing home to smoke. In the dead of winter. And they end up "dead." So, not all states have compassion for the old folks in nursing homes.
I heard this on the news not too long ago. That the employees are getting sick from working around so much microwave popcorn.
Now that I think about it, I probably did...just started buying tobacco when I was 9.
Listen, I am not going to put up with talk like that.
We do not want to smoke everywhere. For heaven's sake! We don't smoke in a Church, or grocery shopping, banks, post office, elevators, hospitals. We know where we can smoke and where we can not. I don't know what smokers you know that want to have one hanging out of their mouths 24/7 but it sure isn't the smokers "I" know!
Smoking is not as tough an addiction as being a busybody. I've had lots of opportunity to observe both species.
People who tell others how they should behave never can quit.
Thanks for the ping!
You bet! :)
I wish this kind of logic would have prevailed here in WA state. Instead, we had the nanny-staters convince the people to vote away their freedom. Our state-wide ban goes into effect Thursday (December 8th).
My employer deals with a lot of foreign customers on our site. Many of them smoke. The "no smoking" thing was tried many years ago and resulted in pissed off customers blocking locked doors open so they could conveiniently go outside without having to walk all of the way around the building to the main lobby where the receptionist could let them in.
Their blocking doors open effectively eliminated any security we had. We found doors still blocked open in the morning many times. Computers and other things did disapear during this time.
Solution: we built a smoking lounge in the building to accomodate our customers. Made everyone happy and our building was secure again. Thefts measurably went down.
Along comes this ban. Now the lounge is being removed and we are going to have to tell customers that they are going to have to walk all of the way to the front lobby, out the doors into the cold wind and rain and stand 25 feet from any entrance or ventilation shaft, all just to keep the nanny-staters happy.
It won't be long before they start blocking the doors open again...
You said: People who tell others how they should behave never can quit.
***
I agree, and I hope you aren't talking about me. If people want to smoke, I am all for it. I don't care for it, but that's just me. I have noticed certain attitudes from both sides on this, though. The anti-smokers can sound pretty self-righteous and put upon by smokers, and smokers seem to get very defensive with regard to their habit.
Like I have said often on this thread and on many others, people should be free (with certain limits) to smoke when and where they want. Those who don't like smoke should avoid it. Property owners should be able to set the policy for what goes on on their own property (whether private or commercial). Let the market decide.
I remember your post. Well, smokers and business owner's everywhere that are suffering smoking bans are figuring out ways to get around them. Got to beat the anti's at their own game.
Sorry about your business. The loss of property is bad!
I agree with your first sentence, but not your second.
As a smoker I do not believe I should be able to smoke anywhere I like.....but I do believe that I should be permitted to do so where the owner of the property says I may. Blanket smoking bans prohibit that ability of the property owner.
It bothers me greatly that many members of Free Republic are not only supportive of such government intrusion but actually promote it.
As to your second sentence about addiction I can only LOL!!! about it. I realized a long time ago that when I am involved in these type conversations, whether online or IRL, I don't smoke at all. It's really funny.
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