We should just get it over with and tear up our Constitution because all we are doing know is using the British "Constitution" anyway.
Posted on 04/19/2019 4:58:45 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans to introduce legislation raising the minimum age to purchase tobacco products to 21 from 18, a move that public-health advocates and tobacco companies hope would curb the use of e-cigarettes among youths.
More than a dozen states have passed or enacted laws raising the minimum age to 21 and others are considering doing so. Sen. McConnell’s announcement Thursday follows the introduction earlier this month of similar bills in the House.
Altria Group Inc. and British American Tobacco PLC, the two biggest U.S. cigarette manufacturers, both support an increase of the minimum age to 21, as does Juul Labs Inc., a startup whose e-cigarettes are blamed by health officials for a surge in underage smoking.
Laws raising the age to 21 “fight one of the largest contributors to this problem: sharing by legal-age peers,” Juul Chief Executive Kevin Burns said.
Youth use of e-cigarettes jumped 78% from 2017 to 2018—to one out of every five high-school students—thanks largely to the popularity of USB-shaped vaporizers made by Juul.
The increase has prompted a regulatory crackdown on the e-cigarette industry. The Food and Drug Administration in March issued new sales restrictions that will effectively ban convenience stores and gasoline stations from selling most flavored e-cigarettes. The passage of a bill raising the legal age nationwide to 21 could alleviate that regulatory pressure, analysts say.
“For some time, I’ve been hearing from the parents who are seeing an unprecedented spike in vaping among their teenage children,” Sen. McConnell said, adding that his bill would exempt military-service members. The Kentucky Republican said he would introduce his bill in May.
Altria, which makes Marlboro, has been lobbying for the move at the state and federal levels
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
You can carry a M-16, but not a can of Skool.
Oh well...
5.56mm
My thought exactly. If the Senate isn’t obstructing the President, they are pushing centralized government as if Bush were still in office.
I don’t like smoking or drinking but if the law says you’re an adult and can join the military at 18, you should be allowed to harm your body as you wish at 18.
“Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans to introduce legislation raising the minimum age to purchase tobacco products to 21 from 18, a move that public-health advocates and tobacco companies hope would curb the use of e-cigarettes among youths.”
In reality they are attempting to recover cigarette taxes by making them taboo and thus irresistible to teenagers.
It’s legal at, what, 9 to take hormones to prevent puberty if your parents have brainwashed you into thinking you’re a different gender.
The reason the voting age is 18 is because the draft age is 18. The argument is that if one is old enough to die for one’s country, one is old enough to vote.
I am in favor of raising the age for both to 21.
Subject is being changed, however raising the age to 21 will create a shortage and 18 year olds are able bodied (Draft is designed to protect your homeland, 18 is old enough to fight). States should determine their own drinking/smoking age.
Glad to see they have solved all those other bugaboos needing legislative action or input.
go to war, get an abortion or sex change yes, but smoking tose evil cigarettes or those even more evil electronic cigarettes..NEVER....
Not within federal authority
I’m so glad we elected small government Republicans
This should be a matter for the states. Enactmement of such a limit at the federal level would be yet another attempt to stretch the Constitional authority to regulate interstate commerce beyond any reasonable limit.
yep, you're old enough to make the decision to fight and die for your country but not quite mature enough to know how to make those really important decisions about tobacco.
Exactly...if teens can process the voters pamphlet and make decisions, then they can process the health issues...(not to mention the sex info forced on them early on). Which way is it Politicians???
Mitch doesn't even try to hide it anymore...and he represents Kentucky, a big tobacco growing state.
Isn’t this an issue for the states to decide?
cuz they don’t have anything IMPORTANT to do.
Freedom matters, even the freedom to do unhealthy things.
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14 year olds are now eating, drinking and smoking weed and the senate is now going after the adult cigarette problem. How about the border crisis, national debt, deep state conspiracy/coup to illegally remove a sitting president and invalidate an election, and our national healthcare crisis. Come on Mitch! Could you be more irrelevant than this? Republicans are a national embarrassment.
The problem is what defines the age of majority, and if that should be uniform across all states, as well as the Feds.
If one has reached the age of majority, then they should have complete rights that are not age-restricted.
The biggest indicator that one has reached the age of majority is the ability to vote and the requirement to sign up for the draft. Whatever age this is, no other age limits should be put on these citizens.
If that means making the voting and draft age 21, so be it. But I thought it was stupid that at 18, I could be drafted but not have a draft beer, and that I could be trusted to shoot a rifle, but not a shot of whiskey.
Just my opinion. YMMV. Peace.
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