Check out the shades and shoes! lol
Posted on 01/27/2006 4:35:37 AM PST by SheLion
If Ohio voters are given the chance to vote on a proposed statewide smoking ban, let's hope our fellow citizens take the time to educate themselves on the big picture.
The proposed ban, unlike the local ordinance, prohibits smoking in all public buildings. It allows exemptions for private clubs, but not bars, bingo halls and bowling centers, as Toledo's ban does.
Smoking is not illegal. Unhealthy and expensive, but not illegal. If an American business owner wants to operate an establishment that allows smokers the freedom to smoke, why should their decision be overridden by people who aren't patronizing those places anyway?
In our Jan. 18 cover story, "Where there's smoke," several local bar and restaurant owners expressed their frustration with the proposed ban. Many of them described the impact of the local restrictions as "extreme" and detrimental to their business.
We also spoke with Stu Kerr, a former health commissioner in Findlay and the Northwest Ohio campaign coordinator for SmokeFree Ohio, the leading proponent of the ban. Kerr dismissed the bar and restaurant owners' concerns: "They'll bring up property rights argument. They'll bring up economic arguments ... it's bullshit."
Any group that dismisses economic arguments and property rights must be held in suspicion; if Kerr can discount these bedrocks of business so easily, he's trampling on precious entrepreneurial principles.
Sharon Kuhnle, owner of Twin Oaks Bowling Center on West Sylvania Avenue, said it best: "We live in a free society, and we're discussing a legal product. This needs to be left up to the business owner. Let the business owner run his or her business as they know it should be."
There's no argument from us that first- and secondhand smoke is deadly. Our solution is not to ban smoking from every corner of the city; our solution is to avoid places where smoking pollutes the air. That's a personal decision. That's how the free market works.
Let business owners decide this issue, not reactionary zealots.
That sums it up! It has totally unleveled the playing field and those on the outskirts of the city are being blessed with riches from smokers right now...and the City Council refuses the even talk about the amount of tax revenue they've lost for Madison. THAT'S the info that needs to be out there, IMHO! The City Council is stacked with "progressive" idiots.
I drove past the South Bay Lounge the other day while I was out running errands. It was noon, and they have GREAT food there; the lot was 99% empty. :(
Well at least you are honest about your effeminate stupidity.
I'm going to be smiling all day over that one...
LOL - it hasn't been a free country long enough for them to start giving whiners the freedom to remove freedoms from others.
Give 'em a couple hundred years. ;-)
Why don't you find a bar or disco that has the big smoke eaters? Not many businesses today go without. The hole in the walls can't afford them, but a nice big bar or disco will have the smoke eaters.
Also, when you are out with your friends who enjoy smoking, and you say you come away smelling like smoke, try to look at it as the smell of fun and friendship.
Why let your hatred of smoking stop you from having a good time. Just forget about it. Smokers aren't going to go away overnight. And you are shutting yourself out because of your dislike of smoke.
You could have stopped right there, because that is precisely the justification legally expressed everywhere for justifying smoking bans.
All else is smoke and mirrors.
Having both smoking and non-smoking establishments (owners' choice) is the civilized answer.
It only makes sense. When the anti's force a smoking ban in a few towns and cities of one state, you know darn well the smokers are going to drive a little further down the road to the next town or city that allows smoking.
And those businesses are reaping all that revenue now.
I know it. LOL
What a putz!
I'm going to frame that statement in my cubicle.
Just a question:
What does a carton of B&H cost, both in downtown and the PX/BX?
I can't get B&H anywhere here. I'm going off the stash I brought and mailed from home earlier this month. A couple of years ago, they occasionally had them at a base up by the airport that is no longer there. (The base where GWB had Thanksgiving dinner in '03.) I paid $24 a carton there.
I can get 'em for $12 a carton at the Duty Free in Dubai. Mostly, I just beg them from home and in the meantime, I smoke USA Gold Light 100s from the Px/BX at $19 a carton.
How interesting. In Utah, I pay ~$25/carton for USA ultra with all the taxes. So it isn't all that much cheaper in the PX.
Duty free is the way to go, of course.
Shelion does a lot in the roll your own smokes area.
I think I read one of her posts that said a carton of quality smokes rolled by hand were $8/carton.
I'll ping her on this post, too.
Yes, I have rolled my own for over 4 years now. I can roll a beautiful carton for a little under $8 dollars. It's wonderful.
Can't a guy in a burqa get a little peace and quiet in that town? lol
LOL
Isn't that something?! Nothing he does surprises any of us anymore.
Thanks for the ping!
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