Posted on 09/19/2002 1:54:08 AM PDT by kattracks
The smoking wars are catching fire.Tobacco giant Philip Morris said it is preparing to unleash its considerable bankroll on stopping Mayor Bloomberg's proposed bill to snuff out smoking in city bars, restaurants and office buildings.
"We are anticipating that we will provide financial support to those who share our views," Philip Morris spokesman Brendan McCormick said this week.
The company has four lobbyists on retainer and will spend some $193,200 this year trying to sway city legislation.
For now, Big Tobacco interests seem happy to let individual bar owners cast this as a fight between big government and small businesses.
It already promises to be one of the more spirited grass-roots showdowns to hit City Hall in years, with bar owners organizing in every borough and anti-smoking forces trying to match them.
Restaurant and tavern owners have called every City Council member and plan to descend on City Hall in force Oct. 10, when the Council's Health Committee is scheduled to begin hearings on the toughest-in-the-nation bill.
On the other side will be anti-smoking crusaders, including city Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden, who said secondhand smoke kills up to 11,000 New Yorkers every year.
"Call me naive, but I really do think that telling people the truth works," said Frieden, who has prepared an 18-page briefing book on secondhand smoking for City Council members. "The bottom line is, secondhand smoke kills."
But Ciaran Staunton, head of the New York Irish Bar and Tavern Owners Association, hopes Council members will see a different truth in the bill's fine print.
"When I hear any politician being concerned about working families - I am a working family," said Staunton, owner of O'Neill's at Third Ave. and E. 46th St. "And this bill would put me and my family on the street."
Expect to see many small acts of protest, such as yesterday's S.O.S. rally - for Save Our Smoke - at Gallagher's Steak House in midtown.
New Yorkers sat at the bar lighting up free maduros and swilling martinis, spitting venom at Bloomberg amid the smoke.
"I'm not saying every bar and restaurant should have a smoking area," said Mark Wechsler, 54, of Pearl River, Rockland County, who manages Nyack Tobacco. "But even Disney World has a place where you can smoke cigarettes."
With Julia Cosgrove
Then I wonder why he DOESN'T tell the truth?
Could it be because the truth WOULDN'T work for HIM?
Ahhhh Thomas Frieden! Prepared "his own 18-page book on second hand smoke." I bet THAT'S a goody!
I think "I" will prepare an 18 page book on THOMAS FRIEDEN! I am SURE I have enough information ON this ANTI by now!
Federal Court Rules Against EPA on Secondhand Smoke
I think Freiden, who tries to dismiss the findings of the U.S. Department of Energy labs at Oak Ridge, should be confronted with the question: "Are you saying that DOE researchers committed scientific fraud and that their findings on ETS exposure are untrue?" I'd like to see what he would say in response to that question.
He wrote his own BOOK! heh! So we KNOW it wouldn't work for him!
Well, since none of the "anti-smoking health advocates" have real jobs outside of pestering and hectoring others for a quick and easy buck, I imagine they won't have any trouble with their struggle to match the bar owners.
I hope a brawl breaks out, to be honest.
Ah, yes. The first rule of propaganda is to never waiver in asserting the truth of the lies you are spreading.
11,000 NY'ers p.a. killed by SHS? What a load of horse droppings.
Yeah, right! According to the City Health Department of New York, there were 41,135 deaths from things which anti's attribute to smoking (heart disease, cancer, influenza and pneumonia) in NYC in the year 2000.
If we assume that 25% of those who died were smokers or ex-smokers (a conservative figure), that leaves 30,851 deaths.
Mr Frieden would therefore have us believe that SHS exposure causes 35.7% of all deaths from those causes in non-smokers in NYC each year.
What a #@!&#)@!!!!
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