Senate Votes for FDA to Regulate Tobacco

ABC News ^ | June 11, 2009 | Z. BYRON WOLF and KATE BARRETT

[nickcarraway]

Years in the Making, Senate Votes to Give FDA Power to Regulate Tobacco

Times have changed now that even tobacco states have smoking bans. Today, after two weeks of wrangling and a decade of considering the change, the U.S. Senate endorsed increased regulation of tobacco.

Senators voted 79-17 to regulate tobacco in the same way the government regulates everything else you put in your body -- from Froot Loops to aspirin.

Watch "World News With Charles Gibson" tonight at 6:30 ET for the full report.

At Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, organization president Matthew L. Myers called the vote "a truly historic victory" and "the strongest action Congress has ever taken to reduce tobacco use."

"Forty-five years after the first U.S. Surgeon General's report linking cigarette smoking to lung cancer, the most deadly product sold in America will no longer be the least-regulated product sold in America," Myers said in a statement.

The bill would give the federal government the power to regulate cigarette ingredients, to ban the marketing of "light cigarettes" and to require graphic warning labels.

It's a huge move that's been a long time coming.

"We have tried for ten years and we have failed," said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., in a speech on the Senate floor earlier this month when the Senate voted to break a filibuster and consider the legislation. "Think what kind of a difference we could have made. How many lives we would have saved if we passed this ten years ago."

The House already passed its version of the bill in April, so it will go the president as soon as the chambers iron out the differences.

Unlike former President Bush, who suggested he'd veto legislation to give the FDA authority over tobacco, President Obama has said he supports it.

[callisto]

Still, an added benefit is that it gets the smokies panties in a twist and the babble about transfats and the slippery slope.

We've down this road before . . .Any FReeper who posts on threads related to tobacco or cigarettes already knows your DUmmie attitude for control and government regulation, as well as your antipathy for freedom of choice. Go share your philosophy with others of like-mind at DU or KOS, please.

[Drango]

Is that your addiction speaking?

[calex59]

Ok, so when the FDA outlaws cigarettes, or makes tobacco products prescription only, what country has the best climate for growing tobacco? I would think that is the one that we will have to ramp up the “war on tobacco” against!

[calex59]

Is that your addiction speaking?

I don't smoke and have no "addiction" and I think you need to go to a non-freedom loving thread. DU or Daily Kos sounds about right.

[Drango]

But you support turning children into addicts? Nice conservative value you have.

[NewRomeTacitus]

[PanzerKardinal]

This is my solution.

I’m going to start adding marijuana to my cigarettes.

Anytime I light up and someone complains, I going to respond, “Hey man, this is medicinal. What are you some kind of fascist trying to keep me from getting my medicine!”

Marijuana - the only acceptable form of smoking left in America.

[Drango]

[callisto]

Is that your addiction speaking?
You hate freedom of speech, too?! What's your user name on KOS and DU?

Sniff . . . Sniff . . .

[Drango]

You support freedom of speech but oppose mine. ~snort.

[callisto]

I don't oppose your freedom of speech, but you are OBVIOUSLY more "at home" on vulgar, liberal, freedom-hating forums such as KOS and DU. I was just being friendly and inviting you home.

[Drango]

There is no freedom in addiction. Kneel down to whatever controls you, I really don’t care. Just don’t ask me to pay for it or suffer your vice. And don’t come here acting like it’s all normal and perfectly OK to addict children.

[callisto]

I've told you before. I don't smoke (except once every few years when drinking with friends), so I HAVE NO ADDICTION. And as you have been asked time and time again but fail to do, PROVIDE PROOF to back up your statements that tobacco targets children. You obviously have no knowledge of actual laws, do you, Mr. Waxman?

[Drango]

Pimping addiction to kids isn’t a conservative value.

[callisto]

LOL! You still can’t PROVIDE PROOF to back up your accusations. I have other words to say to you but you’re not worth getting banned from this forum, so I’ll just tell them to you when I figure out your DU nom de guerre.

[RandallFlagg]

Aye. Agreed.

[callisto]

It’s been obvious for a long time. . . just waiting for the day he/she/it [insert DUmmie behavior], as they all do, and eventually and gets banned. I will enjoy that thread. LOL.

[RandallFlagg]

Every post just strengthens my resolve that, just because I’ve quit smoking and can’t stand the smell of it any longer, to NEVER allow myself to become the horrid tobaccophobic type that infest our world under the false justification of, “I can, so you must, ADDICT!!”

Never will I become that.

[callisto]

We had one of those in our family. Smoked 20 years, then it became the bane of all existence.

[Tzimisce]

More American jobs pored down the drain. :(