Free Republic

It looks like a bar. The customers look like they're in a bar. But technically speaking, it's not. The sign hanging out front of this newcomer to Chicago reads "Smokers Welcome" and it's no joke: smokers are free to light up and puff away, despite being in a city which, like many others nowadays, has strict anti-smoking laws covering most public places. Inside this storefront, not far from downtown, there is a wet bar and a coffee bar, but for some – that may not be the main event. CBS News correspondent Cynthia Bowers says the establishment's operator has...

BEAUMONT - Every evening Pat Roy's bar fills up with workers in their boots and overalls who come to enjoy a few drinks and cigarettes. But if a proposed ban on lighting up in public spaces is approved by the Beaumont City Council, Roy predicts a 50 percent drop in business. "(The ban) would be devastating," said Roy, the owner of Patrick's Pub. For many of her customers, smoking and drinking go hand in hand, Roy said. If they cannot smoke in Beaumont, they will start frequenting bars in Nederland or Port Neches, she said. Roy and about a...

While I have been arguing for some time that making fallacious scientific claims ("health" claims) is wrong, there has been, so far, no response from anti-smoking groups or advocates, other than ad hominem attacks on me, a defense of the organizations in question, and a questioning of why it is such a big deal anyway. In this post, I will address the issue of why this is a big deal. I have already discussed why I think this is a big deal in terms of its implications for the effectiveness of the tobacco control movement. I believe it will...

New York City's attempt to sue Internet cigarette sellers for lost tax revenue under a racketeering theory has been dismissed by a federal judge for the second time.Southern District Judge Deborah Batts dismissed the amended complaint filed in City of New York v. Nexicon, 03 CV 383, finding that the city had once again failed to meet the standard for pleading a racketeering enterprise. The case is one of five that the corporation counsel has brought against Internet cigarette sellers it claimed have been avoiding taxes and failing to file tax reports on the number of sales they make to...

Cuyahoga Falls Mayor Don Robart is a nonsmoker who says he runs eight miles every day. A year ago, he banned smoking on the job for city employees. Since then, municipal buildings including the Natatorium have gone completely smoke free.Yet Robart is one of two big-city mayors in Summit County who virtually ensured the defeat of the countywide smoking ban by refusing to go along with it.Welcome to the complicated politics of the ill-fated Summit County Clean Indoor Air law.The smoking ban was originally sponsored by Summit County Executive James B. McCarthy and council members Pete Crossland, D-4; Paul Gallagher,...

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) _ The state Department of Taxation and Finance has advised a Buffalo cigarette wholesaler it can ignore a new law requiring tax collection on tobacco products sold to Seneca Nation and other Indian businesses. That eased tensions on Indian reservations in western New York where nervous suppliers cut off shipments to smoke shops earlier in the week. Indians accuse the state of ignoring their sovereignty. In 1997, the last time the state tried to collect the tobacco taxes, confrontations between Senecas and state police closed a section of the Thruway. By noon Friday, supplier Milhem Attea &...

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- A month before most indoor smoking is to be banned in New Jersey, a coalition of restaurants, bars and bowling alleys on Wednesday asked a federal judge to block the prohibition from taking effect. The opponents of the ban, scheduled to begin April 15, already have filed a lawsuit against the state, alleging it will unfairly harm their businesses. The federal court filing Wednesday seeks to halt the ban until that lawsuit can be heard.U.S. District Judge Stanley Chesler in Trenton did not immediately set a hearing date on Wednesday's request by the New Jersey Hospitality...

BURLINGTON, Vt. --The Veterans of Foreign Wars post in Hyde Park is defying a 6-month-old state law and will allow members to smoke in a private section of the club.Sign up for: Globe Headlines e-mail | Breaking News Alerts VFW Post 7779 Commander Bruce Martin, a nonsmoker, said he was one of those who voted to allow smoking. The issue was more than cigarettes."These people are sick of the state taking away our private rights," he said.Immediately after club members voted 7-4 Tuesday night to bring back smoking a number of members lit up.VFW auxiliary member Robin Ferris filed a...

Help Stop The Attack On Your Rights!!!The City of Calabasas in an over whelming attempt to stamp out what they feel is an unwanted part of their community has passed a law banning smoking from public places. Not only banning but making it a misdemeanor punishable by up to $1000 fine and/or six months in jail. That is not all if you witness a smoker in the act and don't report them you are guilty of aiding and abiding which holds the same punishment regardless of how you feel about smoking.Calabasas using its own unique judgment has inacted a law...

How would you feel about smoke-free restaurants? If some state lawmakers have it their way, the "no smoking" sign will be posted in every section of your favorite diner.If you enjoy smoking after a meal, like Melody Boutwell, you may have to light up outside. “I do smoke, but I don't like smoking around children. So I typically, even in a restaurant, go outside to smoke,” Boutwell said. A proposed bill would ban smoking in restaurants and possibly public buildings. “The debate has increased over the years, and at this point, it is the most intense I've seen it...

The air pollution scare industry is at it again -- in a very timely manner to help the Environmental Protection Agency impose more dubious regulations on us. “When the air is filled with increased levels of soot and other tiny particles, more people end up in the hospital with heart and lung problems, according to the largest study yet on the health effects of such pollutants,” reported the Chicago Sun-Times on March 8. Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the study reports that “short-term exposure to [fine particulate air pollution or soot] increases the risk for...

A statewide indoor smoking ban that exempts casinos is unfair and should never have been signed into law.When they approved an indoor smoking ban for New Jersey in January, lawmakers all but admitted a double standard was being set by allowing Atlantic City's casinos to continue allowing smoking. Now, a coalition of bars, restaurants and bowling alleys is rightly challenging the New Jersey Smoke-Free Air Act, set to go into effect April 15, asking a federal court to strike it down as unconstitutional. Hopefully, their challenge will lead to the law being scrapped. It was shockingly hypocritical for state lawmakers,...

The rest of the story is quite simple. The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids is not the only national anti-smoking advocacy organization that works just on tobacco issues.  According to a prominent anti-smoking researcher and advocate, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids - a national anti-smoking advocacy organization - has sent out a communication to its constituents claiming to be the only national purely anti-smoking organization. The communication reportedly stated: "As the only national advocacy organization that works just on tobacco issues, it's critical that we team up with other organizations and individuals to be successful." [emphasis mine] The Rest of the...

Democracy is alive and well in Columbia.That has to be the conclusion after a couple of hundred people packed the city council chambers Tuesday night to debate a Board of Health proposal that would ban smoking in bars and restaurants in the city. To some, the question of a ban on smoking isn’t a matter of whether but when. The politically correct bandwagon that says secondhand smoke is the root of all evil is charging through cities, states and nations all around the globe. Why should Columbia be any different? That’s how things seemed a couple of years ago when...

Poll results released late Tuesday show most Ohioans favor a smoking ban that exempts bars, bowling alleys, private clubs and restaurants that reserve separate rooms for smoking. The Ohio Licensed Beverage Association polled 600 voters and found Ohioans would reject a total smoking ban by a 52 percent to 46 percent margin. But a majority of those polled support a modified ban, and 62 percent believe business owners should be allowed to determine their own smoking policies. Locally, the city of Centerville implemented a smoking ban that went into effect last spring. Except for a handful of bars, restaurants...

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg yesterday announced a settlement with an online cigarette vendor that will allow the city to pursue residents for up to $33 million in unpaid excise taxes.It was the largest such settlement, officials said, since the city sued dozens of companies and individuals in 2003 for illegally selling cigarettes over the Internet to city residents. A 2000 state law banned direct sales of cigarettes over the Internet and by telephone or mail. Tobacco companies challenged the ban, but a federal appellate court upheld it in February 2003. The state began enforcing the law that June. Officials...

MADISON — A lawmaker pushing a statewide smoking ban that would pre-empt local rules by allowing people to light up in bars and certain restaurants says time is running out for action. While he doesn't consider the bill dead, Sen. Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, said he doubts it will get passed this year. "I've been around the building long enough to know that, until session is over, it's not over," Fitzgerald said late last week. "I will say this, the votes were not there to bring it to the floor this past fall and it still remains (at the committee...

Where's there's smoke, there's a lawsuit. A coalition of bars, restaurants and bowling alley operators filed a federal lawsuit in Trenton today to strike down New Jersey's indoor smoking ban as unconstitutional. The group is angry that the law excludes Atlantic City casinos, The Smoke-Free Air Act bans smoking in restaurants, bars, private office buildings and other indoor places but permits it on the casino floors. Sponsors and supporters said the casino exemption was needed to keep the casinos competitive with those in other states where smoking is allowed. Attorney Robert Gluck says the group would be satisfied if...

You probably won't get eighty-sixed for smoking cigarettes at Stella's Sand Trap. But you might be asked to leave if you ask too many nosy questions about smoking at the east Bakersfield tavern.It was a typical weeknight at Stella's. The beer and conversation were flowing and the hard, wooden "crack" of cue balls punctuated the air as pool players shot eight ball at the tavern's lighted tables.Cigarette smoke swirled thick and luxuriously toxic above the bar -- and for a moment, it seemed like the era of Merle Haggard's "swinging doors, a jukebox and a barstool" was back.The message was...

ST. PAUL — Several Iron Range lawmakers have snuffed out any talk of a possible statewide smoking ban. They believe it’s a local control issue.St. Louis County commissioners earlier this week deferred action on a possible countywide smoking ban and passed a resolution urging the Legislature deal with the issueCurrently the smoking ban bill is still “alive” in the Senate, but was put to rest in the House last year, and supporters of the legislation in the House will have to resurrect the measure again.Rep. Tom Rukavinia, DFL-Virginia, who described himself as a “libertarian” on this issue, was adamantly...