Posted on 10/01/2002 11:16:00 PM PDT by SheLion
The movement to get the Dallas City Council to pass a city ordinance to make ALL establishments 100% smoke free is gaining momentum. They advocate preventing a bar or restaurant owner to make his or her own decision about giving a choice to the customer. They advocate putting into LAW that you can't... CAN NOT... smoke anywhere in the City of Dallas. "Well, how about the cigar bar in Del Frisco's after a big steak dinner?"
Nope. In fact if they get this passed, they might come back and try to get a law passed that we can't eat a big steak dinner because they found a study that suggests that the side-effects of other people enjoying a steak is bad for "the children".
In fact, there is no stopping a group of people organizing, coming up with their own "research", and lobbying to take our rights away because they don't like what others do.
I know that sounds ridiculous and that is why no normal citizen, who enjoys the rights that people before us fought and died for, ever thinks that anything as absurd as a law to take away any of those rights could be even considered as serious. That is where we have been wrong... dead wrong. It seems that advocates share a certain trait with politicians: they both feel the need to get "involved" with the issue of guiding our citizenry. In the meantime, our citizenry is comfortable knowing that our Constitution is protecting us so we can go about our daily lives working and enjoying life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Well, guess what? We were wrong.
There is a group in Dallas that is working hard to "ban" smoking in any establishment in the city limits.
They contend a restaurant owner has no business making a decision about his or her own policies. They think that the local government should decide what type of customers they should try to attract. This group has even stooped to the over-done, we-should-do-it-for-the-children-and-if-you-disagree-with-that-you-hate-children tactic.
They wonder why when they are with their "children" (because after all, they are pro-family... aren't you?) and someone in a restaurant lights up, the government isn't there to protect the health of their family. They wonder why they are expected to make a decision not to go to that restaurant instead of making everyone around them change so they don't have to.
To find the wisdom in our system, it is often necessary to read what our leaders said a long time ago. It was Abraham Lincoln that had words for this situation:
"Those who deny freedom for others deserve it not for themselves".
Let me be clear. I do not smoke cigarettes. They are nasty and dangerous. There are probably many chemicals and poisons that are let out into the air by smoking. But I reserve the right to smoke one day, if I want to. I won't smoke at your church, school, or in your government building. If you don't allow it in your home, I will totally respect that. I won't smoke in your car, or even near you when I can... I am not rude. However, when I choose a restaurant that wants me as a customer so much as to have a section for me, and you want to go there too (because the food and service are great), we have both made a decision based on personal freedom. Since you have made that choice, why is it my fault that you aren't comfortable? Why do you insist that city government get involved to make sure your dining experience is more pleasant? If you walk by a club and the rap music from inside is so loud that it seems offensive, will you go inside? No, of course not, and you wouldn't run to the city council wanting a law against rap music.
You simply wouldn't go. Get it?
I am not even going to start in on the junk science and so-called "surveys" presented as "irrefutable fact" by this poster group for political correctness. I will give you the link to the web site. Twenty years ago this web site would have made a great satirical magazine. It would have shown, in a ironic way, how fanatics try to push their agenda using any scare tactic they can. Sadly, this is not satire. It is a group that will not be content until others behave the way they think they should. It is time for common sense to replace political correctness.
It is time that people realize a perfect world is not formed by laws.
Here is the web site. Enjoy. http://smokefreedallas.org/
Why not allow the same businesses to lobby for a state wide ban ?
If this were the case then the 14th wouldn't have needed to add the words "without due process". No murdered could ever be executed, no robber could be jailed, no state could ever use eminent domain.
We have a few rights which cannot be imposed on even using due process (which include guns, press, religion etc.) but property rights isn;t one of them and neither is the right to smoke.
An incorrect assumption. There are some who would simply not go out at all. The art of home cooking could make a comeback.
What about the smaller states where it's not more than an hour to anywhere outside the state?
"while at the same time they would have lower staffing costs" "lower equipment and supplies costs."
Well, wouldn't THAT be nice.
There go jobs, both directly and indirectly, simply from the government interfering where it shouldn't.
IMO, the government should be trying to get businesses to make MORE jobs, not less. But of course the demoncRATS wouldn't mind. That would just put more people on the welfare rolls.
It is amazing that you continue to assert that it is proper to use government as a tool to be used by some people to deny the rights of others.
You cling to the notion that people's rights are subject to the whims of the majority. That we live at the pleasure of others, kings or groups of thugs.
Amazing that such a person would even pretend to represent conservatives.
Hint: you are wrong, as usual.
Rights to property can be found in the ten commandments. Can you guess which one? I'm guessing you don't have a working knowledge of them any more extensive than that exhibited on the other documents.
They would be losing customers BY THEIR OWN CHOICE! Losing customers by your own choice and losing customers by government fiat are two completely different animals.
Yes, his rights were "tampled on" but they were trampled on using the political process
SOoooo, using your reasoning, if a town with a majority of midgets, using the political process, decided that restaurants could not allow people of over 5' to be served, there is no recourse. All the taller people would just be out of luck.
what if all the restuarant owners in SmokeFREE town decided they no longer wished to serve smokers.
By your own description the restaurant owners are ALREADY not servicing smokers.
They have a problem even if they all banned smoking at the same time because they would create a new opportunity for a new restaurant.
And creating a new opportunity for ANOTHER business is a PROBLEM? Where is the problem? ALL customers would have a choice, ALL business owners could allow, or not allow, smoking, BY THEIR CHOICE, the city fathers have another business to tax - WHERE'S THE PROBLEM?
Government involvement in business is folly. They only have the power to screw things up, not make them better.
The only way for government to "help" business, is to get the hell out of the way. Lassiez Faire is a forgotten concept by those in power today.
I didn't say MAKE businesses to make more jobs, I said TRY to get.
I agree that Lassiez Faire is a forgotten concept. It would be a good idea to bring it back.
Your lack of understanding about these matters is breathtaking.
We have a few rights which cannot be imposed on even using due process (which include guns, press, religion etc.) but property rights isn;t one of them and neither is the right to smoke.
Amazing. Ignoring the previous references about the origin of rights doesn't make them go away.
That's answering a quetsion with another question, but I'll try to answer anyhow. They can lobby all they want, but whether such a ban should be enacted is a different matter entirely. Just because 50% + 1 of restaurant business owners want such a ban does not mean that such a law is allowed.
At the risk of sounding repetitive, we're a republic not a democracy. In order for such a ban to be enacted, it should have to pass muster based on the state constutition. If the state constitution gave the legislature such a power over restaurant business, then I would agree that a ban like that would be allowed. Not the right thing to do, mind you, but allowed.
Now that I've given a shot at answering your question, please take a stab at mine. What's wrong with letting the restaurtant owner decide if his establishment is to be non-smoking, have a non-smoking section, or allows smoking? Isn't this the free market in action?
"Trying" by doing anything other than repealing past laws which interfere in business can only lead to more mischief, in my view.
The government has no legitimate role to play in the process.
Good line.
Now the thread is complete. And the parties who agree with each other never seem to vary. Great stuff,,,LOL
PS, the subject matter of the thread is about to change.
Last time I was there I went to an Irish pub in ultra-liberal Cape Cod. No smoking rules were in effect at the bar. As we drank our beers, we mused about how the ninny liberals had ruined this and many other places: New York City, California, Ithica, you know, bastions of liberalism.
And yet here we see so-called conservatives hopping on the liberal bandwagon, co-opting yet another of their social engineering experiments. In fact, I think these so-called conservatives would feel right at home in Cape Cod or Martha's Vineyard. Why wouldn't they?
How interesting.
It's more than sad. The kind of tyranny of the majority that is becoming commonplace, and acceptable even to the so called consevatives, will someday turn into a mass exercize of the second amendment by those who's rights have been trampled. It promises to be ugly. I hope I'm not around to see it.
I've got to disagree. Its not amazing, its expected from these authoritarians.
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