Judge rules casino smoke caused dealer's cancer

The Star Ledger ^ | February 13, 2008

[Eric Blair 2084]

A judge said years of breathing secondhand smoke in an Atlantic City casino gave a dealer lung cancer.

Kam Wong never smoked. But a state worker's compensation judge determined a decade of exposure to secondhand smoke at the former Claridge Casino Hotel caused her illness.

She was awarded 60 percent disability pay and lost wages for time she missed before and after two surgeries.

Her attorney said there was constantly smoke around Wong.

Atlantic City passed smoking restrictions for its 11 casinos last April, limiting smoking to no more than 25 percent of the casino floor.

[Eric Blair 2084]

Let me make this clear...any scientific study with a Relative Risk of < 2.0 is considered a "null study" and would be inadmissable in a court of law.

The "Judge" I'm sure has at least heard of the Scientific Rules of Evidence manual.

He's chosen to ignore it and legislate from the bench because he felt like it.

[Eric Blair 2084]

Big Brother, Nanny State, Grant Junkie, Bogus Study, Junk Science, Social Engineering, Sheeple Control, Health Nazi

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[kingu]

75% of the population smoked or were constantly around smokers for most of the previous century. By the theory presented here, most should be dead due to lung cancer.

I guarantee that the environmental report from your average modern kitchen will show more toxins and particulate pollution than second hand smoke. That ‘new car smell’ is a cocktail of hazardous chemicals.

But hey, the world is so much simpler in black and white than shades of gray, and it’s much easier to blame than to understand that ‘things happen.’

[GregoTX]

This is a little off topic, but are their any credible online casinos? I keep I hear most are scams, but I dont know anyone that has tried one.

Oh, to stay on topic, this is another example of how the judicial branch is skipping the rule of law and legislating from the bench.

[CIDKauf]

I’m gonna sue the state of Colorado because those bas***s have been ruining my wardrobe for years. Don’t I have the reasonable expectation that digging ditches won’t yield a worthless wardrobe and loss of self esteem costing me literally millions.......

[gidget7]

Absolutely right. There are and have been, more causes of smoke cancer than there have ever been smokers. Yet these “judges” choose to ignore all other causes. Much like a boss or govt. entity has to find a guy to take the fall when something goes wrong, regardless of evidence. Tobacco is the fall guy.

[elkfersupper]

She should have quit and gone to work for some government agency.

It's been decades since we have been able to smoke around our rulers........er.....leaders.

[Eric Blair 2084]

Don’t say anything about online casinos...armed Federal agents will bust into your den and arrest you.

Second Hand Poker is a killer.

[boop]

Do you have a link to the judge’s “reasoning”? If the dealer worked in a casino and was never exposed to smoking in any other form ever in their life, and had proved that they couldn’t have gotten it from any other source, then OK. That explains why there was such an “epidemic” of lung cancer among children born during the last century. We were exposed 24/7/365. Must have been that magic smoke that only gets people at bars and restaurants and casinos.

[rfp1234]

What about the formaldehyde in the casino carpets?

[rfp1234]

What about the formaldehyde in the casino carpets?

[Eric Blair 2084]

Previous century?

How about our ancestors the cavemen from 1 million BC who cooked their meat in a smokey cave? Human beings are conditioned by evolution to be able to survive smoke. Or we wouldn’t be here talking.

[GregoTX]

Why is that? I know that they an online casino can not be operated in the US, but I havent heard anything about it being illegal to play on them from the US. I have no idea, I’ll have to ask and find out.

[Eric Blair 2084]

What about the radon readings in her basement?

What about the asbestos in her family’s house growing up?

What about the methane from her fathers’ farts?

What about ______ (fill in the blank)?

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Bright boys like this judge will result in companies changing the status of their employees to “shareholders”.

Because the government allows corporations to screw their stock holders silly, having few or very limited rights to legal recourse, employers can take advantage of this basic unfairness to evade all the rules protecting employees.

Actually, by taking government out of the equation entirely, the “shareholders” who work in exchange for money redeemable shares instead of money, can actually make more money, and be taxed at a lower rate, than employees. They don’t pay income tax or FICA, just capital gains. This allows them to opt out of that worthless Social Security ripoff and double or more their take home pay.

It benefits the company, as well, because in addition to earning shares, the company pays dividends on those shares, if you leave them with the company instead of cashing them out. The reason to pay dividends is because the company can use that capital to buy stuff, instead of taking out high interest loans at the bank. The company pays maybe 5% dividend, which is a LOT better than a bank pays in interest, but loans itself the money at 5% instead of the 15 or 20% the bank would charge.

Finally, the company organizes its business as a club, with shareholders as members, instead of being open to the public. Private clubs can have smoking, and though they can’t serve alcohol, they can provide bottled mixers for club members as well as packaged foods, and have “bartendering” classes to teach members how to mix drinks. Members just buy their own bottled alcohol elsewhere and store it at the club.

Club members pay a membership fee, so their food and beverage classes are free, and they can smoke all they want.

It takes lots of tricks to avoid harassment from greedy, nanny government, but it can be done. And less government can mean more for everybody.

[Gabz]

My understanding is the law has to do with not being able to use a credit card in the US to play at the online casinos, regardless of where they are located.

[Gabz]

My understanding is the law has to do with not being able to use a credit card in the US to play at the online casinos, regardless of where they are located.

[rfp1234]

Global warming, Bush’s fault!

[callisto]

Other causes of lung cancer include the following:

• Air pollution from motor vehicles, factories, and other sources probably increase the risk for lung cancer, and many experts believe that prolonged exposure to polluted air is similar to prolonged exposure to passive smoking in terms of risk for developing lung cancer.
• Asbestos exposure increases the risk of lung cancer by nine times. A combination of asbestos exposure and cigarette smoking raises the risk to as much as 50 times. Another cancer known as mesothelioma (a type of cancer of the pleura or of the lining of the abdominal cavity called the peritoneum) is also strongly associated with exposure to asbestos.
• Lung diseases, such as tuberculosis (TB) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), also create a risk for lung cancer. A person with COPD has a four to six times greater risk of lung cancer even when the effect of cigarette smoking is excluded.
• Radon exposure poses another risk. Radon is a by-product of naturally occurring radium, which is a product of uranium. Radon is present in indoor and outdoor air. The risk for lung cancer increases with significant long-term exposure to radon, although no one knows the exact risk. An estimated 12% of lung cancer deaths are attributable to radon gas, or 15,000 to 22,000 lung cancer-related deaths annually in the U.S. Radon gas is the second leading cause of lung cancer in the U.S. As with asbestos exposure, smoking greatly increases the risk of lung cancer with radon exposure.
• Certain occupations where exposure to arsenic, chromium, nickel, aromatic hydrocarbons, and ethers occurs may increase the risk of lung cancer.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Bright boys like this judge will result in companies changing the status of their employees to “shareholders”.

Because the government allows corporations to screw their stock holders silly, having few or very limited rights to legal recourse, employers can take advantage of this basic unfairness to evade all the rules protecting employees.

Actually, by taking government out of the equation entirely, the “shareholders” who work in exchange for money redeemable shares instead of money, can actually make more money, and be taxed at a lower rate, than employees. They don’t pay income tax or FICA, just capital gains. This allows them to opt out of that worthless Social Security ripoff and double or more their take home pay.

It benefits the company, as well, because in addition to earning shares, the company pays dividends on those shares, if you leave them with the company instead of cashing them out. The reason to pay dividends is because the company can use that capital to buy stuff, instead of taking out high interest loans at the bank. The company pays maybe 5% dividend, which is a LOT better than a bank pays in interest, but loans itself the money at 5% instead of the 15 or 20% the bank would charge.

Finally, the company organizes its business as a club, with shareholders as members, instead of being open to the public. Private clubs can have smoking, and though they can’t serve alcohol, they can provide bottled mixers for club members as well as packaged foods, and have “bartendering” classes to teach members how to mix drinks. Members just buy their own bottled alcohol elsewhere and store it at the club.

Club members pay a membership fee, so their food and beverage classes are free, and they can smoke all they want.

It takes lots of tricks to avoid harassment from greedy, nanny government, but it can be done. And less government can mean more for everybody.