Members Write
Members Write
The mind Control Police are at it again...Sarasota has decided to "lead the way" in banning smoking on the public beaches...and I guess it will come up for a vote.
The last referendum regarding smoking in restaurants passed 2 to 1 because it was phrased on the ballot something like this:
"Do you approve an amendment to the Florida Constitution that would prohibit the foul, evil, and heinous pollution of cigarettes that disables and eventually kills all of the employees and customers that enter Restaurants...Yes or No?"
This one will read " Do you approve an amendment to the Florida Constitution that would prohibit the foul, evil, and heinous pollution of cigarettes that kills all of the marine life that comes in contact with our beaches...Yes or No?"
And in this way it will pass...EVIL indeed are these manipulators, with so much idle time on their hands...with what SCORN and CONTEMPT they must regard their fellow man, they think so easily and effortlessly manipulated. My fondest wish for them is that their Scorn and Contempt will eventually make life meaningless to them and gradually devour their very bowels and bestow upon them the worst case of butt cancer ever documented on the face of the Earth. And it amuses me, that they don't seem to realize that one person could smoke for a hundred years without causing near as much pollution as their stinking, $hit-filled carcasses will lavish upon the face of the Earth ( "for the children").
By the way, whenever you hear "for the children" you better look after your own butt because that is the battle anthem of the disenfranchised Communists in this country, that want whatever it is YOU may have and feel THEY should have instead! They think the slogan works great because if you oppose them, they can easily show that you hate children, and must be some type of child molester or something.
Steve Perry
Sperrymkt@aol.com
To: The Smoker's Club,
I was in England last year and noted an article in the Daily Mail, dated 10-21-03: How the world's oldest man lived to 122 by smoking' Seems a Mr Seil Yi died that month in Cambodia. In the same article it mentioned Frenchwoman, Jeanne-Louose Calment was the oldest age authenticated woman died in 1997. Ms Calment was also a daily smoker. Here in Florida, our oldest man died last year at age 113, but he quit smoking at age 94.
My grandmother died at age 96, smoked two packs a day. My geanealogy goes back to 1640. We were all smokers, living into our 80's back in the 1600 and 1700's, when most people were dying in their 40's. What's the message here? Want to live a long life? Smoke.
Jim Ringo, Jensen Beach, FL
To: The Smoker's Club,
Its nice to see someone writing about what the anti-smokers are doing.
Certain things though are being lost in time. The smoking studies of 50's & 60's of which we were shown in school, took rats and painted them with a supposed nicotine tar. They all of course developed cancer. The tar they used was later revealed to be a mix of nicotine and acetone. Acetone is a deadly/dangerous chemical, it could be mixed with water to make it deadly, and of course it would be cancerous causing water.
Then there was the smoking machines. They force injected the equivalent volumn of smoke produced by a forest fire into each animal. A heavy smoker would have had to smoke an 18 wheeler full of cigars symiltaneously to duplicate these experiments.
The Center for Disease Controls computer was programmed to deliberately show death statistics (SAMMEC).
The original EPA report on second hand smoke (size of a phone book), triggered several lawsuits because it was full of falsities. Soon after becoming available they quickly withdrew it from public access and came out with a version that only shows their findings. In that original version it gave their definition of relative risk which was as follows: An estimate of the unknown but believed to the true....
This anti-smoker movement is one that has been corrupt from the start, oppresses a minority group, and is destructive to personal rights/a free society. As these fascist factions banned together to crush smokers, to insure Freedom we must once against stand, fight, and unite, or submit to tyrannical rule.
Jack R.
Houston, Texas
"Pennsylvania Smokers' Action Network's (PASAN) Michael McFadden is continuing to meet with success in spreading the word of his groundbreaking handbook for smokers' activists, "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains" through his website at http://www.Antibrains.com and has recently received a very positive review from Dr. Seipmann, the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Theoretics at http://www.journaloftheoretics.com/Comments/c6-1.htm
Hello Folks,
It seems that it is about time (or actually way past time) to stand up
and act like well informed adult citizens instead of brainwashed TV
addicts and government pawns.
It is time to let our legislators, from the local to the federal level
know that we are tired of propaganda, junk science and general
bullshit!
We have let the junk science about smoking cause smokers to be
second class citizens so that they could be taxed more and so that
their lives could be controlled more by the government and so that
crooked lawyers (around 75% of legislators are lawyers) could get
filthy rich.
The same people who so strongly pushed the propaganda and junk
science about smoking are now doing the same thing to food.
Eating a low fat, low cholesterol diet has been proven to reduce
heart attacks is what you get told. What you don't get told is that
this is because those people die of cancer and other diseases
before they get old enough to have a heart attack. Other food
myths too numerous to be counted can be found as well.
Yet the government and the media and the crooked lawyers (the
infernal, eternal triad) continue to brainwash the unsuspecting
public into believing whatever gives them more money and more
power.
Yes, it is time to stand up to the politicians, change channels,
complain to your newspaper and whatever else you can do to put a
stop to control by bullshit! Also keep in mind that the only political
party that has denounced such control is the Libertarian party. Do
all you can to put more of them in office. Even if you don't agree
with everything in their platform, it will send a message to the
demopublicans that they have gone as far as we will allow them to
go.
The article below is just one of the latest wake up calls to us
American voters. Hold your head over the commode and read what
the anti's are really all about:
-- World Health Organization Becoming Global Food Cop ----
The World Health Organization, whose mission involves tackling
the scourges of AIDS and Malaria, now spends its valuable time and
resources fretting that people like to eat steak and drink soda pop. Late last
week, WHO released its "draft global strategy on diet, physical activity
and health." Following this development, the Pittsburgh Post- Gazette
ran a Saturday feature titled: "WHO wants 'Twinkie tax' to discourage
junk foods."
When Kelly Brownell first proposed the Twinkie tax, only reliable
food scolds like the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI)
thought it was a good idea. But now "sin" taxes on foods and other radical
ideas are widely endorsed by public health officials in America -- and, it
appears, all over the world.
In May, and then again in July, CSPI called on WHO to endorse
Twinkie taxes and other restrictions on food choices. CSPI also consulted
directly with WHO as it developed its "global strategy." And the resulting
recommendations are almost everything CSPI could have hoped
for. Their biggest victory comes in the form of WHO's statement that
governments should "use taxes to increase or decrease consumption of food."
Perhaps more telling than any one specific proposal: WHO comes
down squarely on the side of calorie-counting zealots who couldn't care
less about what people like to eat. The new WHO document contends
that "preventive strategies" should attack obesity "throughout the
population."
That, WHO argues, "will cumulatively yield the greatest and most sustainable benefits for populations" and "will far exceed the limited
impact of interventions restricted to individuals at a high level of risk."
"Preventative strategies," by the way, is public-health code for
government intervention to prevent fat and skinny alike from eating
foods that are high in fat, salt, and sugar. In addition to Twinkie taxes,
other examples include a minimum purchase age for candy and zoning
restrictions on restaurants. Essentially, the global public- health movement
would like to make buying a bag of nacho chips as difficult and expensive as
possible.
So much for the simple proposition that expanded food choices are
an overall good thing. Anti-obesity restrictions that apply to everyone --
not just the obese -- are gradually replacing the idea that
individuals and families should be responsible for governing their own diets.
We can have justice whenever those who have not been injured by
injustice are as outraged by it as those who have been.
- - Solon (594 B.C.)
Pelrod
Sick Smokers Non Sense From Baxter:
You do realize that if you're crossing the street and get hit by a
car, die on the way to the hospital and a pack of cigarettes fall out
of your pocket you make it 440,001 smoking deaths a year.
Or wait, you're out back of your favorite bar and get struck by a
bolt of lightning. That would make 440,002 smoking deaths a year.
Not to say all the pneumonia everyone will get standing outside in
the snow that will be blamed on smoking and our luck a few of them
will be the non-smoker's who insist on following us around. Then the
anti's can say it was all that secondary smoke.
If you die at 80, and haven't smoked in six decades, but smoked for a few years in your 20's, it's a smoking related death.
The way America is going now, not to many people want to hang around
until 70. That's 30 to 40 more years of this crap and most wonder
how they made it this far anyways.
Attention All Smokers:
By Bernie Greene.
The following was written to revitalise smokers who are in apathy over increasing encroachments because they have to some degree or other been mislead by anti tobacco propaganda. It can also be used to send along with letters to representatives and for handling friends and relatives who really do mean well but have been mislead themselves.
Two things every smoker should know
1. Just about every claim you have ever seen regarding the dangers of smoking has been presented with the intention of making it alarming rather than being shown the whole truth. Your own evaluation of danger is apparently not to be trusted.
2. Anti tobacco organisations are not small groups of dedicated people whose only interest is in informing us of risks we may be taking with our health. Their agenda includes; acting as a source of advice on how to sue tobacco companies, bringing about changes in laws concerning where and when we may smoke and insisting that governments raise taxes on tobacco products and bring about other restrictions.
The evidence for the above claims comes not from "Big Tobacco" nor Smokers' Rights groups nor out of the delusory minds of those helplessly addicted to tobacco, but from the website of one of the most notorious anti tobacco groups, the UK ASH group. To find their own statement of their agenda go to http://www.ash.org.uk then click the link on the left "About ASH" then click the link "Mission". Then go to the American ASH site http://ash.org/ashintro.html click on "Introduction to ASH" about half way down on the left hand side.
Evidence of misleading claims comes from the actual studies the claims are supposed to be based on. Here are some data from one of those studies, the infamous Doll/Hill study into lung cancer and smoking from the 1950's.
It is very simple to debunk the vast majority of claims (otherwise known as the "vast body of evidence") using such studies and there is no need to look at "counter studies" made by "Big Tobacco".
The Hill/Doll study showed that smokers of 25 grams of tobacco per day for upwards of 20 years had a 24 times greater likelihood of lung cancer than non smokers. This is almost the kind of claim we are constantly bombarded with except that 25 grams per day for 20 years is usually omitted so that it seems that any smoker of any amount has the same risk. It is possible to find actual figures in the study that support the first sentence of this paragraph but that is by no means the whole story. From the results of 40,000 people studied Hill/Doll projected their statistics across the UK population and showed figures per 100,000 people. Let's assume it was scientifically accurate to do that and just look at the figures produced.
They found that 7 non smokers in 100,000 contracted lung cancer. They also found that 166 smokers (of 25 grams per day, etc.) also got lung cancer. 7 goes into 166 approximately 24 times, hence the figure. What groups like ASH don't tell you is that 99,834 smokers out of 100,000 DID NOT get lung cancer.
Whenever you are presented with a claim like "smokers are X times more likely to get Y disease", if you aren't given the figures this claim is based on then you can't get an answer to the question "What are the chances of a smoker NOT getting Y disease?" Without that data you cannot truly judge the amount of risk you are really taking, but a politician can use the claim as a justification to increase tobacco taxes or impose other measures restricting your choice.
I've been involved in this fight for many years. I recognized the corruption and fraud being used even before Foreigner Koop was brought in by the big three false charities/govt beauracrats, to head the Public Quacker Service. In the process this is what I have observed.
1. Civil liberties has done almost nothing on our behalf.
2. Big tobacco companies have refused to help when I comes to our personal rights, they only oppose sales tax increases. Nothing relating to bans or the mistreatment we endure.
3. Legislatures back stab.
4. We should have learned by now from the past, that compromise to our adversaries (the anti's), is not a remedy but part of their plan to divide & conquer/dissect the resistance.
5. The restaurant associations are not fighting for our rights, its all about theirs....there right to decide.
So, who is representing us? Are we a whole of whats going on, or a part?
1. When you look at things in the broad perspective, you have to wonder.
2. Is also the right to bear arms under attack? How about alcohol? Then another, free enterprise. There's also reverse discrimination which covers many areas. For instance male vs female, race vs race, lifestyle vs lifestyle, physical condition, etc., etc., etc.
Does this sound like a country united? Should government be involved in our personal lives? My definition of Freedom has always been as follows: A society of individuals who are mutually tolerant and respectful of one another. Now I must ask are we Free....
As for our constitutional guarantees, one is stated like this.... Life, Liberty, & the Pursuit of Happiness without fear of oppression. Do smokers live without fear of oppression? Can you light up where you choose in public... Are you treated respectfully or criticized for your lifestyle?
All rights organizations need to be united......for those that seek to take away what freedoms still remain..... are definitely unified, have government backing, and work in
tandem with each other. United we can stand, divided we will fall.
But the answer to the question as to who represents us, I can only think of one organization that has some clout, but in a limited capacity. It is Forces. There are other smokers organizations out there, but the lack of funding and numbers of people not afraid to take a stand. Discrimination against smokers runs rampant and we did nothing to deserve it. It should be us that are angry, we are the target!
Jack
Houston, Texas
Subject: Re: 8.6 Million Sick Smokers Nonsense
You do realize that if you're crossing the street and get hit by a car, die on the way to the hospital and a pack of cigarettes fall out of your pocket you make it 440,001 smoking deaths a year.
Or wait, you're out back of your favorite bar and get struck by a bolt of lightning. That would make 440,002 smoking deaths a year. Not to say all the pneumonia everyone will get standing outside in the snow that will be blamed on smoking and our luck a few of them will be the non-smoker's who insist on following us around. Then the anti's can say it was all that secondary smoke.
The way America is going now, not to many people want to hang around until 70. That's 30 to 40 more years of this crap and most wonder how they made it this far anyways.
June 20, 2003
Mr. Avella (D-Queens),
I just wanted to personally thank you for having more courage than any politician around to stand up and question this absurd and unnecessary smoking ban. I quit smoking cigarettes 3 years ago however my wife and several friends smoke. While secondhand smoke may be a nuisance to some a recent study by the British Journal of Medicine concluded that there is no link between secondhand smoke and either heart disease or lung cancer. Yet the politically correct crusaders march on trying to control people's thoughts and decisions in what is supposed to be a free society. I think about how after a hard day's work or worse yet an unemployed day, a person within the state of New York can no longer go into a neighborhood bar and smoke a cigarette while having a drink. This really angers me and let me say every person I have spoken to, smoker or not is against this ban. It is not popular despite Bloomberg's rhetoric and lies.
I fully support your position to try and remove the ban from bars. Restaurants fine but not bars. I would hope that all city council members would show the same courage as you and reverse this ban in NYC while encouraging the state to amend its' law set to go into effect soon.
R. Kaplan
Dear Smokers Club,
Your newsletter and mail keep me sane. Is that good? Or should I be
insane, since I'm a smoker??? Depends on who you ask, I guess.
Speaking of
sanity, I'm sure antis read your emails also, so I would like to use this
opportunity to give them my personal thanks. Not only are they responsible
for me starting to smoke at age 16 (in 1961 they had already started their
propaganda), since you certainly can't say "NO" to a teenager without
getting the opposite result. But I would especially like to thank them for
making smoking such an interesting and educational hobby. Finding a secure
place to smoke elicits one's creativity, and from their propaganda, I was
forced to learn all about junk science/pseudo science, not to mention
bigotry and intolerance, bias and economics.
Without their help, smoking
would be downright boring! By the way, I'm one of those lucky people whose
asthma was cleared up by smoking. Once I started smoking, I no longer spent
my nights coughing and gasping. I actually began to enjoy breathing again,
thanks to tobacco!
Furthermore, now that they've taken up fat-bashing, I'm
waiting for them to admit that people who smoke tend to be slimmer than
people who don't smoke, since the mild stimulant in tobacco speeds up one's
metabolism. Of course, whether you smoke or not, a diet appropriate for
your individual needs should always be followed. In my case, that involves
eating lots of chocolate.
Since I started smoking, my weight went from 200
to 95, and I'm 5'5".
So once again, thanks to the antis, I'm healthier than
ever, and enjoy the challenge of every puff. Oh yes, the antis also helped
develop my sense of humor. Can you imagine raking in millions of dollars to
stop people from smoking, with the result that millions of people take up
the habit who never would have considered it before?
You gotta laugh.
bg
Letter sent to: JBANZHAF@main.nlc.gwu.edu
To quote The WHO:
Who Are You?
Who are you to file a suit on behalf of people who smoke, or eat?
You DO NOT represent me, nor do I want you to.
STOP what you're doing, because it's not on my behalf and I'm not programmable.
Not even by you.
From what I've read in the news, most people who carry extra weight, do so because of their genes. Do you know about this type of research, or do you just interview 6 year olds at fast food chains?
I've had enough of people like you. Stop telling me what to do.
I do not want you, or your ilk interfering in my life and invading my home.
Stop now.
Because history shows, the more you push people, the more dangerous it gets.
Leave me alone.
Don't Tread On Me.
A. Amorelli
NH
Smokers Club,
Every person who smokes or thinks that Maine would be going too far with this smoking ban, must e-mail, call, or write to every legislator concerning this issue.
They want a perfect society like Adolph Hitler who banned smoking in Germany when he was the Dictator for Germany at that time.
It is a dangerous thing when you take away people's rights for the convenience of those who cannot tolerate anyone else's habits.
Smoking is not illegal.
Sincerely,
Rep. Lois Snowe-Mello
Maine
Whose Business is it anyway?
The answer is in the smokers hands but as usual the smoker will be the ones who comply. It would only take a couple of months of smokers staying away from these businesses, for smoking tourist to stay away from New Zealand and the government would have to reverse the law or watch their gestapo tactics on these businesses backfire.
The reason that places where people socialise are smokey is because the majority of the patronage are smokers.
But smokers are their own worst enemy they will shrug their shoulder and clutter the doorways of these establis hments and in the next election even vote for the draconion government. There is a war on right now many people are dying and many more could die, here in New Zealand nanny state is more concerned with smokers than supporting their allies.
Many of the soldiers fighting for freedom will be smokers, fighting in a public arena. In the smokey atmosphere a war creates it would be silly to tell them they can't smoke because they MAY kill the person next to them, wouldn't it? But when these smokers come back from fighting from freedom from terroris. they once again will be treated like terrorist. The strange thing is those same soldier who fight and die for your freedom and mine will lay down and surrender to the anti-smokers every demand. You go figure!!
Joy Faulkner
Smokers Of Yhe World Unite
Dear Editor,
Why does it have to be so complicated and so controversial?
We all agree that smoking is not good for you, that children should not start smoking, that second hand smoke may have harmful effects. However adult Americans should have a choice.
Here is a practical plan that would satisfy reasonable people:
The County sells permits that allow a restaurant to permit smoking. The County controls the number of permits sold at a number of maybe 10 or 15% of the number of restaurants in the county. The county sets minimum air quality standards and monitors it through the Board of Health that already monitors the food and cleanliness in the restaurants. Workers have a fair choice of where to work, 85% no smoking 15% smoking. Customers have a choice of where to eat. The county collects revenues and overseas the air quality. The business owner has a choice of having an air filtration system and allowing their smoking customers to eat and smoke in peace. Really not that complicated.
Sincerely,
Bruce
This may seem a bit drastic, or harsh, but I would help fund a ad in some newspapers requesting all smokers to stop all charitable donations, from united way all the way to girl scouts, to recoup the excess taxes imposed on smokers by state and federal government.
This whole issue of cigarettes boils down to money. Some states and cities have made it illegal to smoke in public places. This is not because of health related reasons. It is because the governments involved have not realized enough monies from cigarette taxes, so have decided to supplement this deficit with imposed fines.
There is really only one way we as smokers can pass this expense on to others to get politicians attention. All of us have donations in common. This is one thing we are all able to affect, but we need to ban together and hit them hard all at once to be both heard and felt.
All the organizations I used to give to from Riley Children Hospital, to IPD Pal clubs, to Kiwanis Clubs, are now told, "Get my donation from the governor he got your money from me already."
If such a ad could not be placed in a newspaper perhaps we could have a mass emailing. I believe this will work if we stick it out. The government does not want to support all these charity groups.
The government does not listen to us. Maybe they will listen to other groups if we hit them all hard enough.
If I knew how to send this to all people on the internet I would send it. We can not be nice guys, and sit back while all our freedoms are taken away. This is the closest thing to a Boston Tea Party we are able to legally accomplish. Give it some serious consideration and let me know what you think.
Thanks,
Donald Ginsberg
Indianapolis, Indiana
Subject: Anti-Smoking Reality
Though all of us think of this, we don't often put it together in words. So I thought I'd make a check list of all the effects the anti-smokers have had on me (a smoker) and which most of us (if not all of us) endure.
1) Tremendous loss of disposable income due to heavy taxation
2) Denial of Gainful Employment
3) Loss of Existing Employment
4) Exposure to inclement weather conditions
5) Segregation, alienation, and discrimination
6) Censorship (not allowed to publically express views without repercussions) - includes the workplace
7) Placement in the category of "Social Outcasts" even though we have bigger hearts and more love for mankind than our adversaries
Unintentionally, I think I might have just recreated a list that Jews under Nazi Control during the World War II era would have written.....imagine that.
Yours in Liberty,
Jack Ritchie
Houston, Tx
November 20, 2002
Honorable Governor Bush:
Some ideas on how to pay for the two disastrous amendments affecting the school system:
Since the smoking voters are already hateful, I would hesitate to alienate them all the more by increasing a cigarette tax.
While you were campaigning, I was too, in telling the community that the 800 people who move to Florida every day are here because of you, because you support business, but a lot of them are in spite of you because a great percentage are foreign.
The foreigns collect food stamps and aid to families with dependent children. All of the "white" voters resent this and wish that somehow the minorities could pull their own weight instead of sponging off of us. What really burns up people I speak with is that we WASPs or Anglos limit our families, yet the usually Catholic migrants seem to have more children than they can afford.
I am in a grocery line frequently, and watch a woman with 5 kids have a big load of soda and DIAPERS.
I suggest we add the badly needed taxes onto the heavily sugared drinks, or the diapers that the multi-childrened families use. If someone cannot afford one penny per diaper, they have no business having a child. You could probably counteract this by eliminating taxes on birth control products.
I think the public will support you on the diaper tax, because it can be cloaked as a "disposal fee for paper", like they do for engine oil.
Another tax could be on porn magazines, porn shops and anything "adult". The Christian Right would probably turn themselves inside out in loyalty to you if Playboy and more were taxed.
How about taxing Game Boys? Kids sit and "play" this junk and get fat and sluggish when they ought to be studying!
One last idea: give the Lottery back to education.. Everybody says the bureaucrats get the money, not the schools. The loss of lottery money is a very sore side to your public.
Sincerely,
Natalie Reach
Dear Friends,
okay, you convinced me to vote for the Libertarians, though I
didn't have time to research them. Probably kick myself later for doing so.
In your discussions, I didn't see anything indicating that the
Libertarians understand anything about the politics of the smoking issue,
nor of course the science.
Maybe we should invite one to talk to us,
instead of speculating in our emails, about what they think.
My impression
(okay, more speculation)is that they are likely to cave in under the kind of
pressure the fascists are exerting on people on this issue.
Are
Libertarians fighters or just talkers?
Bestsy
We, as a country just lost a FREEDOM !!! Please, in the same manner that a few "idiotics" have found it possible to get an "amendment" to decide for us ...... fight "FUTURE" loss of rights !!! Gather signatures, etc. or anything necessary to get an amendment "ASAP" to reflect the following:
No one will be obstructed in any way to smoke in an open airway area,(which includes a screened area). "Indoor" is defined as a closed area with more than 3 walls ( 3 walls or less does not describe a closed area). Further, no parent can lose custody of children due to smoking in a residence.
Enough is Enough !!!!! I do not need "anyone" giving "me" directives to "protect" my health! I recall a case (I don't recall location, etc.) a mother LOST custody of her children "for child neglect" !!!!! I remember thinking of how I wished that I was an attorney and "what" I would do !!!!!!!! People better concentrate on placing physical and mental energies into action to assist elderly, orphans, sick people (whom have no relatives to turn to), people whom have no one to run errands or transport them to and fro. "SOMEONE" better do something "NOW" so the loss of rights stops "HERE", otherwise and inch will become a mile. There is already talk by some other idiots out there, whom wish to make a law or an amendment reflecting that certain foods be refrained from "sale" to "protect" the "obese". Protect "FREEDOMS", NOW because they are slipping away. It will take an organization to "begin" to put a stop to this decision.
Sincerely,
Sharon J. Kostenbauder (non - smoker)
3511 Dartmouth Avenue
Tampa, Florida 33603
I would dearly love to see the federal Canadian government and all the Canadian provinces attempt to enact a
Nation-wide indoor smoking ban !
Enforcement would cost a fortune and be impossible.
The hospitality industry would be decimated.
A Canadian Charter Of Rights challenge would be guaranteed.
The legality of the government allowing the tobacco companies to exist surely would be brought into question.
As would all levels of government's negligence in failing to protect workers and the public from ETS for 15+ years.
Lawsuits and health injury claims would fly...
This time I believe the anti-smokers have gone too far...
The more stringent the restrictions,the more unworkable they become in regards to enforcement.
Especially if the new regulation will freely be defied at will by a huge segment of the population.
As long as tobacco remains a legal product...
There shall always be challenges to the government's hypocritical stances on the sale of this product and the fact that the government generates large revenues from this deadly product.
Property rights will likely triumph in such a Charter Of Rights challenge.
This should be a wake ip call to all the complacent smokers and the non-smokers who are sitting on the fence in regards to this issue.
Everyone's freedom of choice is at stake, This has nothing to do with health,smoking or liability.
Cheers,
Craig
October 11, 2002
To the editor of all papers and anyone else who will take the time and think
In response to all these billions of dollars being ‘won’ by the misguided persons of majority age.
I can no longer sit back to watch and listen as others take away my personal rights one by one. This smoking versus non- smoking is the last straw. Yes, i smoke and have for over 40 years. My mother smoked – my father smoked – my grandfathers and grandmothers before them smoked. My aunts and uncles smoke and smoked. And they all lived to their late eighties and some into their 90’s. My children don’t smoke but their spouses do. My cousins are split but no one says ‘you can’t come visit if you want to smoke”.
Common Sense is definitely deceased when the people are suing and winning multimillions of dollars for something they ingested on their own not for a day or a month but for years. The packaging has stated a warning, the media has broadcasted many warnings over the years. Logic and Common Sense (which have both deceased in the last decade according to our government) dictates that ingesting something not natural is not good for you. If you continue to ingest that substance then you are taking on the responsibility of the outcome of ingesting or inhaling that substance. It does not take a rocket scientist nor a physics major to figure it out.
As far as these ‘poor misguided souls’ winning multimillions that they will never see, it is putting a financial strain on millions of people. The media nor the do-gooders tell you about the farms that have gone bankrupt, the feed stores that have closed their doors for lack of business, the truck drivers and their families that are in financial ruin, the children that have no new clothes or money for lunch because their parents were laid off from the factories that made the cigarette packs or the paper mills that produced the paper. We are not talking about just the person next to a smoker in a public place that is having a fit because the smoker “is infringing on his right to clean air”. My response to this is “go stand outside and breath in all that exhaust from the bus that just left – or the diesel engine that is idling to keep the ac running – or the poison that a crop duster or your friendly neighborhood truck is spraying for the mosquitoes – or the perfume that a female just took a bath in – or the other personal hygiene items for both male and female that will take your breath away’.
Me, I’ll take the smell of good pipe tobacco any day, or the odor of fresh cut grass, or a floral bouquet or sitting down with a fresh cup of coffee and my cigarette any here I want. You anti smokers are now infringing on my personal right to enjoy a substance that I choose to legally ingest into my own system under the Common Sense that it is a foreign substance and may have consequences.
Or maybe I should sue someone because Logic and Common Sense are now deceased and I need the laws of the government to enable me to understand that I am no longer responsible for my own actions. Besides I’ll probably be dead before I ever see the first check after the lawyers, the courts, the state, the county and the city get their share of the profits. But then I have heirs but they probably will be dead too because they smoke and the money will have to go through the system and then more lawyers and probate court and everyone gets their share first. But then they have heirs…
Signed,
Sharon Karlen, Family and Friends
St. Augustine, Florida
No one should make any decision on a smoking ban without doing their best to examine what all sides have a right to say regarding every issue in a true democracy. That includes we smokers. Since you can't find us in mainstream media, find out what smokers feel, think and say, online, www.smokersrightscanada.org, and learn, for example, that not one illness or death has ever been etiologically blamed on tobacco, including second-hand smoke.
Stephen Hartwell
Stop Prohibitionists
It began with the smoke police. Now we have food police, fat police, caffeine cops, sugar cops, aroma cops and so on, all of them doing their thing for the same reasons - "for our own good," "to protect us from ourselves," "for public health" or that knee jerk hot-button, "to protect the children." Where will it all end? Where are they taking us?
They may try to sound like a big majority, but they are not. However, they do hold the power right now, so watch out. Despite all their high-flown pretensions, obliterating individual liberty and freedom of choice step by step is their true accomplishment.
These self-appointed czars of social control want to take over through prohibition and coercion. They have no qualms about either denying anyone access to the use of perfectly legal products or depriving business owners of the right to run their businesses as they see fit. They don't care whose feet they step on in achieving their egocentric goals. Let them continue to run things, and they'll put an end to democratic principles.
It's time to call a halt to the madness of the prohibitionist onslaught. It's later than you may think.
FELT LAIR
Minneapolis
Re: Jack's Dad
To all of ya'll thanks for your sympathy. I'd like to share a little bit about him and what he did.
On Smokers Rights and politics we talked often. He, like us, thought it was terrible the way smokers were done/treated, and the way fanatics,
social parasites, and our own government conspired together to steal away our Freedom/Rights.
Growing up, he was a west Dallas streetfighter. He was stronger and tougher than those he ran with, even though they were older. When World War II
started, he enlisted into the army, then trained and became one of the 101st Airborne members.
He arrived in France two days after D-Day. He was there, in Holland, when the 101st and 82nd parachuted into the waiting arms of the German 9th
Panzer corps. That day he caught scrapnel and saw 92% of his buddies dead before they hit the ground and 96% of the 82nd wiped out. He fought
throughout Europe. He was one of the few that held out against the Germans at the Battle of Bulge (Bastogne). He was part of the advance guard that
freed the prisoners at the notorious death camp.
He was nominated by both his piers and his sargeants for the Bronze Star, but out of modesty turned it down. To the day of his death, he still
carried three pieces of scrapnel lodged to near to his spine to be operable. He also had three (3) purple hearts and numerous medals from
European governments.
He fought for all Americans and for the cause of Freedom. He was a life long smoker and a true hero.
You all have my deepest respect and I thank you all for exhibiting heroism and taking a stand for Freedom. Let's not fail our ancestors and their
struggles/willingness to give all for the cause of Freedom.
Jack
Houston, Texas
Dear Editor,
Re: B.C.'s province-wide smoking ban.
Actually over 1000 jobs were lost within the ban's 80 day run.
Nine hospitality businesses closed the doors forever.
24 charity bingos are no more.
The smoking ban played a huge part in the ousting of the B.C. NDP,among many issues.
They received over 180,000 letters demanding they remove the ban.
Many people I know in the hospitality industry,who normally never vote,did.
The province-wide smoking ban was a major issue of contention in the last B.C. provincial election.
There is no such thing as a "level playing field" when smoking bans are concerned.
If second-hand smoke is the health-hazard,the anti-smoking faction believe it to be:
The federal government should enact a nation-wide indoor smoking ban.
Still towns that border smoking friendly U.S. states would suffer greatly in their hospitality sector.
Only a North American-wide indoor smoking ban,would fit the definition of "level playing field."
No one forces anyone to patronize or work in a smoke-filled business.
Those who believe the second-hand smoke-danger hysteria,should work or play elsewhere.
No smoking policies should be set by the business owner,not the government.
As long as tobacco products remain legal in this country,government mandated smoking bans should not exist.
When our governments stop reaping huge tax revenues from the killer product tobacco and ban it's production and sales.outright...
I will believe that smoking bans are about public,children's and worker's health.
As our former NDP health minister Joy McPhail once said regarding our failed smoking ban in B.C.
"It's not really about worker's health,the ban is really a social engineering experiment to help people quit smoking."
Any regulation based on lies,misinformation,that a huge segment of the population will violate at will...Is a bad idea.
Unless owned or leased out to the private sector...
Hospitality venues are private property.
Not public places.
The government has no business forcing smoking bans on that private industry.
If the market dictates a need for smoke-free businesses,more and more will exist.
Maybe if the government stopped selling tobacco products,such fruitless experiments like smoking bans in private businesses would not be required.
Our federal and provincial governments are in fact the senior partners of so-called"big tobacco."
They are the true" merchants of death."
75% of the price of a package of cigarettes is provincial and federal tax.
When our "moral" death-peddling politicians outlaw tobacco products, I will believe they care about our health and personal well-being.
Craig Anctil
Burnaby,
B.C.
Canada
"Home of the failed province-wide smoking ban."
604-298-9201
v5b 4n7
roxxon@shaw.ca
If Mayor Bloomberg has such a hatred of smoking and smokers why doesn't he stop selling cigarettes in New York City? I believe it is because he is nothing more that a drug dealer covering up his misdeeds by shifting the focus to his proposed cigarette prohibition. He has the city benefiting financially on the backs of mostly poor people who are the largest percentage of smokers. His usurious tax increase has him reaping billions on the backs of the same smokers who he hates and accuses of being murderers and calls "stupid". Interesting how great leaders like Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt amongst many other great people were smokers. Were they all stupid murderers? Was the mayor who admittedly enjoyed smoking marijuana and cigars, a stupid murderer of others with the secondhand smoke his habits put into the environment? Like so many others this asinine hypocrite was allowed the freedom to make choices and then at a certain point in life make changes. Somehow in his warped mind this should no longer be the case for people today. Everyone must do as he now does. He is a poor excuse of a mayor. He should be focusing on protecting people, rebuilding the city, job creation, attracting business back to the city, unifying and healing people after the attack we suffered on 9/11. Instead he has chosen an extremely divisive issue in which he continuously insults people who use a legal product. It has been proven that the only truly effective means in reducing smoking over the last 30 years has been education. The proof is that smoking percentages declined from approximately 48% to 25% from 1970 until the early 90’s. This all took place without the abhorrent tactics used by anti-smokers today. The self serving hypocritical anti-smoking movement now led by the mayor has blatantly declared their agenda; prohibition and the ostracizing of smokers. Things we certainly do not need in these difficult times.
Rory Kaplan
Smokers Club Forum
Open discussion for tobacco issues. Conversations on products, bans, taxes, information relating to smokers and smokers rights.
You can get all the day's posts in one email, by adjusting your membership to "Daily Digest."
Is it more dangerous to smoke 3 cigarettes before driving or drink 3 glasses of alcohol?
Would you rather your child ride home with the one who drank, rather than the one who smoked?
Are our rehabilitation centers consisting of more drinkers or smokers?
Does smoking or alcohol create a tendancy towards violence, abuse, high divorce rates and which causes more accidents, injuries and loss of lives?
Who is more inclined to lack self control? The smoker or the drinker?
While tobacco companies are being sued for illnesses supposedly related to smoking, who will those who quit smoking due to the discrimination, etc., when their blood pressure rises, their increase of weight gains throw them into the danger zone for heart attacks or strokes? (Note: did anyone ever consider the fact that withdrawing something that has been into your system for decades could have its own physical side affects and dangers)?
Who takes the blame for the patient that leaves the hospital and goes home- only to commit suicide- b/c it is not worth the difficult time through withdrawls?
Who takes the blame for those of us that won't be subjected to threats of high taxes?
(I am very open to cutting my food costs and eliminating my medicine instead)
What about the physicians, who while they are concerned about dangers of smoking, realize that the stresses from trying to quit with traumatized patients, can have enormous impacts on their healing?
Give me a break... Smokers and non-smokers have rights and both sides need to respect the decision of the other. Neither are criminals, just one side is treated as such. No one thinks about the 90 yr. old woman who has spent all of her life smoking and sees that as the only source of pleasure that she has. Give me a break. I am not going to argue the benefits of quitting or not starting; rather the argument of 'choice.' If I am respecting others by not placing them in a smoke filled atmosphere, then seeing that I am entitled to MY RIGHT TO PRIVACY should create no argument. It is just like the 'seat belt' laws. We either have the right to privacy or we don't. If by not wearing my seat belt, I increased the chance for injury, then by all means ... mandate the law. But, if not, it is MY CHOICE...
Why do the politicians go after the smokers rather than the drinkers? How many enjoy their drinks? Does that say anything?
Katharn
I live in Ada and after today I will no longer Tip after I eat. I live about one hour from Texas and will spend as much money as I can in Texas. I think it is time for the Oklahoma government to have a perfect tax on perfect people for they do not pay their way.
Dwayne
I can't believe the gaul of our State House in MI. Our Governor has
started a bill to raise taxes in our state to pay our states deficit.
That don't sound so bad right, well this tax will ONLY effect cigarette
smokers. They will be Taxed 50 cents more per pack to cover the STATES
deficit. This is Outrageous Government out of control. Why should a
group be singled out to pay for a deficit that was caused by the States
overspending?
Not only Don't we, as citizens, get to vote on this issue,
the Governor has said if it don't pass the Senate, they will cut all
funding for the arts in our schools. This is the reason we have a
lottery in our state, is so these programs wouldn't be cut. (only 5% of
the Lotto earnings are going to the schools!?!?!?!?!) Yep, This is
America?!?!?!?!?!?!?! Land of the FREE and home of the brave. I feel
sick to call myself an American when people like this are aloud to
discriminate and Tax people without a vote! This country is was built
FOR The people BY the people but we have no rights as people.
Yes I smoke, I have been trying to quit for 4 years without success. Our state
just received 300 million dollars from the settlement with the big
tobacco companies. As a smoker, I resent the fact that I will not see
one dime go for my health or help in quitting, and on top of that They
(the state) want Smokers to pay them MORE for being a smoker, because
they can't handle money!!!!! What is wrong with these people.
This is PURE discrimination! I'm really starting to know what it's like to be a
Black man, in this country. The discrimination in this country towards
smokers is out of control. I drove a truck in this country for over 13
years, I have been belittled in restaurants by children, and watched the
parents laugh and say good boy. Called Dirty and made to feel less than
human because I'm addicted to cigarettes. I Blame the cigarette
companies for this. I wish I was an alcoholic instead, At least then I
would have some rights and get FREE help to quit.
This is the same Governor that wanted to raise taxes on Diesel fuel sold to Truckers to
pay for their raise. Needless to say that was not passed it was deemed
discriminatory. Why is it not the same for a smoker? We (smokers) have
become the one thing that is deemed to be OK to discriminate against, and
quite frankly I am damn sick of it. Luckily I live close to the border
of Indiana and will be going there to buy my cigarettes till I can quit.
But that will not help the rest of the smokers in the state. It's time
something was done about this.
I can't believe that how far this country has gone downhill in last few years. I hope this gets your attention and
you air it. I'm one want to be NON Smoker that is mad as hell and I'm
not going to take it anymore. Instead of kicking smokers to the curb for
an addiction that is harder to kick than a cocaine habit. Why not start
programs to help them quit, or pay for nicotine patches or what ever to
help people quit?......
Kent Carson
Kalamazoo MI
MR. and MR. Cherner: If anyone watched 20/20 sometime back host Barbara Walters interviewed "the Cherner family" live in their home, the story's peg was that same sex marriages could raise a happy family. In the background was two very pretty girls ages 7-9 one was wearing a "I hate smoking T shirt.
The girls were the daughters of Cherner and his partner conceived in birth by a proxy Mom with donations of both fathers' life giving cells. The "couple" was very much in love. Joe Cherner (sat on couch with legs folded under with arm around husband batting eyes at husband like teenager)
I was repulsed by the sight of this promotion by BA BA Wawa My thoughts turned to the little kids that were manufactured to promote dysfunction as functional and burned with anger as I wondered how it would be for Camille and her sister to live in a world being taught to hate with each passing day.
I hate to write about this out of fear for the two innocent kids as their parents look to demonize smoking to justify their own sins, God, how I hate this road we are traveling down.
Archie Anderson
I think the obvious escapes many people:
Since most nonsmokers are annoyed by smoke, it only makes sense to designate smoking to private places.
Since most middleclass parents are annoyed by rap music...
Since most Americans are annoyed hearing Spanish spoken...
Since most "normal" people are annoyed seeing gays...
Since most people without a liberal arts education are annoyed by modern art...
Since most adults are annoyed by "Barney"...
Since most superficial people are annoyed by those who aren't well dressed or born handsome, beautiful or thin...
Since most taxpayers are annoyed by government spending for programs they don't directly benefit from...
Since most cases of AIDS resulted from behavior we find annoying...
Since most thoughtful people are annoyed by self-righteous do-gooders who wish to change society into their vision of Utopia which makes illegal anything found to be annoying...
Jacob Rose
Letter to the editor:
...thank you Sir, may I have another?
I was quite disappointed although not surprised at today’s news re: Eves might raise tax on tobacco to boost budget. Let’s see if I get this straight. The same people that the province targets, abuses and harasses on a regular basis are the ones they turn to for bailing them out of debt? While my initial instinct is to assume that smokers are getting what they deserve - by not speaking up, I then remember that they unfortunately have no voice in Government – courtesy of government-sponsored extremist groups. Unlike these very well “publicly” funded anti-tobacco lobbyists, who work around the clock on advancing their agendas, actual smokers have no actual opportunity (funding or otherwise) to voice their legitimate concerns to their own government. Where’s the accountability there? Where’s the fairness in at least “honestly” listening to the very public that the government will be directly affecting through its public initiatives? But that’s the game, then again.
Ontario’s tobacco control strategy has long funded organizations such as the Non-Smokers’ Rights Association (NSRA) and the Ontario Campaign for Action on Tobacco (OCAT) – to name a few, to lobby them on how to harass legitimate, hard-working, law-abiding businesses and shame smokers into submission. To essentially help them to secure and justify what is little more than a tax grab from those who are continually getting the paddle.
And I can see that they are indeed getting their money’s worth. OCAT is quick to tell Ontario that it is on the right track by buying into anti-tobacco rhetoric and is quicker to deliver on the broad (incestuous) public support for the initiative. How unfortunate that common sense and public accountability go out the window in our country when it comes to tobacco products. But then again, perhaps that is the greatest sign that the Government has gotten its money’s worth by funding groups like NSRA and OCAT. On a mission to “denormalize” the product, the industry and smokers, they are effectively delivering to governments the necessary loophole to democracy.
Having worked as a successful tobacco control advocate in Canada over the last 11 years, I certainly recognize that tobacco represents a legitimate health issue. I also believe that governments have an obligation to inform and educate consumers (and potential consumers) as to the risks involved with smoking…but enough is enough already.
While tax policy has been promoted as an effective “health lever” for governments over the last decade, the fact remains that there is a point at which usually law-abiding, honest Canadians will break. A point at which Canadian smokers will lose all faith in their government and their ability to be treated fairly. The hard truth is that no government has ever undertaken any significant research in the area of “optimal pricing” for tobacco products in our country. Despite recommendations made by the House of Commons’ Standing Committee on Health in June of 2000, governments in Canada have been steadily increasing tobacco taxes without any clue as to what the market response will actually be. But the public service mentality has always been that any emerging problems from ill-conceived policy directions will likely become someone else’s problem 5 to 10 years from now. And you what?...they’re right.
And so, as Ontario is poised once again to ask smokers to bend over, the likely response will likely be….thank you Sir, may I have another?
Luc Martial
The high tobacco taxes in Alberta gave me a good reason to cut back on other expenses, such as my company had a donations budget of $2,000.00
per year, which was split up to various charitable groups.
Now I have eliminated the donations totally. When called upon by any group to have the company donate money, I simply tell them "sorry, I'm a smoker
and therefore due to high taxes imposed by our dictatoral "so called democratic gov't.", I can no longer give to any organization. Please call up the non-
smokers instead.
As well, I found myself bringing lunch to work more often, due to non smoking restaurants, where I used to go to. This seems to be saving me money
on a weekly basis, ( est. approx. $46.00 per week average).
I know the money saved as per above is very quickly taken up by the high taxes imposed but so what.
Thanks,
Joe Liwczak
To the Editor:
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's theory that raising the price of cigarettes will discourage teenage smoking (NYC column, Feb. 27) ignores the history of the high price of illegal drugs. Where money is to be made, criminals are present. A high price could lead to truck hijackings and illicit importing from other states.
Another result could be an increase in other crime. High drug prices lead addicts to rob to support their habits.
NINA HOGAN
Bronx
March,2002 Providence Journal letter:
Leftist busy-bodies dictating to us
So M. Charles Bakst, in typical leftie fashion, thinks smoking should be banned in all restaurants in Rhode Island. May I remind him, and you as well, that approximately 30 percent of adults in this country use tobacco in one form or another, that it is still a legal product, that it provides a large amount of taxes to cities and states, and that many of us are tired of people telling us what we can or cannot do on the basis of how they feel about things (and no, I don't smoke).:
Yes, there should be smoke-free eating places. But all of them? Aren't we, as adults, capable of deciding for ourselves whether or not to dine in a place that allows smoking? Do we really need (or want, for that matter) the state to tell us what is good or bad for us? Where does that end?
Remember this: those who are willing to give up freedom for protection are neither protected nor free.
PETE SUTTON
Attleboro
Who else?
Dr. Charles Drew, who invented the concept of blood plasma, spent quite a bit of time at McGill University in Montreal. He believed Canadians were anti-racist, because he was welcomed with open arms, and respected widely, despite being black.
How would you like to be "cared for" by the white doctors back in the United States who refused Drew a blood transfusion in 1950 and admission to an all-white hospital after he had been seriously injured in an automobile accident, even though Drew, a surgeon himself, had invented the concept of blood plasma? Drew was sent to a hospital on the other side of town and eventually bled to death.
Today, white doctors in Canada such as Dr. Frederick Ross of Winnipeg are deciding they do not like smokers, so no medical care. Who else do these doctors not like?
Stephen Hartwell
Toronto
Perhaps they're not wild about people who see conspiracies everywhere.
Treatment more costly now than 50 years ago
Please spare me the lectures on the evils of smoking, drinking and obesity. The real cost of health care has increased because medical care has made huge strides in treatment in the past 50 years.
Fifty years ago, if you had a premature baby it died. Now we spend at least $250,000 per preemie to save them.
Fifty years ago, we didn't transplant organs, do open-heart surgery or live to be 100. This all costs money.
Do you want to go back 50 years and let cancer patients, babies and old people die? Or do you want to pay for the cost of increased premiums?
Just don't spout that holier-than-thou nonsense about keeping fit.
Kate Sarginson,
Victoria
They just passed a by-law up here in Brampton, Ontario that allows the owners of restaurants to choose whether or not they wanna be smoke free or not. To wit it states ...... Either your business can be completely smoke free OR you can open your doors to smokers and ONLY those above the age of 18 BUT a sign has to be clearly visible on the entrance stating such.
From what I have heard it is working very well and now the restaurants who banned smoking are complaining of losing business to these restaurants.
I for one am hoping that it opens the eyes of our so called government to the problem. The two faced hypocrites that they are. Ban smoking yet raise taxes on smokes so that they keep getting money in their pockets from us smokers. So basically they're saying " We think smoking is un-healthy and we want you to quit BUT we'll keep raising the taxes to line our pockets with your money.
Darren
Nonsmokers should check facts before chiding
Not only have the vigilantes for the smoking ban infringed on our rights as free Americans to sit in a restaurant and enjoy a cigarette with our meal, now they are invading our places of employment to threaten and intimidate us while we work.
While going about my duties at my job as a server in a restaurant, a "gentleman'' walked in looking lost and confused. I asked if I could seat him for lunch or maybe help him find the people he was looking for.
He asked me if we have smoking in our bar area and also serve food. I told him we do have smoking and food service in our bar at this time. This person responded by saying it is against the law, we were not allowed to do so, and demanded an explanation. I tried to explain that to comply with the first ban we made the necessary improvements (i.e. door, ventilation, glass panels, etc.), and because we did those improvements we were grandfathered in to allow smoking until April 2003 to those 18 years of age and older.
This person didn't even let me get the explanation out before interrupting me, telling me I was not being truthful, the law does not say that, pointing at me and threatening that he would be reporting me/us to the police.
I'm sorry, did this law give him the right to come to my place of work and harass me? Not only did I not make the law against smoking, I would not be responsible if the establishment I work for chose not enforce it. I find his actions representative of the activists and lobbyists who go around forcing their opinions on people who are just trying to peacefully live their lives. He didn't even take the time to understand and know the law before coming in to condemn us! Do you think this has gone far enough? Shame on him. Shame on people like him.
VICKI OESTREICH
DULUTH
I saw your item on smoking on Disney Cruise Lines in your newsletter. Last year my wife and I took an Alaskan cruise on Holland American
Cruise Lines. You can smoke in your room. Interestingly enough, they do not designate rooms as smoking or non-smoking. They say they clean
all rooms thoroughly between cruises. They are the only cruise line I know of that has smoking sections in their dinning rooms. You can smoke
anywhere on deck. Their cruise line is very friendly to smokers. They are the only cruise line I will use.
Bob Speck
The governments of the world need to leave smokers & the Tobacco industry alone once & for all & get down to the
business of doing their job governing.That does not include trampling on the rights of smokers to choose for them
when & where they can smoke nor does it include suing the Tobacco Industry for making a legal product & the verbal
slandering of the Tobacco Industry is appalling but'can be expected from a bunch of crooks who spend their entire
life cheating & deceiving the public.
Shame on them.
Wayne Oversen
I never thought I would be writing these words in America about America but it is reaching epidemic totalitarian, freedom crushing state control.
But we shouldn't stop with a little second hand smoke if we are concerned about the little children. (Actually they are not concerned about the little children at all, in any sense. This is a back door to a totalitarian state)
I predict we will see abuse of children's nutrition laws against the parents, children's choice of disciplines laws against parents, children's rights laws and children's attorneys for the poor weak things against the parents. Etc, Etc. (more back doors)
Anyone with real concern for the weak and unrepresented children ( which is what they want you to believe, to use these back doors) will leave them to the Love and care of the parents. They won't get any better. Of course there are some that abuse but these can be dealt with by existing laws. 99% of parents love their children and want the best for them. So what's the problem. POWER TO CONTROL THE MASSES That's the problem. But that's another story of which abuse of children is only a part.
As I read history, these things that are happening in America have always preceded a control Government. Hitlerism is a prime example, among many others. Freedom lovers have always had to work and pry out the Power brokers who are the real scum of America. Most Americans are a decent, hard working majority. Why should we let a few control the many? We shouldn't!
If enough veterans would do this, it would help put a stop to the Governments war against smokers and tobacco companies. When it begins to hurt them in their pocket book, they'll back off!
I am personally bothered by grotesque priggishness, and troubled by its recent ascent in American life.
Linda Stewart
New York
Customers returning to restaurant after exemption granted from smoking ban
Minneapolis Star Tribune
A local restaurateur has put ashtrays back on the tables after being granted an exemption to the citywide restaurant smoking ban, and as many as 41 others hope to do the same.
The Kenosha Common Council on Monday granted Andy's Restaurant and Andy's Drive-In two-year exemptions . . .
"I've seen some of my regular customers come back that I haven't seen in three months," said Anderson, who estimated that at least 15 customers returned once the ban was lifted. " They made known they were back because they could smoke."
Letter sent to info@americanlegacy.org
You people are confusing genetic destiny with pleasure causation.
There's just too many old smokers around to justify your conclusions.
Consider who benefits from the anti-smoking promotion:
Government- More taxes.
Medical Industry- Reasons for unknown medical problems, government research money, and cover for invalid diagnosis.
Insurance Companies- Higher premiums and excuses for higher medical cost with more profit.
Oil Companies- Scapegoat for carcinogen and emphesema producing fuels at the self serve pumps and in refineries.
Non-Smokers- Not having to rely on etiquette to remove a little irritation from their environment.
Religion- Helping out the anti-pleasure fools by going along with their self righteous ancestors.
Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop- A health web site that is almost as bankrupt as his ideas on smoking.
Media- Something else to report on.
Politicians- Another great issue and a good control factor over the hapless voters.
American Legacy- It's very existence.
Stress causes more medical problems than all other causes. Smoking relieves stress. Have a cigarette and a glass of whiskey and sit around a campfire, a soothing activity that human beings have enjoyed for several million years.
Sam Nettles
Ft. Worth, Tx
(Heavy smoker for 55 years)
Australian doctors are playing God. American doctors, if they are not already doing so, will soon follow. That is a pretty scary thought.
They aren't smart enough to come up with a cure for cancer, but they think they are smart enough to play God.
They should ask themselves whether or not God would discriminate against smokers.
Here are some other questions:
Why treat overweight people for heart problems, they are probably going to die from a stroke or diabetes or other heart problems?
Why treat homosexuals, they will probably contract HIV/AIDS and die anyhow?
Why treat professional football players, the future health care costs of their injuries will be a tremendous burden to taxpayers?
Why treat (fill in the blanks) ...
Steve Murphy
Let's see if I understand the current state of personal responsibility in America:
If a woman burns her thighs on the hot coffee she was holding in her lap while driving, she blames the restaurant.
If your teen-age son kills himself, you blame the rock 'n' roll musician he liked.
If you smoke three packs a day for 40 years and die of lung cancer, your family blames the tobacco company.
If your daughter gets pregnant by the football captain, you blame the school for poor sex education.
If your neighbor crashes into a tree while driving home drunk, you blame the bartender.
If your cousin gets AIDS because the needle he used to shoot heroin was dirty, you blame the government for not providing clean ones.
If your grandchildren are brats without manners, you blame television.
And, if your friend is shot by a deranged madman, you blame the gun manufacturer.
God bless America, land of the free, home of the blame.
Aren't we glad we live in America? Is this a great country, or what? We can do what ever we want, and give the blame to someone else.
Hitler would approve of cigarette taxes
This is in response to the editorial, "Cigarette tax hike fair way to finance more health care." I would like to briefly tell you how this "politics of punishment" agenda works in Canada.
You'll be relieved to know that Canadian smokers pay $7 (Canadian) for a pack of Camels. This has had the effect of pushing literally thousands of starving kids into food banks. Their crime? Having poor parents who made a mistake as teen-agers in less politically correct times and becoming addicted to cigarettes.
This is a small price to pay, however, so Canada's legions of anti-smoking activists can attend winter conferences in Miami on teen smoking. Canada, along with Cuba and North Korea, has a government monopoly on health care.
I would briefly like to describe to you the wonderful level of health care we Canadians get for $7 a pack for cigarettes (not to mention $50 for a bottle of booze, 71 cents a liter for gasoline, a 7 percent provincial sales tax, a 7 percent federal sales tax, and a top rate of 50 percent income tax).
I was a childhood asthmatic. In 1970 at age 15, all my prescriptions and treatment were terminated because I started smoking. Canada's health care monopoly was kind enough to restore the prescriptions 23 years later (1993) when I was on my deathbed for "smoking-related reasons."
The historical precedent for this "politics of punishment" agenda comes from Nazi Germany. Before modern Canada or Massachusetts, Nazi Germany embarked on a campaign to end smoking. Cigarette taxes were raised 800 percent, a draconian indoor smoking ban was instituted, and a goofy, mostly anti-Semitic, anti-smoking campaign was launched.
Caricatures of Hasidic Jews trying to lure an "Aryan" youth to take up smoking, cartoons depicting smoking as the vice of "Jews, Africans, Indians, loose women, decadent intellectuals" were among the more popular with Hitler Youth and the League of German Girls, who signed smoke-free pledges, put on plays warning of the dangers of smoking to the "Aryan race," etc.
Most ended up smoking, anyway.) In fact, smoking rates increased in Germany by some 50 percent from 1932-39, while staying stable in France. This is even more remarkable since Jews were banned from buying or smoking cigarettes in 1938. (Hitler was obviously concerned about their health.) Similarly, women under 25 and over 55 and all pregnant women were banned from smoking. Non-Jewish-owned restaurants that allowed smoking were forbidden from selling cigarettes to female customers.
WARREN KLASS
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Smoking foes use skewed statistic
City Councilor Paul Hart wants to ban smoking in city restaurants because "secondhand smoke kills 53,000 Americans per year." Not true. If your Board of Health and Tobacco Control are touting this figure, they either know the truth and are lying in order to protect their agenda and livelihoods or they are so ignorant of the truth they should look for work elsewhere. Here are the facts on the infamous 53,000 death figure:
First, it was not the American Cancer Society that compiled that figure. Drs. Glantz and Parmley -- known, biased anti tobacco activists -- compiled a report taken from a study by Judson Wells. In 1989 Glantz submitted the report to the EPA. The EPA rejected the report and the figure.
In 1994, the Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress, was asked to review the 53,000 figure and they rejected it also, saying the figure was "implausible."
Prior to the report getting published, the peer reviewers for the publisher recommended a revision of the report, saying it was "too speculative." It was published anyway.
Secondhand smoke is not a health issue but a political one, and Councilor Hart is buying right into it. If anyone needs more proof, it’s there, you just have to look for it and stop listening to those that profit from the scare.
Marty Ronhovdee
San Luis Obispo, Calif.
My mother lives in a Senior Citizens building here in Toronto, Ontario.
She was sitting outside on a bench smoking a cigarette when a non-smoker sitting on a bench opposite began to insult her and tell her she could not smoke. Upon telling the person there was no sign that said she could not smoke, my mother proceeded to do so. The other person responded by getting up, coming over and hitting the cigarette out of her hand. The person accompanying the non-smoker raised her hand to hit my mother but my mother's sister fortunately stood up and told the woman that if she did so, she would hit the woman.
I asked my mother why she didn't call the police. Her answer was so very sad because it's so very true. She told me she was afraid that if she called the police they would take the side of the non-smoker!!!!!! When she told me this I was so livid, I wanted to hit someone myself.
This is what the non-smoking public is turning we smokers into -- angry, rebellious, powerless to fight 'losers' (or at least if this keeps up, that's what we'll all become).
If there's ever been a case made for the psychology of mass oppression against any group of people, this serves to prove that by direct association, the antagonists by virtue (or non-virtue) of their actions against us, are turning us into the same thing.
Being a single widow still seeking the companionship of a nice man, a friend of mine gave my telephone number To a man who called me last night. Of course, I have become quite hyper vigilant when it comes to meeting, or even speaking to, new people, concerning the issue of smoking -- and rightly so, as the following episode reveals.
He began telling me what a 'healthy' person he is, ya know -- jogs every day; belongs to a fitness club; (I was waiting for him to tell me he was also a vegetarian) but we didn't get that far. He had told me he was 45 and single (never been married) and I told him I was a widow who'd lost my husband to cancer many, many years ago. When the issue of smoking came up -- he asked if I was a smoker and of course I told him I was -- he immediately boasted how he WAS NOT a smoker. He said he dates women who smoke but only if they are so deferent to him that they hide their cigarettes in public. I told him that he and I would never get along if that were the case.
Of course he used that irritatingly repetitive line about we smokers killing everyone with out second-hand smoke. At that point I told him that although I didn't want to get into a political argument with him about the lies being told about 'that particular issue', I tried to enlighten him with the REAL facts about ETS. He, of course, did not believe me but said, "Well, even if that were true, don't you think that non-smokers have the right NOT to breathe in YOUR smoke?" If this wasn't so profoundly absurd, I would have laughed at the comment. As it was, I could only stop myself from seething. I told him that I didn't feel it was MY right to demand that people with body odor or strong perfumes or 'flatulence' be restricted from restaurants or public places. Naturally, he said, "It's not the same thing." I told him I felt it was exactly the same thing, given that neither second-hand smoke, body odor or flatulence are dangerous to other people.
Needless to say, at this point I was ready to hang up, when he asked me how my husband died. I told him that my husband died of a very rare type of cancer called 'metestatic melanoma' which manifested itself in his eye and then later spread to his liver. His answer, "Well perhaps he got it from YOUR second-hand smoke!!!!" I don't think I have to tell you the effect that comment had on me. Had he been in the same room with me I would have assuredly attacked him with all the venom I've been accumulating from having to deal with people like him in the past. And, by the way, this man claimed to not be an adamant non-smoker, which makes you wonder what an adamant one would be like if his attitude was considered 'passive'.
It frightens me to think that I, a reasonably rational, non-violent, easy-going, prudent, courteous, friendly and sensitive person, can be (to my own chagrin) incited to such levels of anger.
Bayla
Greetings
I know opinions are like other bodyparts with everybody having one, but here's mine.
After reading the newsletters and the e-mails at the club and the other Smoker's link sites, it seems to me that Smokers have been forced to take a defensive-reactionary position. This is ok but not many wars are won with defense only. I'm not a Californian, but I think the California Smokers could adopt the opposition's approach and place a few propisitions on the ballot. For example, a proposal that the tax collected from smokers be only used to pay for alleged smoking-related illnesses. I'm sure enough voters would support a proposal such as this. It would have to be monitored to ensure that WHO would not introduce "Scientific Research" claiming smoking causes such ailments as ingrown toenails, etc. The science would have to be challenged in court. If successful this prop would strip the opposition of some funding and the taxes smokers pay would pay for the alleged illnesses (a major claim in the recent lawsuits.)
Thanks for letting me mount my soapbox and taking up your time
Ken
Hi.
I don't know if you remember me, but I wanted to keep you updated on
a smoking ban at work.
I had to hire a good will lawyer to send a letter to the company I work
for. There is really nothing anyone can do in NYS. There is no law that
says employers have to give employees a smoke area. I think the reason
they might be changing smoke policy is due to the fact that the
publicity would not be good for the company seeing it is owned by mostly
stockholders.
This policy went into effect in Feb. and we are still fighting it.
Response to lawyers letter was that we will be getting a smoke area in
mid August
I wanted to thank you for helping me through this. Really appreciated.
Doreen
To The Smoker's Club,
I am a bartender in Fresno, Ca. I think this smoking law is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of. How can the government decide that they can close someone's business down if they decide to. They are not suppose to site anyone unless a employee complains, yet they do. They seem to be able to do as they please, and we are suppose to sit back and take it. It is quite scary that bar owners are scrambling around trying to build patios to keep their business open. They have invested money in a business that they stand on losing. If smoking is allowed, it should be posted as a smoking establishment. If smoking is not allowed then it should be as such. We still have a brain, and should be allowed to use it to decide for ourselves if we want to be around smoke or not. Cigarettes are still legal in this state.(For the time being) I guarantee you that if the government found that second hand catsup or first hand catsup for that matter caused cancer, how long do you think that catsup would remain on the shelves. The government makes way to much money on the taxes we pay to smoke to pull cigarettes off the shelves, so I guess they just control where we, as AMERICAN CITIZENS, are allowed to smoke these horrible things. I believe as a bar tender and working in an establishment that has one of the largest Lotto machines in the valley, should shut them all down. Then see how long the state of California is willing to hold out without any revenue from all the machines in the state. Anyway, that is my feelings, and I'm sticking to them.
Thank you,
Cindy
Re: new smoking warning labels:
What a joke!
If the government thinks this will cut the incidence, of smoking, they need brain surgery!!!
The last time, they had their new bold labels, put in place. they were sure that, would be an effective measure. Since then, teenage smoking has risen, close to 40%!!!!
People will just use, cigarette cases and fun-pack sliders, with positive images on them. They have already been developed!
Just tell the kids don't smoke, they'll do, the opposite, .thinking that, they are bad-asses!
They are rebelling against corrupt, governments, and society in general.
The government should, put all the smokers on prescriptions. sell cigarettes only out of pharmacies. The next generations of youngsters,would then indeed, have a difficult time starting
this habit!
The only problem is.... this is about money! The govt. is addicted to tobacco tax profits!! This is just another bit of political posturing, on their part... for their up- coming lawsuit against the tobacco industry! But, shouldn't they be named as the co--defendants, in this suit? They make 3 times the profit the tobacco companies do! They call the tobacco companies: the merchants
of death! True, but doesn't that make them 3 times as bad and senior partners, in the business?????
Face it, if smoking was costing health-care as much as they claim.(they can never, get the figures straight).cigarettes would be outlawed tomorrow!
In B.C. we now have the W.C.B. ban! A law(unenforceable) made without consultation of the public or industry. All based, on the results of the flawed E.P.A. second-hand smoke study. the WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION ruled this test invalid!! But the B.C. government, preaches these bogus findings as the gospel truth!!!
This will be challenged by business owners, who have put their life-savings on the line. They have seen their profits dwindle, have had to lay-off employees and live in dread of what the coming tourist season will bring.
With THE W.C.B.s' NAZI-LIKE: snitch-line, they have brought on loathing and hatred, between the smoking and non-smoking factions, alike! Over 600 bar and pub workers have been laid-off, in the first 3 weeks of this ban!
When will, the madness stop?! This isn't about health, it's just another cash-grab!!! Any thinking person, can see this, including the children taking up this habit!
From Craig Anctil
Burnaby,B.C.
From the mailbag...
Three major lies in the country today:
1. I'm entitled to one mistake.
2. It will never happen to me.
3. I've got plenty of time.
J.C. Watts, R-OK Speaking to students in Bryan/College Station 1999/10/09
A couple of years ago, Jack put an ad in a local Los Angeles area newspaper looking for an employee, adding, "smokers preferred." He had a great response, about 130 replies to his ad. Just recently he called the same newspaper wanting to put the ad in again but this time he was warned that if he added "smokers preferred" that there were people ready to pounce on him. Not needing any problems during his busy season, he followed the newspaper's advice, obviously learned from experience, and left the reference to smokers out of the ad. This time he only received six replies.
If all the air pollution caused by cars were a white sheet of paper and all
the tobacco smoke were a black dot, then one would need an electron
microscope to see the black spot.
T. Graves
True story: A client of mine, a feisty 70 year old smoker, was finally talked into having a
chest x-ray by her doctor. When looking at the x-rays with her, he pointed out
white spots on her lungs which he said were caused by her smoking. She then
asked him, "And what would you have told a non-smoker?" He replied, "I would
have said that you have L.A. freeway lungs."
Marty