The Smoking Ban

[MidtownGuy]

Ninjahedge,
I stopped reading after the word "bullshoot".

[Ninjahedge]

Ninjahedge,
I stopped reading after the word "bullshoot".

That's great.

You never read the previous posts either, so why does that not surprise me.

[MrSpice]

I believe that this approach of taxing more things that are "bad for you" is dangerous and at least somewhat un-american. So some people want to smoke. They are already taxed beyond their imagination in this city. They because an easy source of revenue where any time the city needs more money, the government increases the tax on cigarettes since it only affects smokers. But tax is a tax. It's like saying: "we will increase taxes on donuts, but you can just have a bagel if you don't want to pay so much, and this tax will only affect dounut-eaters" Certainly, cigarettes are not donuts, They are more harmful to one's health than donuts by far. But one can make a case that hambjurgers are harmful to your health and to the environment (waster and farming of cows can be harmful), donuts are harmful since they contain a lot of sugar and calories and contribute to a variety of deceases that the public often has to pay for (through medicaid and medicare). This is a slippery slope where you want to change people's behavior through taxes. I understand limiting smoking in restaurants where it can affect others (workers, non-smokers). But when will we stop raising taxes on other people? We are already grossly overtaxed in this city. It's kind of interesting that Ninjahedge would be so mad about NSA spying on convesations with suspected terrorists from abroad without the FISA warrant, yet so happy that many New Yorkers will have less money in their pockets just because they smoke. Taking about misplaced priorities...

[Ninjahedge]

I believe that this approach of taxing more things that are "bad for you" is dangerous and at least somewhat un-american. So some people want to smoke.

Smoking is one of the leading cause for health problems in the city and it costs the city, and the taxpayers, money.

I think they should maybe directly affiliate any cigarette tax to the programs taht are most directly effected by it (medical services) instead of a general tax (similar to my other idea about parking tickets going toward funding public garages...).

Call it "Smokers Health Insurance. Because dispite what any smoker says while they are lighting up, MOST will not refuse medical care when they are having a heart attack, and no medic will just stand by and let the guy die.


They are already taxed beyond their imagination in this city. They because an easy source of revenue where any time the city needs more money, the government increases the tax on cigarettes since it only affects smokers. But tax is a tax. It's like saying: "we will increase taxes on donuts, but you can just have a bagel if you don't want to pay so much, and this tax will only affect dounut-eaters"

No it isn't. the analogy is not well suited. It may be akin to taxing all fast food restaurants due to the fact that things liek type 2 diabetes is starting to take a huge toll on our medical system, and that simply being overweight is putting a strain on things like air travel, mass transit, and other public services.

Certainly, cigarettes are not donuts, They are more harmful to one's health than donuts by far. But one can make a case that hambjurgers are harmful to your health and to the environment (waster and farming of cows can be harmful), donuts are harmful since they contain a lot of sugar and calories and contribute to a variety of deceases that the public often has to pay for (through medicaid and medicare).

The analogy was weak, just let it go.


This is a slippery slope where you want to change people's behavior through taxes.

Oh, and I guess it is OK to do so through lobbiests that get farm subsidies for tobacco farmers, or for peoples opinions and habits to be shaped by advertising. If they want to spend money to make money off of making people consume something that will kill them, I guess that is OK too.


The main reason for the tax is to offset the expense. The main PR reason is to get children to stop/never start.

I understand limiting smoking in restaurants where it can affect others (workers, non-smokers). But when will we stop raising taxes on other people? We are already grossly overtaxed in this city.

You think so? Try NJ with the property taxes. Everyone is taxed in different ways, but the percentages, for urban areas, is not that different.

It's kind of interesting that Ninjahedge would be so mad about NSA spying on convesations with suspected terrorists from abroad without the FISA warrant, yet so happy that many New Yorkers will have less money in their pockets just because they smoke. Taking about misplaced priorities...

Again, two totally unrelated subjects. You might as well bring up the fact that I don't like the Iraq War and that means, somehow, that I should be against a cigarette tax.

Straw man arguement.

[MidtownGuy]

ninjahedge,
i am going to indulge you by doing what you seem to like best- quoting every line of a post and then picking it apart like a lunatic. But I'll warn you, I'll only stroke you on this one occasion, because I have more stimulating ways to spend my time here. I find this whole line for line quoting thing to be juvenile and niggling.

Who says it was in insult? And how is it hypocritical?
Do you often use "addict" in an endearing way? I't hypocritical for the reason stated in my next line, which you must have read since you quoted it next.

Um, when that is ALL OF THEM, it gets hard to be choosy. Do you live in Hoboken? Try coming in here and finding a restaurant that you can eat at without walking near a bar. It is not easy.
So now you don't want smokers to have a choice. I don't live in Hoboken but if you are so intolerant that even walking by a bar where someone is smoking is means for legislation to you, then you are an obsessive personality. This might be further evidenced by your previous rantings on this very thread, which you erroneously assumed I have not read:

Read the rest of this thread to see the reasons why, they have already been stated, and restated.
It's true, you HAVE stated and restated and triple stated YOUR reasons, the trouble is that none of your views are evidenced by fact. After reading the exchanges between you and Shadenfraud it seems she cleaned your clock, my friend. (condescending tone fully intended.)

And the smoke does not have to be thick to leave you smelling like it for hours afterwards.
That is BS, to use one of your favorite expressions.

I don't force you to drink, and I do not spit on you when I am drinking. If you would let the person next to you, totally healthy, piss on you in the mens room, then I can see where you can validate the whole "free to do what you want if it is not hurting anyone" position.
Look, you have repeatedly employed that comparison on this thread and it is laughably outrageous, and getting quite tiresome to read.

You have not seen the taxes on alcohol?
I have, and alcohol is just one example. When I called for some consistency, my point was that this whole law sends us on a slippery slope towards over-regulation and over-taxing of more and more behaviors.

And that is more BS. The whole thing is that it is a DETERRANT! There are not enough rich people out there to make it worth a damn if they got every single one of them to stop. But make it cost 50¢ a cig and the kiddies will be less likely to start.
My point about rich people, which flew completely over your head, was that
using economic means like taxes to deter behaviors which are not already ILLEGAL (like putting 'em in kiddies' hands), is inherently unfair because only lower economic classes feel the pinch of paying them. Let's face it, people are going to get cigarettes somehow even if it is illegally like the 5
dollar packs on 125th street. Oh, and that 50cent a cig thing- where have you been? The "kiddies" all over this town buy "loosies" all the time for 25-50 cents each, so if parenting hasn't prevented them from smoking, neither will higher taxes.


But the smell does not stick on you. It is also very easily controllable. It is liquid, so the spill is the only thing you are talking about.
The dreaded "lasting smell" thing again! I've had booze spilled on me. It wasn't nice, and it smelled horribly. left a stain too. Know what? I never complained to a bar owner, the legislature, or anyone else except whoever was standing next to me at the time. And sticky, smelly spills happen in every bar, every night. So give up the smell thing, ninjahedge. Bars don't naturally smell like rose gardens, and boozers don't smell like lilies either.
Someone like you , with his sensitive (if somewhat selective) smell and all, might be happiest at home-far away from nasties.

That's great.

You never read the previous posts either, so why does that not surprise me.
*This is a bonus one. It is an illustration of how to really piss someone off by being so completely, arrogantly, presumptuously, WRONG.

After this post, I will no longer waste my time answering anything addressed *by you, to me or anything I said*. It's like arguing with a smarty-pants 7 year-old. I am not in the habit of making attacks on people in this forum. I will not do so again. I am here to learn and exchange ideas. Disagree with the spirit of my post , but don't try to talk me down, call my views BS, or do the idiot quote-for-quote thing. [Deleted]

[MidtownGuy]

2. Your arguments are a better case for further restricting alcohol, rather than easing the restrictions on cigarettes.

I agree with many of your points. However, I need to make clear to everyone that I am as against any further restrictions of alcohol, as I am against the recent ones on cigarettes.

This is what I would like to see: I believe in compromise between smokers and non-smokers, not "my way or the sidewalk". Such compromises, such as were allowed under '95 laws, could be a starting point. Business owners should be allowed to choose, within guidelines, what they will do...
A possible compromise previously mentioned- allowing some bars and clubs to apply for tobacco licenses, for example? Perhaps the zealots who like the total ban are afraid of what capitalist competition will prove- that most tolerant people think there should be choices when it comes to smoking in bars and clubs.

[lofter1]

Calif. classifies second-hand smoke a toxic risk

Reuters
Jan 26, 2006

http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=10991744&src=rss/domesticNews


SACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) - A California agency voted on Thursday to classify second-hand tobacco smoke as a "toxic air contaminant," a first-in-the-nation move that could ultimately toughen state regulations against smoking.

The designation by California's Air Resources Board starts a process that could lead to further smoking bans in the nation's largest state, which has often pioneered in health and environmental regulation.

Scientific studies in recent years have warned about the health impact from second-hand smoke and linked it to a wide array of ailments including heart disease, lung cancer and other respiratory ailments, and breast cancer.

"I think there is no question that this puts California way ahead," said John Froines, chairman of the Air Resources Board's Scientific Review Panel.

"To actually have the major air pollution agency in the state of California to list ETS (environmental tobacco smoke) as a toxic air contaminant is going to have immense impact, we think, in terms of public education around other states," he said. "It will clearly lead to regulatory changes within the state."

The panel's 2005 study found that about 16 percent of all Californians smoked, but 56 percent of adults and 64 percent of adolescents were exposed to second-hand smoke.

"Because the diseases are common and ETS exposure is frequent and widespread, the overall impact can be quite large," the study found.

California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment estimates that as many as 5,500 non-smoking Californians die annually of heart disease related to second- hand smoke and as many as 1,100 die from lung cancer caused by second-hand smoke.

GROWING TOBACCO BANS

The decision in the California state capital kicks off a process that will likely take two or three years as officials study ways to reduce exposure to second-hand smoke.

A spokeswoman for tobacco giant Philip Morris USA, a unit of Altria Group Inc., declined to comment.

In 1994, California became the first U.S. state to bar smoking in the workplace, and then followed up with bans on smoking in restaurants and bars. Other American cities and states have since adopted similar prohibitions.

Several California cities have enacted wider bans, such as San Francisco, which now prohibits smoking in city parks, and Los Angeles, which bars smoking at piers and beaches.

Some health experts say the ultimate impact of California's decision to classify second-hand smoke as a toxin could reach beyond the United States.

"It is important because it has included important new findings, new scientific information that will not only help California policymakers but will help those across the United States address this issue," said Paul Knepprath of the American Lung Association of California.

"And, as I think some board members mentioned, this impact on the international community could be very helpful." Some foreign countries, including Ireland, Norway and Sweden, have workplace smoking bans.

© Reuters 2006

[Ninjahedge]

Midtown, in response to your rant:

Are you saying that smokers are not addicts? If the truth hurts it is still the truth.

Smokers always had the choice. It is an INVASIVE PRACTICE. We have laws against noise, public urination, and people, in general, don't take it kindly if you pass gass in a restaurant. But somehow it is a right of the people to spew an unhealthy, distrubing, damaging substance into the air because it is their choice? No, it isn't.

None of my views are evidenced by fact? Where have you been living? She did not clean ANYONES clock. Thank you for just reaffirming that you are in this as an emotional tirade, not as a logical position.

You say that it doesn't last for hours? Let me introduce you to my GF who can smell it on me hours after, and is worse with her with long hair.

Or my father, who when he sneaks one, OUTSIDE, still has the smell on his shirt THE NEXT DAY, or a miriad of other people that have expressed the same FACT. I call your BS and I announce a red herring.

As for me making the comparisons/analogies and you calling it laughable, that is another straw man. you have not refuted it, just called it stupid. I am sorry, but that does not work on anything but Reality TV.

Your point about rich people was a worthless distraction brought on in full force by those trying to turn this into a class issue instead of the fact that they are pissed that they ghave to pay more for their addiction.

As for "looseys" I was referring to the price per cig if you buy a pack. If that goes up to 50 cents a cig, the "loosies" would go up to 75 or a dollar. You think kids would do that? You think ALL of them would? Or would they want their cash for other more pressing matters like clothes, food, and cell phones?

And as for higher taxes not reducing juvenile participation, please show me where the ammount of teen smoking has gone up after the price has gone up.


As for booze being spilled on you, that is akin to having ash flicked at you. Neither is nice, but booze spilling is not akin to smoke. I have also yet to see anyone die from lung cancer, or suffer an asthmatic attack from a beer spill. Are you a smoker? If you are, I suggest you stop smoking and be able to smell the roses.

ALL the ex-smokers I have heard and talked to have mentioned how they never realized how bad it smelled.

Also, if the smell is so great, why do SO many smokers not smoke at home? Why do they dislike the smell on their clothes, they ARE smokers, aren't they? If they find no problem having other people smell like that, why do so many of them not subject their family to the same?

*Thanks for the bonus, the bonus being you will not post on this anymore. You are a pig-headed bullistic individual that doesnot like being told he is wrong even when he is wrong.

And you could do yourself a favor and listen to the "smarty pants 7 year old" if he is making more sense than an insulting, downcasting individual that does not refute statments, but simply derides them.

As for talking you down and calling your comments BS, I have already done so. They are BS and they will always BE BS on this issue.

And thank you for proving who s the real juvenile. Nice call on the "prick" comment. You really no how to "debate" an issue, don't ya?

[Ninjahedge]

I agree with many of your points. However, I need to make clear to everyone that I am as against any further restrictions of alcohol, as I am against the recent ones on cigarettes.

This is what I would like to see: I believe in compromise between smokers and non-smokers, not "my way or the sidewalk". Such compromises, such as were allowed under '95 laws, could be a starting point. Business owners should be allowed to choose, within guidelines, what they will do...
A possible compromise previously mentioned- allowing some bars and clubs to apply for tobacco licenses, for example? Perhaps the zealots who like the total ban are afraid of what capitalist competition will prove- that most tolerant people think there should be choices when it comes to smoking in bars and clubs.


Again, they tried this and it does not work.

You allow both and all become both. You have one smoker in a group of five, and more often than not they will go to a place that allows smoking.


Financially, a partial ban will never work.



The only thing you can do that would work would be to simply have LITERAL smoking bars. No alcohol, but the thing like the turkish smoke houses.

If you want to go in to have a pipe, cigar, cigarette, or Waterpipe (forgot the name) you can.

Hell, they can even serve small foods (donuts and the like). But nothing else.

Draw the line and keep to it.

The whole fallacy of a smoking section has never really worked well because of two things.

1. The smoking section always had the bar.
2. It was almost impossible to keep the smoke out of the non smoking sections, especially in small places (like the ones found in NYC).

So whatever. You know this to be true too, and as unfair as you see additional taxes, or a ban, you know that other solutions, although they sound feasable, would never work.

[MrSpice]

It seems like what NJ and many other states have done is a great compromise where most restaurants and bars have special smoking sections where those who smoke can enjoy their time and do what they like doing.

I am frankly surprised to see people like Ninjahedge in this "land of the free" advocating draconian measures to teach people a lesson. We all make choices in life. Many of those choices may be viwed as harmful to us and to others. Those riding a motorcycle have a higher chance of hurting themselves and others than those riding in the car. Those eating unhealthy food contribute to higher medical costs and lost productivity. Those who drink a lot of beer are not very healthy either. I am sure those who are pro-choice (like me) would admit that abortions have high social and economic cost associated with them. We cannot respond to anything that can be deemed unhealthy or wrong or harmful with more and more taxes and more and more regulations/bans/restrictions. People should be free to do what they desire if it does not adverselu affect other people. One of the great virtues of free country should be respecting other people's choices even if they appear inappropriate or wrong to you.

[lofter1]

IMO (and I've been known to enjoy a puff or ten, so I'm not a non-smoker but do know the nastiness of the habit -- all described in gritty detail by ninjahedge) the California-type laws mentioned in the article above are the wave of the future. Don't be surprised if before too long there is no smoking allowed in NYC parks.

Think of the revenue the city could bring in with all those tickets!!

[ZippyTheChimp]

I've allowed a few inappropriate personal remarks to remain in this thread to illustrate the passionate nature of the smoking ban.

No further remarks of that nature will be permitted.

I know it's hard, but if you smoke, try to quit. It's a pain in the ass, and will get worse.

[NYatKNIGHT]

Obviously name-calling is disrespectful and is not allowed, nor does it help promote any argument and won't be tolerated.

However, this is a subject open for debate, no matter how strongly anyone feels about it. Claiming that anybody does not like being told he is wrong even when he is wrong is irritating and as disrespectful as name-calling.

Let's everyone stop the use of drowning out each other's opinions with three feet of nitpicking posts, in this and all threads, the immaturity is embarrassing to this otherwise respected board.

[Ninjahedge]

It seems like what NJ and many other states have done is a great compromise where most restaurants and bars have special smoking sections where those who smoke can enjoy their time and do what they like doing.

But that simply does not work.

they had the smoking rooms at workplaces too for a while, but they found that to be an inconvenience, an added expense, and it did not really accomplish anything.

I am frankly surprised to see people ... advocating ... measures to teach people a lesson. We all make choices in life. Many of those choices may be viwed as harmful to us and to others. Those riding a motorcycle have a higher chance of hurting themselves and others than those riding in the car.

But it does not directly effect others if they ride responsibly. Repeated use does not make others get sick or die. AND you cannot ride a cigarette to work. So the analogy does not fit Spice....

Those eating unhealthy food contribute to higher medical costs and lost productivity.

I never said I was against taxing the people who not only sell this to people, but market it and make wads of cash from it. I do, however, feel that any tax placed to try to alleviate a problem should have its funds directed towards mitigation methods. Parking tickets for Garage Building, "fat tax" for weight loss programs and health studies, Tobacco Tax for cancer wards and research, alcohol for city run AA clinics. The whole 9 yards.

Those who drink a lot of beer are not very healthy either.

Bad example. Those that drink a little lower their cholesterol, and those that drink a healthy ammount of red wine actually do their body good!

I am sure those who are pro-choice (like me) would admit that abortions have high social and economic cost associated with them.

This is a confusing point, and it brings in the red herring of abortion, which I will not even touch.

The purpose of smoking prohibition is to limit exposure to non-participants without forcing them to go out of their way to do so. The purpose of the taxes is to discourage use, limit initial use, and provide funding which SHOULD be earmarked to help with the costs the habit incurs.

We cannot respond to anything that can be deemed unhealthy or wrong or harmful with more and more taxes and more and more regulations/bans/restrictions. People should be free to do what they desire if it does not adverselu affect other people.

But this does. It also costs other people money. It is not fair that I should have to pay for a medicare person with ling cancer he got from smoking. I feel bad for him but, as many smokers say "[he] knew what he was doing, don't tell him what to do!"


One of the great virtues of free country should be respecting other people's choices even if they appear inappropriate or wrong to you.

Unless they effect YOU. And this does.

[MidtownGuy]

I am proud do say that I do not smoke. In fact, I am what some would call a "health nut". I am also proud to say that I have a more tolerant and compromising view than many other non-smokers.

[Kris]

December 21, 2006
Mayor’s Curb on Smoking Is Credited With Saving Lives
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA

Could Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s antismoking crusade have already saved hundreds of lives? It has, city health officials said yesterday.

Smoking-related deaths in New York City fell by more than 800 a year from 2000 to 2005, a drop of more than 10 percent, according to the city’s annual Summary of Vital Statistics report, released yesterday. Asked how much of that can be credited to the mayor’s measures, Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the city health commissioner, said, “I think most of it.”

In another piece of good news, New Yorkers are living longer than ever, after an unusually big one-year rise in longevity. In 2004 (this statistic lags the others by a year) average life expectancy in the city reached 78.6 years, almost five months more than in 2003.

After trailing for six decades, New York City overtook the national average for longevity in 2000, and by 2004, the city led the nation by almost 10 months. Health officials say it is fairly clear why the city would have improved faster than the nation over the last decade, starting with the much reduced tolls of murder and AIDS, but they are not sure why the advantage continues to grow.

Infant mortality dropped slightly in 2005, to the lowest level ever recorded, 6 deaths among every 1,000 babies. But after decades of steep decline, progress has slowed nearly to a stop, and the infant mortality rate has changed little in the past five years.

The birth rate continued to drop, to 15.1 per 1,000 people. In more than a century of keeping track, the city has been less fecund in only two periods: the mid-to-late 1970s, and the Great Depression.

Even so, New Yorkers entering the world outnumbered those departing by more than 2 to 1, as the death rate fell very slightly, to a record low of 7 per thousand. The Bayside section of Queens had the city’s lowest death rate, while Brownsville, Brooklyn, had the highest, almost three times as high.

The leading cause of death, heart disease, continued to decline steadily as a killer, as it has for several years, possibly helped by the development of cholesterol-lowering drugs.

Dr. Frieden said he was frustrated by some areas that could be improved with education and better care, but show little or no change, including H.I.V.-related deaths and the racial disparity in infant mortality.

Black infants were twice as likely to die before their first birthdays as white or Hispanic babies. “Black women go into pregnancy and go through pregnancy in much worse health status, and that translates into higher infant mortality,” Dr. Frieden said.

H.I.V. deaths in the city peaked in the mid-1990s at more than 7,000 annually, then fell sharply with the introduction of new drug treatments, but progress slowed in recent years. The death count fell last year to 1,419, the lowest in more than two decades, but only 32 fewer than the year before.

After taking office in 2001, Mr. Bloomberg sharply increased the city’s cigarette taxes, and the state later imposed another steep increase. Then the mayor closed loopholes in the ban on smoking in restaurants and extended the ban to bars. The city also gave away nicotine patch kits to tens of thousands of people.

Despite fierce opposition at the time, the tax and the smoking ban were widely accepted. Since then, surveys have shown significant drops in the number of New Yorkers who smoke, which antismoking activists attribute largely to the city’s actions.

Using formulas developed by the federal Centers for Disease Control, the city calculated the number of smoking-related deaths at 8,096 in 2005, down from an average of 8,960 between 1999 and 2001.

Most of that decline was in death from cardiovascular disease. Death from the cancers associated with smoking also dropped, but Dr. Frieden said that was a continuation of a long-term trend, not a result of Bloomberg policies.

“Cancer takes 10 or 12 years to go down after people quit,” he said. “Cardiovascular disease goes down right away. For an individual smoker, within a year after quitting smoking, your risk of a heart attack is about half what it was before.”

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

[ZippyTheChimp]

June 22, 2007

City Smokers’ Ranks Drop 19%, Study Says

By ANTHONY RAMIREZ

The city’s department of health, citing a combination of high taxes, workplace limits and $10 million in grim television advertising, said yesterday that the number of smokers in New York City had declined by 240,000 in the last five years.

That change represents the sharpest drop since the city began keeping records in 1993, and one of the steepest declines in the nation since 1965, when the surgeon general first warned Americans about the dangers of smoking.

“When we look at the U.S. data overall, from 1965 to the present, this is faster than the United States as a whole in any period,” said Jennifer Ellis, the city health official who helped direct the study.

City researchers, writing in a widely followed publication of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the share of the city’s residents who smoked had dropped by 19 percent during the period of the study.

They said that in 2002, about 1,305,000 city residents smoked, or about 21.6 percent of the adult population, and that in 2006, about 1,065,000 residents, or 17.5 percent, smoked. The study was based on interviews with 10,000 city residents and used the same measures that the C.D.C. uses. The sharpest drops were in the Bronx, where smoking dropped from 25.2 percent of the population to 19 percent, and in Manhattan, where the rate dropped from 21.2 percent to 16.1 percent. Staten Island was flat, at 27.3 percent in 2002 and 27.2 percent in 2006.

Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the commissioner of the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, said in a telephone interview, “The big picture is that if you are willing to do the right thing and take political risks as Mayor Bloomberg did” with curbs on smoking in public places, “you can get enormous health benefits.”

Moreover, Dr. Frieden said, the administration will continue to press for higher cigarette taxes of 50 cents more per pack. Adjusted for inflation, he said, a pack is actually 60 cents cheaper now than when taxes were last raised in 2002.

At that time, New York City increased the excise tax on cigarettes from 8 cents to $1.50 per pack. New York State also raised its excise tax from $1.11 to $1.50. Both resulted in the highest combined city/state tax in the United States at the time.

The tax increases raised the average price of a pack from $5.20 to $6.85. The city’s revenue from cigarette taxes has declined to $120 million this year from $123 million in 2005.

Councilman Tony Avella, Democrat of Queens, who has clashed with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg about smoking curbs in restaurants, said he would oppose higher taxes.

“People who smoke are addicted,” he said. “All you succeed in doing is making addicts pay more in taxes.”

Dr. Frieden said the city would continue to buy television advertising. “The tobacco industry is spending at least $400 million in New York City alone for marketing and promotion,” he said. Even if the city and state spent $20 million annually, he said, “We would still be outspent 20 to 1.”

Bill Phelps, a spokesman for Philip Morris USA, the nation’s largest tobacco company, declined to comment.

The health department researchers, writing in the most recent issue of the C.D.C.’s morbidity and mortality report, said the rapid drop in smoking in the city represented a continuation and an acceleration of long-term trends.

The drop, they said, represents as many as 80,000 fewer premature deaths from cancer and other smoking-related diseases, if the smokers quit the habit permanently.

The researchers attributed the most recent drop in the smoking rate to the 2006 television campaign highlighting the physical ravages of smoking.

The commercials ran on broadcast and cable channels. The researchers said that the typical New York viewer would see the city’s antismoking ads, called “Nothing Will Ever Be The Same,” as many as 110 times over the course of a year.

Moreover, the researchers said that separate research suggested that 9 of 10 city smokers had seen the ads.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

[MikeW]

So when are they going to just ban smoking in public?

[Ninjahedge]

:rolleyes:

I am still amazed at the % of people that smoke. What is the average % of people that work in the city that smoke? (I don't remember seeing 1 in 5 walking along the street to work puffing away...)

[NYatKNIGHT]

^Smokers don't smoke constantly, so you wouldn't see 1 in 5 at any given time.

[Ninjahedge]

^Smokers don't smoke constantly, so you wouldn't see 1 in 5 at any given time.

Most that I have known try to get that last one in before they go to work. So I am surprised that I see less than 1 in 10 puffing when I come in in the morning.

Mid-day and other times is all up to the individuals......

[ZippyTheChimp]

Do you really count them?

[lofter1]

My self-imposed smoking ban is now starting week 13 ...

Funny what triggers the urge for a smoke ... this weekend while painting my bathroom I had huge urges to smoke when I would finish a coat or other tasks. In the past my breaks (no matter what it was I was doing) would usually start with a smoke -- and sometimes finish with one as well :cool: ...

I did not give in -- but did yell a few times, "G** Dammit, I want a F***ing Cigarette!".

Somehow that helps the moment pass :D ...

Finished the painting project without one smoke. For me I find that smoking is really a mental thing much more than a physical addiction. Sure don't miss coughing up the cash to pay for a pack or ten ...

[pianoman11686]

Congratulations on making that sort of progress, lofter. Even with all the patches, gums, and pills these days, I still hear from most smokers that it's too hard to quit.

[Ninjahedge]

Do you really count them?

Sadly, yes.

I also know that the red hand flashes 11 times before it goes solid and that you have 7 seconds between then and the light changing green on most of the avenues...


I don't know why, but I pick up on these things. I wish I could filter them out...

[Ninjahedge]

Congratulations on making that sort of progress, lofter. Even with all the patches, gums, and pills these days, I still hear from most smokers that it's too hard to quit.

It IS mostly psychological.

Geez, I find it hard not to bite my nails, and as far as I know there is nothing physically addictive about that!


Good job Loft! You will always get the cravings from time to time. But hopefully the return of the sense of taste and smell (FOOD!!!) will more than offset the nicotine rush. that is what I have heard is one of the most welcome thing from recent ex-smokers I know....

GL!

[ZippyTheChimp]

July 1, 2007

Staten Island Up Close

Even as the City Rejects the Habit, One Place Is Still Tobacco Road

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/07/01/nyregion/thecity/smok600.jpg

By EMILY BRADY

From the southernmost tip of Manhattan, even on a clear summer day, Staten Island can appear shrouded in a smoky haze.

There’s the pollution, which has earned the island the dubious distinction of having the worst air quality in the city. And there’s the cigarette smoke, which, according to a report released 10 days ago by the city’s Health Department, has hardly dissipated over the last four years, despite declining numbers in every other borough.

According to the report, 27 percent of adult residents of Staten Island puffed away in 2006, the same percentage as in 2002. During the same period, smoking rates among adults plummeted elsewhere in the city, bringing the city’s 2006 smoking average to 17.5 percent, a record low.

As to why Staten Islanders are the only city residents who don’t seem to be quitting smoking, no one is quite sure.

“It’s the $64,000 question,” said Sarah Perl, the assistant commissioner of the city’s Bureau of Tobacco Control, who credits the sharp drops elsewhere to higher cigarette taxes, a ban on indoor smoking and an antismoking ad campaign.

Donna Shelley, an assistant professor at the Columbia Mailman School of Public Health, was also unsure how to explain the Staten Island results, but she noted that the borough has a long history of high smoking rates. She also wondered, as Ms. Perl did, if the city’s antismoking ads need to be tailored more to the borough population.

Staten Islanders themselves are mystified by their behavior.

“God, I have no idea why,” said Christine Morrill, a 33-year-old Staten Islander from West Brighton.

“I had lymphoma, and I still smoke,” she added as she sat at the bar in Duffy’s, a neighborhood tavern on Forest Avenue, her miniature dachshund nibbling on her burger.

Down the avenue in front of Jody’s Club Forest bar, Norman Senk, a 49-year-old Staten Island native with a white stubbly beard who smokes two packs a day, had a more philosophical take on things. “We like to smoke; hey, what are you gonna do?” he said as he leaned back in a green plastic lawn chair and took a drag on a Marlboro Red.

As the Health Department works to develop a plan of action, Ms. Perl intends to send researchers to Staten Island to interview residents directly.

Maybe she should consider a suggestion from Kevin Gill, who said at Jody’s bar that his 23-year-old daughter has been a smoker for 10 years. “I’d like to take her to the morgue and show her a pink, healthy lung and then a black smoker’s lung,” Mr. Gill said. “I think that would make anyone stop right there.”

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

[ZippyTheChimp]

January 3, 2008

Paris Journal

Even France, Haven of Smokers, Is Clearing the Air


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/01/03/world/03smoking.600.jpg
Tomas van Houtryve for The New York Times
As of Wednesday, people could smoke at outdoor cafes,
but not indoors. There are fierce pockets of resistance to the ban.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/01/03/world/03smoking_2.650.jpg
Owen Franken for The New York Times
A smoker puffed on a hookah on a heated terrace in a water-pipe
tea house on Wednesday.


By ELAINE SCIOLINO

PARIS — Overnight, conviviality has taken on an entirely new meaning in France.

Under a sweeping decree that took effect Wednesday, smoking has been banned in every commercial corner of “entertainment and conviviality” — from the toniest Parisian nightclub to the humblest village cafe.

No matter that cigarette is a French word. Or that the great icons of French creativity — Colette to Cocteau, Camus to Coco Chanel — all smoked. Or that Paris boasts a Museum of Smoking. Or, in fact, that Paris has named a street after Jean Nicot, the 16th-century French diplomat who took tobacco leaves imported from America to Catherine de Medici to treat her migraines. (Nicotine was named after him.)

The ban is the final step in a 2006 prohibition on smoking in public places, which had granted postponements to restaurants, bars, discos, casinos and other commercial pleasure enterprises so that they could better brace themselves for smokelessness.

On Wednesday, Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot visited the high-ceilinged, 100-year-old Wepler brasserie in Paris and announced that there was “perfect” compliance with the new rule.

“This is a new art de vivre,” she said, even as she warned of consequences for “repeat offenders and rebels.” (Smokers who break the rules will face fines of $100 to $661. Owners can be fined $198 to $1,100.) Michèle Alliot-Marie, the interior minister, has told the country’s police that they do not have to meet quotas in issuing fines and urged them to leave policing to “competent” agents like public health inspectors.

The ban was supposed to take effect on Tuesday, but to preserve the New Year’s Eve party spirit — and avoid the risk of violence — French smokers were given an extra day of grace.

About 12 million French people — about 20 percent of the population — are smokers, according to official figures, and more than 70,000 people die in France every year from smoking-related illnesses and secondhand smoke.

The decree coincides with a broad Europe-wide nonsmoking movement that began four years ago when Ireland banned smoking in public places. But here, there are fierce pockets of resistance. Opponents say the ban signals the erosion of French liberté. They say it is undemocratic because it was not passed through Parliament but imposed by government decree.

Some owners of smaller bars and cafes contend that the ban is unfair because it favors large, wealthy establishments that can take advantage of loopholes. (Smoking is allowed in outdoor cafes and sophisticated indoor “hermetically sealed areas, furnished with air-extraction systems.”) Indeed, in writing the ban, little thought seemed to have been given to the country’s 800 water-pipe tea houses, most of them extremely modest enterprises owned by ethnic Arabs.

“We have sacrificed everything to open these little places, borrowing money from our family members, using our cars and apartments as collateral, and what’s going to happen to us?” said Tariq el-Hamri, the 33-year-old owner of Dar Daffia (House of Hospitality), a water-pipe bar in Paris. “If the government wants to have healthy people, it should stop selling cigarettes — and alcohol.”

Mr. Hamri belongs to the Union of Hookah-Pipe Professionals, which plans to challenge the ban in French courts and is lobbying for the same exception for water-pipe smokers that is in effect in parts of the United States and Canada. Expensive and space-consuming hermetic sealing is not an option for most of them. “We are second-class citizens,” said Badri Helou, president of the union, which was created last February and has 270 members. “The reason you come to a water-pipe club is to smoke a water pipe. The mint tea and the pastries come afterward. We cannot survive on them. It would be as if you go to the movies and there’s no film — just popcorn.”

The Confederation of Tobacco Dealers, which represents 28,000 tobacconists in France, has accused President Nicolas Sarkozy of duplicity.

During the presidential campaign last year, Mr. Sarkozy called for flexibility to protect small businesses. “To ban smoking in places where tobacco is sold, is somehow strange,” he said at the time, adding that there should also be leniency for the small cafe-tabac in a village of 750 people where “if it closes, there is nothing else.”

The confederation’s newsletter reprinted the opening two-page spread in a recent issue of Paris-Match that shows Mr. Sarkozy at his desk, lighting a cigar. “Is the Élysée Palace a private space where one can smoke or a place of work?” said René Le Pape, president of the confederation. “The president is setting a bad example. This is a provocation.”

For Mr. Le Pape, the ban signals the demise of a part of French culture. “It means the destruction of village life,” he said. “What will happen to the ritual of arriving at the cafe in the morning to read the morning paper over a coffee and a cigarette?”

At Le Musée du Fumeur (The Museum of Smoking), there is concern that the French may not be able to think as well without their cigarettes. “All our great writers seem to have been smokers,” said Michka Seeliger-Chatelein, one of the curators.

Still, there are efforts to keep a sense of humor. The cafe-restaurant Le Fumoir (The Smoking Room) has made gifts of its signature ashtrays. The cover of the current issue of Le Figaro Magazine retouched black and white photos of Che Guevara, Jacques Brel, Brigitte Bardot and other passionate smokers; they grip giant yellow buttercups instead of cigarettes between their lips.

Most establishments seemed resigned to the ban. “We are not taking sides,” said Colin Peter Field, the head bartender at the Hemingway Bar at the Ritz. The bar will continue to sell 40 to 50 types of upscale cigars and is studying plans to renovate its outdoor spaces to accommodate smokers.

“Once you’ve hung yourself,” Mr. Field said, “you’re not going to drown yourself as well.”



Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

[Ninjahedge]

I feel bad for the Hookah bar owners, but this:

“What will happen to the ritual of arriving at the cafe in the morning to read the morning paper over a coffee and a cigarette?”

Garners no sympathy from me.


How do you think smaller establishments, who rely on smoking as their primary income, could get around this w/o others taking advantage of it and ruining the desired effect?

[Fahzee]

speaking as a non-smoker here: smoking a cigar at The Hemingway Bar will be missed.

lung cancer will not be missed

[Ninjahedge]

That is kind of what I am saying...

How can you sepearate the two though? How can you survive just on the sale of tea and pastry in France? (Especially when your consumer base was primarily smokers).

The line is tricky to draw between a bar that you smoke at and a smoking lounge that you eat/drink at.....

[Fahzee]

^ well put - I've wondered the same thing.

Harry's New York Bar (sure - it's a tourist haunt - but I freakin' loved it) had a cigarette girl - I'm actually a little worried about her. I guess she sells gum now.

But in the long run, bars & restaurants have all survived the smoking bans. After all, the pubs in Ireland are doing fine - why wouldn't the cafes in France do the same?

Also: In New York, Hookah Bars are still allowed to operate - they just can't serve tobacco (instead, you smoke dried fruit). More Hookah bars have opened SINCE the ban than before.

[TonyO]

Also: In New York, Hookah Bars are still allowed to operate - they just can't serve tobacco (instead, you smoke dried fruit). More Hookah bars have opened SINCE the ban than before.

I've been to Hookah bars here and they certainly sell tobacco as well as allow you to smoke it (and cigarettes).

Seeing the French adopt a no smoking law is surprising. If they could now take it a step further and require "pomposity free" establishments things would be that much better.

[Fahzee]

If a Hookah bar is allowing you to smoke tobacco, they are doing so illegally.

That being said, many (if not ALL) Hookah bars could potentially get away with allowing you to smoke flavored tobacco, as the testing & enforcement policies of the NYC Department of Health are notoriously lax

- basically, a DOH representative has to ask for a sample of whatever is being smoked in the Hookah - but the hookah bar doesn't have to give the representative the actual substance in the Hookah! Instead, the Bar owner gives the DOH representative a piece of "fresh" substance - and no tests are done to ensure that the fresh substance and the smoked substance are one and the same

Cigarettes are an entirely different story - if you've seen people smoking cigarettes in a Hookah bar, chances are it's only a matter of time before someone cracks down on that particular establishment

[Ninjahedge]

Maybe that is a deliberate blind eye that is being turned on those establishments....

The only thing I would find hard would be to try to seperate the Smoking Primary establishment from the Smoking Accessory establishment. You say you can have smokes at this and such a bar, but only if it does not serve beer, or food, or something, the line gets a bit blurry.

Maybe the Hookah is the only way to go with potential tobacco allowances. They definitely take up space that could be used to fill with more patrons, and they are not cheap in themselves....

I don't know. I do think it is unfair to have an absolute ban on all establishments, but I do not see any other way that would work with a substance that is that addictive and prevalent in a culture. If you want to protect non-smokers from it, i is very hard and very convoluted to give rights to some without taking something away from the non-smokers (like smoke free bars).

Although it is silly, maybe they need to seperate tobacco from full-food/liquor establishments. NJ does something similar with strip clubs (or is it CT) where Alcohol cannot be served where full frontal is shown. (that is the silly thing I was talking about). Theory being that it prevents unruly behavior, etc etc...

Would making it so that only wine/liquor could be served at a smoking bar (where only specialty ciggs/cigars/hookah could be used/sold) make it?

I think people would still be upset that they could not bring their own, but this would at least give them a place to try something different. It works for Alcohol (why pay $5 for a pint when you can get the same beer for $1 at the store?)......

I don't know. I like that they are doing this, but I still feel sorry for the small guys that are running smoking establishments, not bars where people smoke....

[Fahzee]

^ plus, it's economically unfair that owners of establishments with roofbars/outdoor bars can still allow smoking, but your average dive bar cannot.

all of this being said - I was recently in a bar where smoking WAS allowed (I forgot where I was - Virginia maybe?) - and it was awful. I will always feel bad for the little guy - but I have ZERO nostalgia for the smoke filled bar.

[Radiohead]

Smoking bans in restaurants don't bother me at all, since I'd prefer to eat a meal without the smell of smoke wafting my way. Bans in bars I can live with as well, since the majority of drinkers don't smoke anymore.

What does bother me is the Bloombergonian nanny-state that tells ALL establishments that they HAVE to be smoke free. Why can't an entrepreneur open a restaurant or bar exclusively for patrons and employees who do smoke? If you don't like the smoke, don't eat there and don't apply to work there. There are hundreds of other places in town to eat and work.

Unfortunately, the PC nannies, who of course have only the health of the the public in mind, will have none of this. The smokers are addicts who must be protected from themselves. A restaurant/bar for smokers? Egads!

[TonyO]

If a Hookah bar is allowing you to smoke tobacco, they are doing so illegally.

That being said, many (if not ALL) Hookah bars could potentially get away with allowing you to smoke flavored tobacco, as the testing & enforcement policies of the NYC Department of Health are notoriously lax

- basically, a DOH representative has to ask for a sample of whatever is being smoked in the Hookah - but the hookah bar doesn't have to give the representative the actual substance in the Hookah! Instead, the Bar owner gives the DOH representative a piece of "fresh" substance - and no tests are done to ensure that the fresh substance and the smoked substance are one and the same

Cigarettes are an entirely different story - if you've seen people smoking cigarettes in a Hookah bar, chances are it's only a matter of time before someone cracks down on that particular establishment

Legally, you are correct. There are only 8 establishments that legally allow tobacco smoking. However, as is everything here, reality is not the law. Hookah bars routinely sell/allow flavored tobacco and people smoking their own cigarettes.

[Ninjahedge]

What does bother me is the Bloombergonian nanny-state that tells ALL establishments that they HAVE to be smoke free. Why can't an entrepreneur open a restaurant or bar exclusively for patrons and employees who do smoke? If you don't like the smoke, don't eat there and don't apply to work there. There are hundreds of other places in town to eat and work.


That does not work.

People kept asking "why not let this and such do this". But what you end up with is ALL the bars becoming "special" and going right back to what they were.

Smoking is addictive both physically and psychologically. Most people have the hardest time separating past behavior from smoking after they quit (they can't do this or that because they start craving when they do). Bars are just that.

They developed the link over many years of the two being hard-linked and making it possible for an establishment to be "special" and offer both will prompt many to do the same.

So the hard part that I am talking about is drawing that line. How do you make it so that you can have a few establishments that cater to smokers without going right back to square one where anyone in NYC that wanted to be social (with alcohol) had to put up with the smoke?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Funny how the term politically correct has become synonymous with the simple incorrect, the added benefit being the implication that the offender knows his position is incorrect, and is just avoiding offending some group (the actual meaning of PC).

So just what group are the PC nannies trying not to offend? The non-smokers? That would be themselves.

[Radiohead]

That does not work.

People kept asking "why not let this and such do this". But what you end up with is ALL the bars becoming "special" and going right back to what they were.

Smoking is addictive both physically and psychologically. Most people have the hardest time separating past behavior from smoking after they quit (they can't do this or that because they start craving when they do). Bars are just that.

They developed the link over many years of the two being hard-linked and making it possible for an establishment to be "special" and offer both will prompt many to do the same.

So the hard part that I am talking about is drawing that line. How do you make it so that you can have a few establishments that cater to smokers without going right back to square one where anyone in NYC that wanted to be social (with alcohol) had to put up with the smoke?

I think most establishments would remain non-smoking so as not to alienate the majority non-smokers. Most would also not want to pay for any special license to allow smoking. Also, the government could choose to limit the number of such establishments if too many applied for such a license.

The bottom line is, in a free society, shouldn't adults have the CHOICE to go to a restaurant that caters to smokers if they so wish, and shouldn't business owners be able to open an establishment that caters to such a crowd? Who are they really hurting other than themselves. If you don't like the smoke, don't go there. Do we really want the government mandating what type of legal activities can be indulged in a particular establishment, no matter it's health effects. Alcohol itself can cause many negative health issues, but do we want the government telling a bar what types of alcohol it can serve? No shots, their alcohol content is too high. No double mixed drinks, it speeds up intoxication. A Red Bull and Jager?....nope, those energy drinks speed up the heart and promote more consumption. Where does it stop? Once the precedent is set with smoking, it likely won't end there.

And that is quite chilling....
http://www.fotosearch.com/thumb/ARP/ARP114/Chilled.jpg

[AmeriKenArtist]

Cigar Bars? Can they exist? (I didn't read all 20 pages here.)

[Sheff1]

I went to Lexington Bar and Books in the UES over Christmas. You must wear a shirt, but basically it is a bar that allows cigar smoking. No cover but a bottled beer is $9. No draught beers. No cigarettes allowed.

[Radiohead]

I went to Lexington Bar and Books in the UES over Christmas. You must wear a shirt, but basically it is a bar that allows cigar smoking. No cover but a bottled beer is $9. No draught beers. No cigarettes allowed.

Cigar smoke is far more invasive and odorous than any cigarette; I wonder how that is allowed. Likely that too many big shots with political connections smoke cigars.

$9 beers?? Now that's more offensive than any kind of smoke:eek:

[mykingdomlisa]

I agree.

I hate smoke and hate coming home wreaking of smoke, but it's NYC and it's a bar. *Hello, don't go and don't work there...

Also, the city needs to lighten up on bars, clubs (dance and strip), etc. *NYC nightlife has been and should always be a MAJOR part of NYC. *It's why many people are here and it is one major factor that sets us apart from everywhere else.

It annoys me that a business that makes a lot of money for the city and the owners/employees is looked upon as "evil."

Damnit, I'm gonna start ranting, so...


good point

[Ninjahedge]

I think most establishments would remain non-smoking so as not to alienate the majority non-smokers. Most would also not want to pay for any special license to allow smoking. Also, the government could choose to limit the number of such establishments if too many applied for such a license.

I do not think that will work. There is still a strong pull for smoking by those that still smoke. Most establishments would go back to what would bring in people. And if the bars started smoking, the non-smokers would stop coming and the smokers would determine the course of the market.

I am not saying that issuing limited permits is not a bad idea, but it would be very hard to make it fair unless you had some other special requirement (like Hookahs) to allow people to smoke, only what YOU sell, in your establishment....


And do not get started with the "alcohol is bad for you too" svhpiel. I cannot make another drink by sitting next to them and drinking. Any of my actions CAUSED by Alcohol are limited, and against the law if it were to harm another. Someone does not go home smelling like Alcohol if they were simply in the same establishment as someone else who was drinking, and alcohol does not stain the walls, ceilings, and fabrics of an establishment unless used with wonton abandonment and kenetic exhuberance.


IWO, apples and oranges.

All they have to do is make it so that smoking is, well, smokeless and many people would have no problems with it.

[ZippyTheChimp]

All they have to do is make it so that smoking is, well, smokelessI think that thin blue line curling up from the tip, and the cirrus layers drifting in the room have a lot to do with the appeal.

I never enjoyed smoking on a windy day.

[Ninjahedge]

I hate smoke and hate coming home wreaking of smoke, but it's NYC and it's a bar. *Hello, don't go and don't work there...

*bzzzt*

Nope. SO because someone else wants to smoke, I can either stink or stay home? Is that fair to me? For something that has been rammed through the public eye by way of movies and very expensive commercial association, it would be very difficult to make a "free market" argument for any kind of bar being able to be smoke free "of their own free will".

As was said many times before, one smoker in a group can make many turn away from your establishment.

If people are expecting something when they go out, your clientelle, or lack thereof, is determined by what was the standard before.

Bottom line is, a free market model does not work in cases like this. This is not a question of Freedoms, and if it was a question of Democracy, there is a good chance that more people would vote for the ban than not if posted to the general population.

[Ninjahedge]

I think that thin blue line curling up from the tip, and the cirrus layers drifting in the room have a lot to do with the appeal.

I never enjoyed smoking on a windy day.

Actually, that is all "atmosphere", and I only saw it dramatized by people trying to create a specific image.

And it was pushed by the tobacco industry as well. Very good marketing.

But if everyone loves that "layer" so much, why do they smoke in the car with the window cracked open? Is there a limit to how much smoke a smoker can take? ;)


(PS, the *bzzt* was a little harsh, but I have a bit of work stress, so...... sorries!)

[MidtownGuy]

Good grief, didn't we go all through this a few pages back? Ninjahedge, you have an obsession about this. The Cerberus of this thread.
You do seem stressed and shrill, lighten up Francis!

[Ninjahedge]

"You call me Francis, I'll kill you!"

:p

[MidtownGuy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTUruCv4Qi4

:D

[Radiohead]

I do not think that will work. There is still a strong pull for smoking by those that still smoke. Most establishments would go back to what would bring in people. And if the bars started smoking, the non-smokers would stop coming and the smokers would determine the course of the market.

I disagree. Sure there are many customers who would like to smoke, but there are many more who would not and they would have a bigger say in determining the course of the market. Surveys say that only about 20% of NYC residents smoke (17% of Manhattan residents). Even assuming that the rate is a bit higher for drinkers, the minority of smokers will not cause most bars to become smoking environments again. Most bar owners will not want to alienate the 75+% of customers that don't smoke.




And do not get started with the "alcohol is bad for you too" svhpiel. I cannot make another drink by sitting next to them and drinking. Any of my actions CAUSED by Alcohol are limited, and against the law if it were to harm another. Someone does not go home smelling like Alcohol if they were simply in the same establishment as someone else who was drinking, and alcohol does not stain the walls, ceilings, and fabrics of an establishment unless used with wonton abandonment and kenetic exhuberance.

IWO, apples and oranges.


First off, you're taking my alcohol can be bad" comment out of context. That was merely to make a point about the potential dangers of excess government intrusion in a business' day to day activities under the guise of protecting the public health. Besides, you're totally missing my point. If you don't want to breath in the smoke or have your clothes smelling of it, don't go into the designated cigarette or cigar bars. These establishments would be for the ones who DO wish to have a cigarette with their drink. If you don't, then don't go there.

I don't understand why smokers having a few places to go and enjoy themselves and their unhealthy habit bothers you so much. You seem to think that it will cause a snowball effect, and the bans will be recinded. That is not going to happen; the ban is here to stay. But a limited number of special licenses for on-premises smoking should be allowed. The "fairness" issues could be worked out.

[pianoman11686]

That "minority of smokers" is sort of a circular argument, Radiohead. A major reason the smoking rate has kept going down is how much more difficult (and embarrassing, inconvenient, aggravating, etc.) it has become to smoke in public places. Try comparing smoking rates between places that restrict it, and others that don't.

You make it easier to smoke again, and more people may light up. Or, at best, the rate won't get much lower.

[MidtownGuy]

How very unlibertarian of you.

Not only should there be businesses that allow patrons to smoke cigarettes, but there should also be businesses where it is legal to smoke marijuana.

[Radiohead]

That "minority of smokers" is sort of a circular argument, Radiohead. A major reason the smoking rate has kept going down is how much more difficult (and embarrassing, inconvenient, aggravating, etc.) it has become to smoke in public places. Try comparing smoking rates between places that restrict it, and others that don't.

You make it easier to smoke again, and more people may light up. Or, at best, the rate won't get much lower.

Then we get into the argument of should the government be setting restrictions on behavior, however unhealthful, in order to eliminate it. It's easy to pick on smokers, because smoking obviously is bad for your health. But what if the government tries to restrict drinking in say, street festivals, because it encourages overindulgence (or god forbid, the premise of protecting children from observing alcohol consumption). Ninja calls it apples and oranges, but it's really not. There are already a number of supplements that the FDA has banned in the USA, due to trumped up health concerns (i.e. tryptophan(ban recently lifted), ephedra). And the push to severely limit dietary supplements has been ongoing in Europe the past several years, and could eventually cross the Atlantic:

http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2003/2003_preprint_eu_01.htm

Governments can educate the public via PSA's all they want. But they do not need to be protecting people from themselves, or their bad habits, via legislation.

[lofter1]

Ah, c'mon .. stop telling us what to do .. anybody who wants to smoke, go ahead ... SMOKE (http://whyquit.com/pr/071806.html) :cool:

http://whyquit.com/whyquit/KimScar.JPG

[lofter1]

ooops ^ Sorry :o I meant to post the "Smoking is Sexy" pic ...

http://www.sexysmokingteens.net/uploads/smoking-fetish-teen-lorena.jpg

[Radiohead]

You know, there's a whole subculture of men (and women) who have a deep-seated smoker fetish. The leathery skin, the wrinkles, the deep, throaty voice. Do we want to deprive people of that by banning all smoking?......

http://seniorjournal.com/Photos/4-12-15Smoker.jpg

http://www.clauss.dk/Billeder/Cuba/Old_cigar_smoker_from__Havana.jpg

http://www.drunkhollywood.com/images/tarasmoke01.jpg

http://dermnetnz.org/site-age-specific/img/smoker.jpg

http://health.learninginfo.org/images/damage.jpg

http://www.treatment-skincare.com/Images/January07/Vitamin-C-Irritating-Aging-Ineffective.jpg



:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
http://www.plu.edu/~health/img/leatherface.jpg


Despite even that last picture, I still think smokers should have places in the city to smoke. It's called choice, whether good for you or bad.

[lofter1]

Precisely ^ The choice is to do it in the street or at home.

I smoked for many many years. But a certain body part recently made the choice for me: Stop now or else.

Were those many many years of enjoyment worth the eventual revolution within my body?

From my present standpoint ... Nope.

And I certainly shouldn't be inflicting any of that on someone who is employed to serve me ... especially if that server doesn't have the option to say, "Not going near that table."

But why should anyone let logic & reason get in the way of a few furtive puffs and momentary pleasure?

[Ninjahedge]

RH, I know where you are coming from, but the key thing here to keep in mind is how your own freedoms infringe on others.

Like what I said before, if they had the smokeless ciggie, then it would have little, if any impact on anyone else.

But think about this. If everyone loved it so much and there was nothing wrong with it, why did so many people leave their coats at home when going to the bars? I can't tell you how many times I saw people walking to bars in Hoboken, in February (30 degrees or so) with nothing but a skirt and a tube top or button up long sleeve shirt and slacks.

I will tell you why. Their clothes STUNK after being in the bar for only 5 minutes! God FORBID you wear a wool coat in there, it would take MONTHS to get all the stank out.

And that is just cosmetic. That crap gets into your lungs as well. The first few times you are exposed, you cough, get respiratory irritation, your eyes water. It is your body telling you that it does not like it and you should stop. That goes for passive smoke as well.

So people would have to put up with that just so some could have their "freedom" to cater to an addiction that so many say "I can stop any time" but few ever can, or do.


Now, back OT, I think, as I said, that if the establishment was selling the tobacco, you were only allowed to get its product, and the bar was specifically set up to cater to just that, then that is different than just allowing smoking. You want to smoke? Go to one of those bars or just step outside for a puff. Better yet, petition the tobacco industry to put more $$ into research for a smokeless ciggie that does not look like a breathalyser mouthpiece (talk about humiliating) and tasting like licking a nicotine patch (not that I have tried, but that is another fault smokers have said about the smokeless).


Oh, OFF topic. That last pic looks more like a leatherback than a smoker. A Tan-a-holic.

Why she still does it when she looks that bad is, although not "beyond me", rather sad.... But, her life, her choice, doesn't effect me (although I am reluctant to have to pay medicare/medicaid if she needs it for skin cancer).

[ZippyTheChimp]

That last picture gave me the heebie-jeebies.

[MidtownGuy]

That one is definitely sun damage. A lifetime at the beach.

[pianoman11686]

Governments can educate the public via PSA's all they want. But they do not need to be protecting people from themselves, or their bad habits, via legislation.

The slippery slope argument is certainly valid, and we should always be on guard against restrictions of individual liberty.

Smoking is an unusual case, as Ninja explained, because it does harm not only to smokers, but also anyone in the immediate vicinity of the smokers. Why should a substantial majority suffer from secondhand smoke in restaurants, bars, etc. because some people can't kick the habit? I consider that in itself an infringement of rights. And while I'm no fan of majority rule to make policy, no one's saying smoking should become illegal. Just don't do it where it endangers others.

Even aside from all of this, I have no problem with seeing big tobacco companies lose more and more of their business. Who knows if we'll ever be able to put a number on the total amount of damage they've done through their deliberate attempts to get people addicted to their products. We're talking about the worst of the worst of American corporations.

[Ninjahedge]

Slight OT on that Piano, RJ Reynolds and the other Big Tobacco companies had some smarts. They did not stay all in one particular product. Many are buying things from property to cleaning products.

I would hazard a guess that they are paying their lawyers handsomely to make sure that their divestments are isolated, legally, enough from Tobacco so that they do not lose them when they are finally forced to close down some of their more illicit endeavors (such as research into more addictive plant progeny, etc).

They are probably trying to go the way of the coal mining companies. When enough people are successful in suing them, they close shop and say they have no $$, when really they have just been transferring all of their assets over to safer venues while making as much money off their sinking ship as possible while it is still above the waters surface.

Rats simply don't just jump ship these days. They make sure that others are tied to the hull to go down with it!


Back ON topic, yes, you got what I am saying. So long as I do not have to put up with it, and have my health effected by a completely voluntary act (in theory, we all know it is an addiction) I have no problem with it. But similar to, and worse than, other things I have mentioned which are NOT health risks but not tolerated (noise, body oder, etc), I see no reason they should be allowed or argued for under "free market" or "personal freedom" assertions/associations.

[Radiohead]

I keep hearing arguments about second hand smoke that you do not wish to be exposed to, which is irrelevent to my argument, which are for bars that cater exclusively to smokers. These would likely be new establishments that need special licenses anyway, not existing ones. If you don't like the smoke, don't go there to drink, and don't go there to work. It comes down to voluntary choice. When I lived in the city, and when I visit city taverns today, I rarely smoke when I drink. So I would probably frequent the overwhelming majority of bars that don't allow smoking. But adult smokers should have the choice to go into an establishment and enjoy their habit with other adult smokers if they so wish.

It's quite scary how many are so gung-ho on controlling the activities of others. And it's ironic that many of the same are equally vocal in espousing the freedom to choose in other areas. Maybe I'm missing something in translation. I don't understand how someone sitting in a "cigarette bar" puffing away with other smokers undermines the rights of anyone who wouldn't be caught dead (no pun intended) in that same bar anyway. The truth is, it doesn't undermine either their rights or their health. It should be of no concern except those who choose to be there.

New York City.....the great liberal, tolerant city:rolleyes:

[Radiohead]

But similar to, and worse than, other things I have mentioned which are NOT health risks but not tolerated (noise, body oder, etc), I see no reason they should be allowed or argued for under "free market" or "personal freedom" assertions/associations.

Ninja, that sounds a lot like prohibition. It didn't work with alcohol, and it won't work with tobacco. You sound like some self-righteous, bible-thumping evangelicals I've heard....
http://www.jesus21.com/img/news/angley_2.jpg

Please don't damn me to hell's fire:(

[lofter1]

So, based on that position ^ a question (or three) ...

If you're an employer and hire folks to work in your smoke-infused bar do you make your employees sign a waiver stating that anything that occurs in the workplace is not the responsibility of the employer -- nor is the employer liable for any costs which might stem from health issues due to the activites which are allowed in the employer's place of business?

Or do you agree that if an employee gets sick and that the illness is linked to tobacco smoke then do you as the employer agree to cover the insurance / health costs for same?

And what if the insurance company says, "We're not covering that. The illness was due to the employer's negligence. And the negligence of the employee for working in such an environment. Both should have known better. They are fully and mutually responsible and must pay all costs. We're not paying a cent."

:confused:

[Radiohead]

So, based on that position ^ a question (or three) ...

If you're an employer and hire folks to work in your smoke-infused bar do you make your employees sign a waiver stating that anything that occurs in the workplace is not the responsibility of the employer -- nor is the employer liable for any costs which might stem from health issues due to the activites which are allowed in the employer's place of business?

That could very well be the case. And if I was a smoker and wanted to work in a bar that allows smoking, I'd sign it. Liability waivers are a fact of life in modern day America. For owners of a cigarette bar, in the litigious society we live in, it's a no-brainer.

Or do you agree that if an employee gets sick and that the illness is linked to tobacco smoke then do you as the employer agree to cover the insurance / health costs for same?

If an employee makes the effort to apply for a job specifically in a "cigarette bar", more likely than not they already smoke. So I doubt the employer should be on the hook when they're the ones inhaling their own cigarettes. Blaming second-hand smoke would be almost laughable. And even if they didn't smoke, they would have probably signed the contract mentioned in the prior paragraph. That said, I do wish that even part-time bar workers could be covered by health insurance to some degree. Since I don't own a bar, I don't know how feasible that is.


And what if the insurance company says, "We're not covering that. The illness was due to the employer's negligence. And the negligence of the employee for working in such an environment. Both should have known better. They are fully and mutually responsible and must pay all costs. We're not paying a cent."

If that were the case, I would assume such specific language would be in the policy. The employer would want to verify that the policy didn't specify that. If such language wasn't there, the company should pay; you can't make up excuses not to pay after the fact. Not even "pre-existing conditions" would apply here.

If all insurance companies were smart, they would charge a hefty premium to cover smokers, which in the case of either a cigarette bar or an individual smoker, would be a significant cost. I don't have a problem with insurance companies charging higher rates for smoking, morbid obesity, high risk behaviors or hobbies etc. I work in health care and know the negative and costly effects of all of them.

And still I have a disdain for government setting restrictions on any of them
http://kevinrothermel.typepad.com/kevinrothermelcom/images/big_brother.jpg

[MidtownGuy]

There's the idea that the health care industry shouldn't be denying anyone necessary treatment, regardless of how the need came about. Mountain climber...buzz off with your broken leg, you shouldn't be climbing rocks?

The trouble with hypotheticals like this:

And what if the insurance company says, "We're not covering that. The illness was due to the employer's negligence. And the negligence of the employee for working in such an environment. Both should have known better. They are fully and mutually responsible and must pay all costs. We're not paying a cent.


is that our environment is full of health hazards that are the result of voluntary choices and things we should avoid. Breathing pollution from sources other than cigarettes , say for instance vehicle exhaust, is also harmful, are we going to have different classifications for people who live too close to a road or have a balcony above a busy intersection? Order pizza with bacon and extra cheese? Locate themselves and their children near cancerous wires or utility stations? Redline those neighborhoods and adjust insurance rates accordingly, perhaps?

What if a person chooses to eat factory farmed beef? I wouldn't touch it any faster than I would touch a cigarette. So do I conclude that meat eaters should pay more in insurance for their unhealthy choice of being an eater of non-organic, overly-marbled meat? Of course not. Then there is the pollution from cattle feedlots. Because of an unnatural amount of beef consumption, pollution is leeking into aquifers, you know...the amount is staggering... it's polluting the groundwater. The environment is being harmfully affected by a behavior I do not choose to partake in. Should we outlaw, restrict, or categorize by risk for that too? Mandate the consumption of 100% soy substitutes? Or maybe the government should determine what's an acceptable level of pork lard before danger of atherosclerosis rises, and ration it out by family according to genetic risk.

[MidtownGuy]

For-profit HMOS and insurance companies deciding about treatment is a fundamentally and FATALLY flawed system.

So is government playing nanny over every unhealthy behavior. Where does it end?

When technology allows, just give us a synthetic titanium body or genetically engineer us all to have the same behaviors and get it over with. Then we'll have zero risk.:rolleyes:

[Radiohead]

There's the idea that the health care industry shouldn't be denying anyone necessary treatment, regardless of how the need came about. Mountain climber...buzz off with your broken leg, you shouldn't be climbing rocks?

The trouble with hypotheticals like this:




is that our environment is full of health hazards that are the result of voluntary choices and things we should avoid. Breathing pollution from sources other than cigarettes , say for instance vehicle exhaust, is also harmful, are we going to have different classifications for people who live too close to a road or have a balcony above a busy intersection? Order pizza with bacon and extra cheese? Locate themselves and their children near cancerous wires or utility stations? Redline those neighborhoods and adjust insurance rates accordingly, perhaps?

What if a person chooses to eat factory farmed beef? I wouldn't touch it any faster than I would touch a cigarette. So do I conclude that meat eaters should pay more in insurance for their unhealthy choice of being an eater of non-organic, overly-marbled meat? Of course not. Then there is the pollution from cattle feedlots. Because of an unnatural amount of beef consumption, pollution is leeking into aquifers, you know...the amount is staggering... it's polluting the groundwater. The environment is being harmfully affected by a behavior I do not choose to partake in. Should we outlaw, restrict, or categorize by risk for that too? Mandate the consumption of 100% soy substitutes? Or maybe the government should determine what's an acceptable level of pork lard before danger of atherosclerosis rises, and ration it out by family according to genetic risk.

Good points, Midtown.

[Radiohead]

^Doesn't look real -- looks like a photoshop job or a wrinkled brown skin outfit.

Just passing by and commenting on the picture, that's all.

You might be right. The legs do look look like a rubber suit. Still, I might use it on some future "Sunbathing Ban" thread, should Bloomberg choose to ban that, too.:)

[pianoman11686]

I keep hearing arguments about second hand smoke that you do not wish to be exposed to, which is irrelevent to my argument, which are for bars that cater exclusively to smokers. These would likely be new establishments that need special licenses anyway, not existing ones.

Fair enough. But why would you draw the line at bars? Don't you think that, once certain smoke-only bars opened up, people would demand licenses for smoking restaurants, smoking movie theaters, smoking-only sections in office buildings and malls?

It may not be worth the effort. That's beside the socially-limiting aspect of your plan: segregating smokers and nonsmokers in public settings. In the current way, if you want to smoke, you just go outside for 2 minutes and come right back in, where you can socialize with everyone.

[Radiohead]

Fair enough. But why would you draw the line at bars? Don't you think that, once certain smoke-only bars opened up, people would demand licenses for smoking restaurants, smoking movie theaters, smoking-only sections in office buildings and malls?

My argument for specially licensed cigarette bars is a pipe-dream in itself; restaurants would be a bigger stretch, since eating and smoking are not as intertwined as are drinking and smoking for many. There could be demands for them, sure, and I don't have a problem with them as long as they're advertised as such, but I think they'd be denied. As for movie theatres, if an entrepreneur wanted to open a well-marked, smoking only cinema, I supposed they should be allowed, though I doubt it would happen either. Office buildings are another story. They're smoke free for good, since segregating smokers and non-smokers would be impractical in a work setting. Plus, employers wouldn't want to encourage smoking anyway. Malls and stores will never allow smoking, and shouldn't.

It may not be worth the effort. That's beside the socially-limiting aspect of your plan: segregating smokers and nonsmokers in public settings. In the current way, if you want to smoke, you just go outside for 2 minutes and come right back in, where you can socialize with everyone.


I remember when separate, well-ventilated smoking areas used to be a good enough compromise. But that was not enough. And soon I suspect stepping outside for a smoke won't be an option. Smokers congregating outside the door, which non-smokers will have to pass by to enter, is already outlawed in some businesses, and that will extend to bars and restaurants in time. And the time is coming when smoking anywhere on the street will be outlawed.

Unfortunately, I don't see any way other than segregation. But like I said before, I'm just promoting a pipe dream. Things are as they are.

[TonyO]

There will come a time when people look back at photos of smoke-filled bars and it will be as alien to them as a photo of spitoons in bars are to us. That's a good thing.

[Sheff1]

I fully agree that no one should be forced to breathe in second hand smoke or work in a smoky environment against their will. But saying that, I do think cigarette smokers are being unduly persecuted.

A bar equipped with heavy duty smoke extractors would not be at all uncomfortable for most non smokers. Today, it is possible to install machines in bars that suck up almost all smoke as soon as it appears.

There is no doubt that smoking is harmful. However, it has not been proven that second hand cigarette smoke is any more dangerous than, say, car exhaust fumes.

If smokers are not allowed to go somewhere outside the home to smoke, they are more likely to smoke in front of their partner and kids.

I have no problem with smoking being banned in most bars. But while it remains legal, I have a big problem with it being banned absolutely everywhere indoors - even if the owner of the building and all his guests want to smoke.

I also have a big problem with the signs banning smoking on sidewalks outside buildings when the sidewalk does not actually belong to the building.

[lofter1]

Meanwhile, in Berlin ...

Boss fires staff for not smoking

REUTERS (http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN1063983120080110)
Thu Jan 10, 2008

BERLIN (Reuters) - The owner of a small German computer company has fired three non-smoking workers because they were threatening to disturb the peace after they requested a smoke-free environment.

The manager of the 10-person IT company in Buesum, named Thomas J., told the Hamburger Morgenpost newspaper he had fired the trio because their non-smoking was causing disruptions.

Germany introduced non-smoking rules in pubs and restaurants on January 1, but Germans working in small offices are still allowed to smoke.

"I can't be bothered with trouble-makers," Thomas was quoted saying. "We're on the phone all the time and it's just easier to work while smoking. Everyone picks on smokers these days. It's time for revenge. I'm only going to hire smokers from now on."

(Reporting by Sarah Roberts; editing by Giles Elgood)

[Ninjahedge]

"We're on the phone all the time and it's just easier to work while smoking.

News to me.

[lofter1]

We're on the phone all the time and it's just easier to work while smoking.

News to me.



Maybe it lost something in the translation (http://babelfish.yahoo.com/translate_txt) ...

Wir sind am Telefon alle Zeit und it's, die gerade einfacher sind beim Rauchen zu arbeiten.
But then again maybe not, especially when you look at the reverse translation ...


We are simpler at the telephone all time and it's, the straight are at smoking to be worked.

[pianoman11686]

My argument for specially licensed cigarette bars is a pipe-dream in itself; restaurants would be a bigger stretch, since eating and smoking are not as intertwined as are drinking and smoking for many.

But many restaurants are intertwined with bars. I don't think you can address those separately.

I remember when separate, well-ventilated smoking areas used to be a good enough compromise. But that was not enough. And soon I suspect stepping outside for a smoke won't be an option. Smokers congregating outside the door, which non-smokers will have to pass by to enter, is already outlawed in some businesses, and that will extend to bars and restaurants in time. And the time is coming when smoking anywhere on the street will be outlawed.

Yeah, the outdoor aspect is starting to bother me as well. IMO, anything that is officially public space and is outside should be fair game for smoking.

[Radiohead]

Yeah, the outdoor aspect is starting to bother me as well. IMO, anything that is officially public space and is outside should be fair game for smoking.

Not that I was promoting any outdoor bans. I was just stating what I think is going to happen eventually.

How about smoking in your own car? And on the street, will there be "cigarette police" handing out tickets? I don't know what's more ridiculous, the idea of such a thing, or the fact that some people actually think it is enforcable. You'd actually get people smoking on the street just to spite the law. And any tickets would likely end up in the gutter.

http://thejournal.parker-joseph.co.uk/smoking%20is%20healthier%20than%20fascism.gif

[lofter1]

But don't forget ^ smoking can be dangerous to democracy ...

http://www.shorpy.com/files/images/3b49005u1.preview.jpg

http://www.shorpy.com/taxonomy/term/78%2C107?page=4

[MinnieMe]

[How about smoking in your own car? And on the street, will there be "cigarette police" handing out tickets? I don't know what's more ridiculous, the idea of such a thing, or the fact that some people actually think it is enforcable. You'd actually get people smoking on the street just to spite the law. And any tickets would likely end up in the gutter.

http://thejournal.parker-joseph.co.uk/smoking%20is%20healthier%20than%20fascism.gif[/quote]

I totally see that happening! Not just in NYC but everywhere!

[Ninjahedge]

Parking tickets also end up in the gutter along with Jaywalking and, ironically, littering. But that does not mean they are off the hook.

I think people do have a right to smoke in their cars if they want to. That should not be outlawed. But it should be frowned upon if they are doing so in the presence of their kids. That is just not right.

Not right, but NOT MY BUSINESS, so I do not have the right, in a case like that, to forbid them from smoking in their own "private" space.

Edit: Oops, mini, you need a [quote] at the beginning to separate what the previous person wrote!

I thought that was all your writing!! ;)

[Sheff1]

Is it still legal to smoke on the sidewalk?

I se an increasing number of businesses are putting "no smoking" notices on the sidewalk outside their buildings. But the sidewalk is not their property, is it?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Yes, it's legal to smoke on the sidewalk.

Those signs are only enforceable if the area outside the door is within the property lines.

There's probably a code violation against blocking a doorway, but it has nothing to do with smoking. The sign should read:

"Don't Block the Entrance"

[Ninjahedge]

I don't know. I thought there was a minimum space, unless things like ashtrays were provided. (Mostly for larger buildings).

Or is that just Cali?


I think what the buisnesses are trying to do is get the people to spread out a bit, so that workers, clients and tenants do not have to walk through the smoker crowd on the way in, or have the butt-litter to deal with at their front door.

Just a matter of presentation and first impression.

[lofter1]

Doubt that the US will ever go the route of European package standards with strong message and scary visuals :eek: on the pack, but this could scare a few more folks away from lighting up ...

Cigarette packs to carry graphic picture warnings

breitbart.com / AFP (http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=081001084306.ipencnwu&show_article=1)
October 1, 2008

Smokers buying cigarettes will from Wednesday be confronted with a series of gruesome images printed on the packets showing how tobacco damages health.

The pictures, which show cancerous lungs and throats as well as rotting teeth, replace written warnings such as "Smoking clogs the arteries and causes heart attacks and strokes" or "Smoking can cause a slow and painful death" which currently greet going to light up.

The picture warnings will start appearing on cigarette packs from October 1 and will be compulsory from October next year. They will be printed on all tobacco products from October 2010.

The images aim to shock smokers into realising
the harm done to their bodies:

http://img.breitbart.com/images/2008/10/1/081001084306.ipencnwu/CPS.NTJ30.011008104229.photo00.photo.jpg
One of a range of images issued by the Department of Health showing how
smoking harms the body. This image, of a man with throat cancer, is just
one of a series of gruesome picture which will be printed on cigarette packets
from October 1 instead of the written health warnings.

One in six people in Britain smoke out of population of more than 60 million and the government has been stepping up measures to reduce that figure.

Written warnings on packs were adopted in 2003, and last year, the minimum age for buying tobacco was raised from 16 to 18.

Smoking in enclosed public places was banned across the country from July 2007.

"These new stark picture warnings emphasise the harsh health realities of continuing to smoke," Chief Medical Officer Liam Donaldson said.

"I hope they will make many more (people) think hard about giving up and get the help they need to stop smoking for good."

Healthy lungs and lungs of a smoker:

http://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://www.breitbart.com/images/common/dot.gifhttp://img.breitbart.com/images/2008/10/1/081001084306.ipencnwu/CPS.NTJ30.011008104229.photo01.photo.jpg

Copyright AFP 2008

[Ninjahedge]

YUMMY!!!!

Right before lunch! ;)



A bit more direct and to the point than "May cause inconvenience, Buy me anyway."

[brianac]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/01385/short-arse-Aznym-D_1385369i.jpg

Your friendly local ashtray

Location: Dublin, Ireland
Spotted by: Aznym Adam

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/picturegalleries/signlanguage/5163976/Sign-language-week-44.html?image=7

© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2009 (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/termsandconditions)

[Merry]

NYC officials want to ban smoking in city's parks

September 14, 2009

By The Associated Press SARA KUGLER

From Coney Island to Central Park, banning smoking at New York City's famous parks and beaches is the next goal of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's anti-tobacco crusade.

Bloomberg's health commissioner, Thomas Farley, said Monday that parents shouldn't have to breathe smoke while standing on the sidelines of their children's soccer games, and children shouldn't even have to look at adults smoking, he said.

"Smoking is responsible for killing over 7,000 New Yorkers a year," Farley said. "We don't think it's too far to say that people shouldn't be smoking in parks, and to try to protect our children from getting addicted to tobacco."

New York City wouldn't be the first local government to ban smoking in parks — other states, counties and cities have already done it, including in Utah, Louisiana, Maine and California.

But the nation's largest city would be among the most ambitious urban efforts — New York has hundreds of parks and 14 miles of beaches.

Bloomberg, a former smoker turned tobacco hater, has waged a war on smoking since taking office in 2002. His administration banned smoking in bars and restaurants, raised taxes on cigarettes and has tried to scare smokers with gory advertising campaigns about smoke-related health problems.

The mayor revealed Monday that his anti-smoking agenda includes scowling at smokers "with not a particularly nice look" as he passes by them when they are gathered outside of buildings.

"And social pressure really does work," he added.

The restaurant smoking ban presented a tough political battle for the mayor, and he said recently that it would be difficult to outlaw smoking in parks.

In advocating for the 2002 ban, the city pinned its arguments on the right to a safe workplace, saying waiters, bartenders and others deserved a smoke-free environment where they wouldn't have to worry about getting sick.

On his weekly radio show this summer, when a caller complained of having to walk through clouds of smoke in Union Square Park, the mayor sympathized but said it would be complicated to make parks smoke-free.

"It would be harder to do, harder to build a consensus, and generally I don't think that, you know, we could get it done," he said in July.

On Monday, Farley, who was unveiling the administration's health agenda for the next three years, said he believed it was possible.

He said officials had not worked out whether it would be a new city law or a parks department policy.

Bloomberg issued a statement late Monday that sought to soften the idea of smoke-free parks as something he would like his administration to study, rather than a policy New Yorkers can expect to see soon.

He said he wants to understand the health hazards and said it may not be logistically possible to enforce a ban across thousands of acres of parks.
"But there may be areas within parks where restricting smoking can protect health," he added. "We will continue to explore this and the other ideas presented in the plan."

Smokers in City Hall Park on Monday were not alarmed by the idea. Some said they had been expecting it.

"I understand that — it's respect for people who don't smoke," said Maria Rodriguez, a student taking a smoking break on a park bench. "I wouldn't really care."

"It wouldn't be the greatest hardship of my life," said Andrew Moreno, who smoked an American Spirit cigarette while on a lunch break. "Am I happy about it? No. But can I understand it? Yes."

http://www.newsday.com/news/new-york/nyc-officials-want-to-ban-smoking-in-city-s-parks-1.1446430

[Merry]

New York Eyes ‘No Smoking’ Outdoors, Too

By SEWELL CHAN

New York City’s workplace smoking ban six years ago drove cigarette and cigar puffers outdoors. But soon some of the outdoors may be off limits, too: The city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley, said Monday that he would seek to ban smoking at city parks and beaches.

Dr. Farley said the ban — which officials said may require the approval of the City Council, but could possibly be done through administrative rule-making by the city’s Department of Parks and Recreation — was part of a broader strategy to further curb smoking rates, which have fallen in recent years. The proposal, however, seemed to catch Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg off guard.

On Monday night, the mayor, who has championed antismoking programs but also is running for re-election, issued a statement that did not disavow the proposal but appeared to qualify it, saying he wanted “to see if smoking in parks has a negative impact on people’s health.”

He added, “It may not be logistically possible to enforce a ban across thousands of acres, but there may be areas within parks where restricting smoking can protect health.”

The City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, whose support could be crucial, said she would want the Council to hold hearings on the matter. She said that fines should be modest and not intended primarily to punish, and that any ban should make clear whether areas like boardwalks are affected.

“Conceptually, that’s an idea I’m very, very interested in and open to,” she said of Dr. Farley’s proposal.

Such bans are still rare, though growing in number. A number of municipalities — particularly in California — have banned smoking at outdoor parks, playgrounds and beaches. In 2007, Los Angeles extended its smoking ban, which already covered beaches and playgrounds, to include municipal parks. Later that year, Chicago banned smoking at its beaches and playgrounds, though smoking is still allowed in many parks. This year, California lawmakers took up a measure to prohibit smoking in all state parks and parts of state beaches.

The proposal was contained on Page 10 of a 41-page document, “Take Care New York 2012,” that put forth health policy goals for the next three years including cutting obesity, H.I.V. transmission and drug and alcohol abuse. The antismoking strategy would also include pressing for higher local, state and federal taxes on tobacco and urging organizations and businesses in the city to reject financing and sponsorship from the tobacco industry.

Mr. Bloomberg, who smoked as a young man, faced furious criticism from restaurant and bar owners in 2002 when, in his first year in office, he reached a deal with the City Council on legislation banning smoking in virtually every indoor public or commercial area, including most bars. (Smoking had been banned in most restaurants in 1995.)

But the ban, which took effect in 2003, has since gained widespread acceptance and has been credited with helping drive down the percentage of adults in the city who smoke to 15.8 in 2008, from 21.5 percent in 2002.

The New York City proposal would affect more than 1,700 parks, playgrounds and recreational facilities, as well as the city’s seven beaches, which span 14 miles of shoreline. The proposal drew praise from public health advocates and criticism from one of the nation’s biggest tobacco manufacturers.

“The issues with secondhand smoke are very real, and the majority of the population today doesn’t want to be breathing in tobacco smoke, whether indoors or outdoors,” said Dr. David A. Kessler, who was commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from 1990 to 1997. “While undoubtedly some will think this is going too far, 10 years from now, we’ll look back and ask how could it have been otherwise.”

Cheryl G. Healton, president and chief executive of the American Legacy Foundation, the smoking prevention group that was created as part of the 1998 master settlement between the tobacco industry and 46 state governments, also applauded the proposal.

“There is no redeeming value in smoking at beaches or parks,” she said in a statement. “Anyone who has sat behind someone smoking a stogie can tell you that. The health risks are real. Secondhand smoke is deadly.”

David Sutton, a spokesman for the cigarette maker Philip Morris USA, which is part of the Altria Group, said the company supported a ban on smoking in public buildings, public transportation and many areas of the workplace, as well as areas like elevators where smoking would be a fire hazard.
“We maintain, however, that complete bans go too far,” Mr. Sutton said in a statement. “We believe that smoking should be permitted outdoors except in very particular circumstances, such as outdoor areas primarily designed for children.”

Interviews on Monday suggested that smokers were, unsurprisingly, cool to the idea, while nonsmokers seemed to favor it.

“In this world, the people who have the power always try and make rules for the other people,” said Ismael Bah, 37, a salesman at J & R Music World, who was smoking Marlboros on a park bench near City Hall. “It makes sense to ban smoking inside, but smoking outside? Come on.”

Peter Prince, 55, an account executive at J & R who lives in the Riverdale section of the Bronx, said the city could at least designate smoking areas within parks. “I try to be considerate if I’m sitting next to somebody not to bother them when I smoke,” he said. “Occasionally it does happen that I light up and somebody moves away and I feel bad.”

Adele Jeune, 47, a home health aide from East New York, Brooklyn, does not smoke and had no objection to a ban. “I love clean air,” said Ms. Jeune, who was sitting on a bench in Union Square. “And if I go somewhere like this, I want to smell clean air.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/nyregion/15smoking.html?_r=1&ref=nyregion

[Ninjahedge]

While I favor such a measure, I do NOT think it is fair.

The only things I can see that are even passable may be a restriction on smokingin or around childrens playgrounds and a stronger stand on cigarette butts.

But no smoking on Parks?


As for the beaches, NJ has that already. Some beaches do. When you let people smoke on a beach and tell them to clean up after themselves, you will still get those that decide to use the sand as their own personal ashtray. Just GREAT to be stepping on someone's soggy butts, or have them float by when you are swimming!

I remember this when I was a kid, and it was always gross.


But again, none in any parks? Maybe that is just teh first salvo to trim it down to what I am talking about......

[Merry]

I could have sworn I posted the following article yesterday, along with a response to Ninja's post above.

Did I say/do something wrong :eek:, thus deletion, or was it just operator error :rolleyes:?


Proposal of Smoking Ban Stirs a Sense of Tolerance

By ANEMONA HARTOCOLLIS

We’ve come such a long way that in New York City, even many smokers feel guilty about smoking these days — if a walk through City Hall Park on Tuesday was any indication.

But what of the city health commissioner’s proposal on Monday to ban smoking in public parks? In a city where people — tall, short, fat, thin, rich, poor, pregnant, stinky, perfumed — have turned peaceful coexistence in crowded quarters like subways and sidewalks into an art, there was a widespread feeling that public parks should also be a place of tolerance.

Banning smoking in bars, restaurants and workplaces is one thing, people said, but banning cigarettes in parks and on beaches might be going just a step too far — except near children — on the road to a nanny state.

“It’s a real quandary,” said Jared Hayley, 37, a nonsmoker who was reading the paper during a break from teaching English as an adjunct professor at nearby Pace University. “This is a public space. What if somebody is eating a food that the odor is offensive to me?”

Asked about the proposed ban, Almash M. Bux, 53, an electronics technician, who was smoking to calm his nerves before an appointment for Section 8 housing, said, “I think that’s very ridiculous.”

“Where else are people going to go where they can enjoy themselves because it’s free? Except the jail or the park, that’s it,” Mr. Bux said, sitting in the shade of sweet-smelling trees and bushes, a large fountain burbling 10 feet away. “Rich people, they go to the club.”

The city’s health commissioner, Thomas A. Farley, said Monday that he would seek to ban smoking at city parks and beaches. On Tuesday, the proposal seemed to have roused many people’s inner civil libertarian.

Not far from Mr. Bux, eight construction workers, hard hats in hand, sat in a row on several benches, talking. None of them were smoking, but they defended the right of others to do so.

“Pretty soon they’re going to start charging us to breathe the air,” said one of the workers, Emilio Cuomo.

“When I was smoking, they got rid of smoking in bars, and I thought that was great,” Mr. Cuomo said.

“But parks?” a coworker, Sam Mele, said incredulously.

“What — are they talking about having a body-odor ticket?” Mr. Cuomo said. “I think they should do that.”

“Excessive perfume too, it’s a killer,” said Richie Skeans, another of the construction workers. “On a man or a woman.”

Patrick Langworthy, 26, who was sitting on a bench reading an espionage novel during a work break, said he sympathized with the goal of reducing smoking. But he added: “How do you regulate the air around you? Everyone has the freedom to be outside. I don’t understand how you can enforce that.”

Edward Dixon, 61, a marketing manager who does not smoke, said the proposal sounded awfully close to Prohibition, and, he added, look how well that worked. He imagined a future city in which people might be arrested for having nicotine-stained fingers. “Get out of the car!” he barked, enacting the scene.

Still, Mr. Dixon said he thought smoking should be prohibited near children, and some parkgoers suggested that a designated smoking area or benches in parks might be more reasonable than a ban.

In fact, smoking has been prohibited in playgrounds and at a small number of other enclosed outdoor areas, like pools and ice-skating rinks, since 1995, Jessica Scaperotti, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, said Tuesday. A city law passed in 2002 has banned smoking in virtually all workplaces, including most bars.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg acknowledged on Tuesday that enforcement of a ban in parks might be hard, and suggested a nuanced approach.

“Look, nobody is more of a believer in saving lives and stopping smoking,” the mayor said during an event at Columbia University to promote tourism.

“The real issue is, if you’re sitting in the middle of Sheep Meadow and you’re the only one there, are you doing any damage to anybody other than killing yourself? Probably not.”

But Mr. Bloomberg said that in a crowded park, “yes, you are hurting other people.”

He also cited the “practical aspect” of enforcing such a law, saying that the police and park rangers already “have a lot of things to do.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/nyregion/16smoking.html

[Merry]

NYC versus tobacco: Three new smoking deterrents spark controversy

Tom Johansmeyer

New York has long been unfriendly to smokers, particularly with the ban instituted in 2003. This year, however, a renewed effort to curb tobacco sales could translate to a negative financial impact on a city that has already felt the effects of downturns in media, finance and travel industries. Several proposed new measures could increase the restrictions on smokers in New York -- but they may have a cost to taxpayers.
For anti-smoking advocates, the ban has been cause for celebration. The number of smokers in New York City fell from 21.5 percent of the population in 2002 to 16.9 percent in 2007.

The unintended consequence, however, is that those who continue to puff have had to find places where they can do so. Sidewalks, building entrances, parks and other public places have become preferred spots, irritating outdoor diners, sunbathers and many passers by.

To remedy this secondary effect, the Bloomberg administration has proposed a ban on smoking in parks and beaches.

If recent history is any guide, taking another location away from smokers will simply push them into the few remaining spaces. Sidewalks, benches and building entrances will become even more concentrated with smokers, until further legislative action is pursued.

At the same time, New York has pursued the fight on another front. This month, the city began to prohibit the sale (or free offer) of coffee and other nonalcoholic beverages by tobacconists, stating that they would need a food and beverage license to do so. Barclay Rex, a premium tobacconist with a store near the New York Stock Exchange, was fined for allowing customers to use a free coffee maker. Since then, tobacconists up and down Manhattan reacted by shuttering their espresso and coffee machines.

The third measure is broader in reach than the crackdown on coffee and push from the parks. The board of health is considering a regulation that would require any retailer with tobacco products to post photos of diseased organs and other effects of smoking.

The reaction at a hearing in late July was mixed, according to Ron Melendi, general manager of De La Concha, a tobacco retailer in midtown Manhattan. He recalls that there were many citizens supporting the measure, including a doctor who dramatically unfurled a long document listing the chemicals contained in cigarettes. Yet, an elderly woman, a nonsmoker, explained that she didn't want to see those images in her local grocery store.

"I feel like the city is trying to shut us down," Melendi said later of the smoking ban, coffee compliance and photograph efforts currently in progress.

He separates stores like his, which is owned by Davidoff USA, Barclay Rex and the other premium tobacconists in the city from convenience stores and other retailers that include cigarettes in a diversified product offering.

"We specialize in cigars," he explained, "you come in here [referring to his store] understanding the product and the environment." Melendi is concerned that the warning photographs that may be required will detract from the ambiance and result in a revenue decrease.

Melendi is not the only person concerned. De La Concha's parent company, Davidoff USA, notes that a negative impact on sales in Davidoff's three Manhattan stores (there are Davidoff retailers on Madison Avenue and at Columbus Circle, along with De La Concha) would affect the city as a whole.

According to Davidoff USA's most recent tax filing, submitted on September 15, 2009 for the previous quarter, the three retailers paid $280,000 in sales taxes. This may be a mere rounding error for a city the size of New York, but it's money that would have to be replaced if the city's tobacconists' worst fears come true. Additionally, she says, Davidoff USA employs 21 people at its mid-town stores.

Of course, the premium tobacco industry is but a small part of the tobacco retail trade in New York, with cigarettes far more common and sold in many more locations. So, the triad of restrictions in progress reaches far beyond the employees and sales taxes of Davidoff and the cigar community.

On the anti-smoking side, health care costs are cited as more than counterbalancing the lost tobacco tax revenue, and there is a vocal majority that simply does not appreciate the smell.

The doomsday scenario that keeps tobacconists up at night -- being unable to remain in business -- does not seem like a near-term reality. But the measures currently being explored could very well squeeze demand and, consequently, sales.

For now, New Yorkers have to decide between smoking deterrents and tax revenues.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/09/19/nyc-versus-tobacco-three-new-smoking-deterrents-spark-controver/

[Merry]

Although drugs have health consequences and dangers, making them illegal -- and keeping them illegal -- will only bring additional death and suffering.I hate smoking, but I agree.


Criminalizing Smoking Is Not the Answer: Bans on Cloves and Outdoor Smoking Will Backfire!

Tony Newman
Drug Policy Alliance, Director of Media Relations

September 24, 2009 02:30 PM

The war on cigarettes is heating up. This week a new federal ban (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/23/health/policy/23fda.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=FDA%20Smoking%20Ban&st=cse) went into effect making flavored cigarettes and cloves illegal. The new regulation halted the sale of vanilla and chocolate cigarettes that anti-smoking advocates claim lure young people into smoking. This ban is the first major crackdown since Congress passed a law in June giving the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco. There is already talk of banning Menthol cigarettes next.

Meanwhile, another major initiative to limit smoking wafted out of New York City last week. A report to Mayor Michael Bloomberg from the city's Health Commissioner called for a smoking ban at city parks and beaches (http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/city-seeks-ban-on-smoking-in-parks-and-beaches/?scp=2&sq=New%20York%20Smoking%20Ban&st=cse) to help protect citizens from the harms of second hand smoke. To his credit, Bloomberg rejected this measure citing concern over stretched city and police resources.

While I support many restrictions on public smoking, such as at restaurants and workplaces, and I appreciate public education campaigns and efforts aimed at discouraging young people from smoking, I believe the outdoor smoking ban and prohibition of cloves and possibly Menthols will lead to harmful and unintended consequences. All we have to do is look at the criminalization of other drugs, such as marijuana, to see some of the potential pitfalls and tragedies.

Cities across the country - from New York to Santa Cruz, California - are considering or have already banned smoking at parks and beaches. I am afraid that issuing tickets to people for smoking outdoors could easily be abused by overzealous law enforcement.

Let's look at how New York handles another "decriminalized" drug in our state, marijuana. Despite decriminalizing marijuana more than 30 years ago, New York is the marijuana arrest capital of the world. If possession of marijuana is supposed to be decriminalized in New York, how does this happen? Often it's because, in the course of interacting with the police, individuals are asked to empty their pockets, which results in the pot being "open to public view" - which is, technically, a crime.

More than 40,000 people were arrested in New York City last year for marijuana possession, and 87 percent of those arrested were black or Latino, despite equal rates of marijuana use among whites. The fact is that blacks and Latinos are arrested for pot at much higher rates in part because officers make stop-and-frisk searches disproportionately in black, Latino and low-income neighborhoods.

Unfortunately, when we make laws and place restrictions on both legal and illegal drugs, people of color are usually the ones busted. Drug use may not discriminate, but our drug policies and enforcement do.

Now let's look at the prohibition of cloves and other flavored cigarettes. When we prohibit certain drugs, it doesn't mean that the drugs go away and people don't use them; it just means that people get their drugs from the black market instead of a store or deli. We've been waging a war on marijuana and other drugs for decades, but you can still find marijuana and your drug of choice in most neighborhoods and cities in this country.

For many people, cloves or Menthols are their smoke of choice. I have no doubt that someone is going to step in to meet this demand. What do we propose doing to the people who are caught selling illegal cigarettes on the street? Are cops going to have to expend limited resources to enforce this ban? Are we going to arrest and lock up people who are selling the illegal cigarettes? Prisons are already bursting at the seams (thanks to the drug laws) in states across the country. Are we going to waste more taxpayer money on incarceration?

The prohibition of flavored cigarettes also moves us another step closer to total cigarette prohibition. But with all the good intentions in the world, outlawing cigarettes would be just as disastrous as the prohibition of other drugs. After all, people would still smoke, just as they still use other drugs that are prohibited, from marijuana to cocaine. But now, in addition to the harm of smoking, we would find a whole range of "collateral consequences," such as black market-related violence, that crop up with prohibition.

Although we should celebrate our success curbing cigarette smoking and continue to encourage people to cut back or give up cigarettes, let's not get carried away and think that criminalizing smoking is the answer.
We need to realize that drugs, from cigarettes to marijuana to alcohol, will always be consumed, whether they are legal or illegal. Although drugs have health consequences and dangers, making them illegal -- and keeping them illegal -- will only bring additional death and suffering.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tony-newman/criminalizing-smoking-is_b_298581.html
I

[ZippyTheChimp]

First of all, I think that banning smoking at parks and beaches is ridiculous.

But the attempt to draw conclusions from comparisons with marijuana criminalization is a big stretch.

Marijuana is an illegal drug. Its production and distribution is completely underground. Banning menthol cigarettes isn't going to result in an underground market to produce and sell menthol cigarettes while you can still legally buy "regular" cigarettes.

As for criminalizing cigarette smoking, specifically a ban at parks and beaches, that criminalization has been going on for decades with bans at workplaces, then restaurants, then bars. During the time these restrictions have increased, cigarette smoking has steadily dropped.

The author is talking about two different things. The comparison might be more valid if tobacco was banned as an illegal drug, and all legitimate production and distribution were shut down.

[ablarc]

^ While you were at it, you could legalize pot, which has fewer health hazards (and actually some benefits).

[Ninjahedge]

If only you could make it smell like Vanilla or Clove, I would not mind it as much on the streets in the Village (Man, "skunkweed" is right!).

[ZippyTheChimp]

^ While you were at it, you could legalize pot, which has fewer health hazards (and actually some benefits).Yeah.

A better comparison is pot and alcohol. And we have a handy, well documented case study (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_in_the_United_States).

[Ninjahedge]

The surest way to kill a substance is over-regulation, not prohibition.

Hell, steep taxes make it less potable than taking it out of stores! Poeple are still smoking even though single packs are going for $10 each in some places!

I am tempted to bum cigarettes just so I can pocket them! ;)

[ZippyTheChimp]

Council Bans Flavored Tobacco


by Courtney Gross
15 Oct 2009

http://www.gothamgazette.com/graphics/2009/10/flavoredcigs.jpg
Photo by SheHartley

Snuffing out cherry-flavored cigarillos and cookie dough laced cigars, the City Council banned the sale of flavored tobacco products Wednesday just weeks after the federal government took flavored cigarettes off of shelves nationwide.

Often found behind the counter in glitzy, fluorescent colored wrappers and sometimes near candy, these cigars, chewing tobaccos and cigarettes have been laced with child-friendly flavors to get kids addicted early, said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn. City officials hope getting this type of tobacco product off shelves will keep kids from starting smoking.

The council also approved legislation, which allows developers to extend permits at stalled construction sites in exchange for keeping sites secure and safe.
Putting Out Flavor

Just weeks after the Food and Drug Administration banned the sale of flavored cigarettes, officials already feared tobacco companies were ready to take a different tack. Instead of cigarettes, under the new law these companies could start marketing their flavored products as cigars, effectively circumventing the country's new anti-flavored agenda.

The City Council said yesterday it wouldn't happen here.

Going a step beyond the federal government, the council included not only flavored cigarettes in its ban, but also chewing tobacco, flavored cigars and cigarillos -- a small version of a cigar. These products are big tobacco's latest attempt to garner new customers, specifically young adults who are attracted to the wide variety of taste and aroma, said council officials.

Though overall tobacco use has declined in the last five years, the percentage of students who smoke only cigars and cigarillos has tripled since 2001 from 5 to 14 percent Quinn said. She added a study from the American Cancer Society showed 90 percent of smokers begin at or before age 19.

Given the look, taste and smell of these flavored products, Quinn added, the tobacco industry couldn't be aiming for any customer other than kids and young adults.

Holding a small pink cigarillo in her hand, Quinn said, "That looks like a lip gloss. Don't tell me that's not targeted for a young girl."

The bill's sponsor, Councilmember Joel Rivera, said these brands are the latest rendition of Joe Camel -- the R. J. Reynolds character allegedly aimed at kids who was banned in the 1990s.

The bill (Intro 433-A)was approved by a vote of 46 to 1 with Councilmember Lewis Fidler dissenting.

While admitting he smoked a flavored cigar from time to time, Fidler said the law was written too broadly and there was no evidence that people start smoking by opting for flavored cigars. It is illegal already, he added, to sell these products to kids.

"If we wanted to truly affect the market for young people, we would tax it, and we would make the tax significant enough to make an economic disincentive for it to be used for blunts or any other purpose," said Fidler.

The city's health advocates applauded the legislation, saying these flavored products attempt to make smoking appear sexy to children.

Anyone who violates the law will be subject to a fine of between $250 and $2,000.


Gotham Gazette is brought to you by Citizens Union Foundation.

Gotham Gazette - http://www.gothamgazette.com/article//20091015/203/3053

[Ninjahedge]

While admitting he smoked a flavored cigar from time to time, Fidler said the law was written too broadly and there was no evidence that people start smoking by opting for flavored cigars. It is illegal already, he added, to sell these products to kids.

I assume "peach" flavor was for the more discerning palate?

I also assume that making alcohol products more fruity and bubbly has NOTHING to do with trying to get people to drink them earlier, and more often.

I mean, I know kids LOVE the taste of a genuine old-time stogie and a glass of screw-top bourbon, but you have to make sure that toddlers don't get their hands on this stuff!....


"If we wanted to truly affect the market for young people, we would tax it, and we would make the tax significant enough to make an economic disincentive for it to be used for blunts or any other purpose," said Fidler.


BS. If it is forbidden, a kid will pay more for it. The earlier you get them started, even if it is a lesser amount, the more likely they will smoke their entire life.

Tax it more? What are YOU smoking?

[MidtownGuy]

Removing products with certain flavors is ridiculous.
This town is turning into romper room if we keep limiting the choices of adults just to tailor everything for the safety of children, especially when we're talking about things that are already regulated. It's already illegal to sell any tobacco product to children.
Removing flavors does nothing...the ones who want to smoke will do it anyway. How long have kids been smoking behind parents' backs? Since there was anything to smoke.

[MidtownGuy]

I wonder if this affects shisha, the fruit flavored tobacco used in hookahs.

[MidtownGuy]

Got me remembering this classic piece of Carlin

George Carlin- F*uck The Children (http://www.ebaumsworld.com/audio/play/704824/)

[Ninjahedge]

MTG, the problem is simple. They are making cherry flavored heroin.


There are VERY few people I see, as adults, sucking on a "berry" flavored cigar. AAMOF, I don't think I see ANYONE smoking them really (but they are selling!!).

I have smelled quite a few vanilla cigarillos with the manly plastic tip, but they are mostly picked up by "kids" just over the legal age. (is that 21 now, or is it still 18?).

The problem is, flavored pipe tobacco has been around for 20 years, but i never saw kids smoking it, not really. People in college used to smoke that, but it was never a huge thing.

But a product that is targeted and marketed at the youngest age possible is just an unhealthy extension of capitalism. they are ALLOWED to do this, but it ends up costing ALL of us more in the long run from THEIR medical bills (either through Medicare/Medicaid, or through increased private insurance payouts being reflected in even higher average premiums for all).

Maybe this needs to be re-written to make it so that it is less in-your-face as what Zippy's clip shows. You don't start sticking a peach cigar right under the nose of a kid, they will never really express a desire for one then, or in the future....

[MidtownGuy]

MTG, the problem is simple. They are making cherry flavored heroin.

You wouldn't smoke heroin just because it's flavored.

[MidtownGuy]

There are VERY few people I see, as adults, sucking on a "berry" flavored cigar. AAMOF, I don't think I see ANYONE smoking them really (but they are selling!!).

Ninjahedge, you don't see anyone smoking them because you hardly see people smoking ANY type of cigar nowadays...it happens only about once a week that I see anybody walking down the street with a cigar. One generally doesn't grab a quick cigar and smoke it away in front of a building, the way you do with a cigarette...they are a slow burn. Enjoyed while relaxing somewhere, most likely out of sight of ninjahedge's commuting route.

Then you have the fact that berry flavors are often used to roll some weed by dumping out the tobacco and using the wrapping. Another topic.

[Ninjahedge]

You wouldn't smoke heroin just because it's flavored.

Nope, it would have to be COOL first!!!! ;)

[Ninjahedge]

Ninjahedge, you don't see anyone smoking them because you hardly see people smoking ANY type of cigar nowadays...it happens only about once a week that I see anybody walking down the street with a cigar. One generally doesn't grab a quick cigar and smoke it away in front of a building, the way you do with a cigarette...they are a slow burn. Enjoyed while relaxing somewhere, most likely out of sight of ninjahedge's commuting route.

Then you have the fact that berry flavors are often used to roll some weed by dumping out the tobacco and using the wrapping. Another topic.
Meh on the Weed issue. Butt the other? I have not seen them in here, I have not seen them there. I have not seen them anywhere.
I have not seen them on a boat, I have not seen them on a goat!
I do not see them in the rain, and have not seen them on a train!.
They may be in a box, but I have never seen them with a fox!!!!


:D

[MidtownGuy]

I guess people smoke cigars in the privacy of their homes (or on their yacht:)) more often than not?

[Ninjahedge]

Back to serious for a moment MTG, I see a LOT of juvies sucking vanillas in Hoboken. They do not smoke them on THEIR stoop because their parents would probably give them a hard time. So we get some on ours, some at bus stops, etc.

I have yet to see a grown man puffing one of these. Maybe they only suck those in the closet?

[MidtownGuy]

^No, on a barcalounger.
http://cn1.kaboodle.com/hi/img/c/0/0/4c/0/AAAADJWG9CwAAAAAAEwLog.jpg
Grown men have different habits. Grown men aren't afraid of/don't live with parents and therefore aren't looking for stoops and bus stops to smoke at...grown men have a living room and a lounge chair.
SO, therefore you see a smaller proportion outside smoking things on stoops....cherry flavor or NOT.

[lofter1]

The age old answer to sneaking a puff (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqdTBDkUEEQ) :cool:

[Ninjahedge]

MTG, people, in general, smoke outside more now regardless of what they are smoking. Wether it be because their partner does not want the smoke in the house, or if the place they are living has a no-smoking policy (my old apartment had that).

Still, I see very few, if ANY, grown men over the age of 30 smoking anything designed for the sweet tooth....


I was just looking around for thnigs on this and found a few things that might be interesting, but no hard sells:

http://www.case.edu/med/adolescenthealth/publications/M_Cigar_Use_Joshua%20Terchek.ppt#260,1,Slide 1

http://oig.hhs.gov/oei/reports/oei-06-98-00030.pdf

[Merry]

For Some Smokers, Even Home Is Off Limits

By C. J. HUGHES

The movement to ban smoking in New York City has grown so quickly that no place seems immune — certainly not restaurants or bars, and public beaches and parks may not be far behind. Now the efforts are rapidly expanding into the living room.

More landlords are moving to prohibit smoking in their apartment buildings, telling prospective tenants they can be evicted if they light up in them.
This month, the Related Companies will ban smoking at some of its downtown apartment buildings because of health concerns about secondhand smoke, according to company officials.

Smokers who already live in any of these buildings will not be affected, according to Jeff Brodsky, a president of Related, which is a national developer with 17 buildings in Manhattan.

But any new renters must promise not to smoke at home, even if they continue to elsewhere.

Kenbar Management, a local developer, is going a step further. When its new project, 1510 Lexington Avenue, opens in December, smoking will be banned in all 298 units, in addition to private and shared terraces.

And the typical smoker’s refuge — directly outside the building — is also off limits; tenants must agree not to smoke on any of the sidewalks that wrap around the building, which takes up most of a block in East Harlem, according to Kinne Yon, a Kenbar principal.

The trend has predictably divided smokers and nonsmokers in New York.

“I think it’s absolutely absurd,” said Bryan Marx, 53, a cabinetmaker who has lived at Tribeca Park, a Related building on Chambers Street, since 1999. He smokes hand-rolled cigarettes in his apartment, but said that he cut back on a cigar habit a few years ago to appease a neighbor.

“How about a little tolerance?” Mr. Marx added. “Smokers have become the whipping boys for everything that’s unhealthy about living in New York City.”

Across the country, the movement to ban smoking in residential buildings is gaining traction. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/h/housing_and_urban_development_department/index.html?inline=nyt-org) has strongly encouraged (http://www.hud.gov/offices/pih/publications/notices/09/pih2009-21.pdf) public housing agencies to ban smoking in some or all of their units.

So far, about 50 public housing agencies have now forbidden smoking, according to Betsy Feigin Befus, a lawyer with the National Multi Housing Council (http://www.nmhc.org/), a landlord trade group that has tracked the efforts.

Other cities, through legislation or by initiatives of developers, have taken similar steps. In California, for example, all apartments and condos in Richmond, near San Francisco, must outlaw cigarette smoking, according to an ordinance passed in July. Across the bay in Belmont, a ban on smoking in apartments took effect in January (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/us/27belmont.html) after a 14-month grace period, with $100 fines possible for offenders.

While there is no question about the dangers of secondhand smoke, there is debate about whether the amount of smoke that may be transmitted from one apartment to another is harmful. A recent study by New York City’s health department (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/09/health/policy/09smoke.html) found that about 57 percent of nonsmokers had been exposed to substantial levels of cigarette smoke, raising suspicions among experts that apartment dwellers might be susceptible to secondhand smoke from their neighbors.

New York City has been at the forefront of efforts to ban smoking in bars and restaurants, and the city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley, said in September that he supported a ban on smoking at city beaches and parks. But the city, he said, has no plan to push for a smoking ban in public housing developments.

The city did help Related research the health effects of smoke in apartment buildings, Dr. Farley said, adding, “Our focus would be on individuals having their homes smoke-free.”

Pan Am Equities, a real estate management company, may have been one of the first in New York to introduce a smoking ban to an apartment building. About 18 months ago, the company asked new renters to promise not to smoke; the ban did not affect existing tenants, according to David Iwanier, a company vice president.

All of Pan Am’s rentals — which include 270 Park Avenue South, 145 West 67th Street and 60 West 23rd Street — are affected, though Mr. Iwanier would not discuss the reasons for the ban.

“It was just something we decided to do,” he said. And in terms of lease renewals, he added, “we’ve not had any negative feedback.”

Mr. Brodsky, of Related, said that existing tenants would be reassured that they would not be evicted or pressured to leave. He would not specify which of the developer’s buildings are in line for the ban, saying only that they are among the six in or near Battery Park City and Chelsea. Those include Tribeca Park; the Caledonia, which abuts the High Line (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/h/high_line_nyc/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier) park; and Tribeca Green in Battery Park City, which bills itself as “New York’s most environmental rental.”

“I think it’s a bloody good thing,” said Dale Smith, 41, a Broadway producer who formerly worked in the health care industry. A resident of Tribeca Green for nearly three years, Mr. Smith, who does not smoke, said he had complained to his landlord about secondhand smoke in his apartment.

“A policy that is in place because something has proven to be hazardous in eating establishments should be effective in the home,” he said.

Experts say there is no known law in the United States that prohibits landlords from banning smoking in their buildings, and many trial judges have sided with the nonsmoker. In New York, for example, a 2006 decision (http://www.nycourts.gov/reporter/3dseries/2006/2006_26343.htm) found that tenants had the right to break a lease because the landlord failed to safeguard an apartment from secondhand smoke.

Co-ops and condominiums have been somewhat slower to embrace such bans, according to real estate lawyers.

In interviews with several lawyers who represent real estate concerns, only one, Stuart Saft, knew of any buildings that had instituted a smoking ban. He said that of the 100 or so co-op buildings he represents on the Upper East and West Sides of Manhattan, only two have banned smoking outright in the last few years.

A poll commissioned by the NYC Coalition for a Smoke Free City (http://www.nycsmokefree.org/) suggested that a residential smoking ban might not hurt rentals or sales. The survey of 1,000 New Yorkers, which was administered by Zogby International in July, found that 58 percent would pay more to live in smoke-free housing; 68 percent might not live in a smoking building in the first place.

Yet some real estate brokers question the wisdom of instituting a smoking ban during a housing downturn, with vacancy rates climbing.

That 950,000 New Yorkers — or 16 percent of the population — call themselves smokers, according to the city’s health department, is not insignificant, said Daniel Baum, chief executive at the Developers Group/The Real Estate Group of New York, a brokerage that focuses on rentals.
“I think in general it’s probably not an ideal time to try to limit potential tenants,” Mr. Baum said. “Every occupied apartment counts.”

And Audrey Silk, the founder of Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment (http://www.nycclash.com/), a nine-year-old advocacy group, said the trend was troubling from a civil liberties perspective.

“If we’re talking about annoying odors, where do you draw the line?” she said. “What about cooking odors, from fish or curry?”

Yet some smokers seemed resigned to their fate. Brian Mossotti, 28, a day trader, moved into the Pan Am-run building on 23rd Street 14 months ago, after the developer’s ban had taken effect. After receiving three warnings from management about fumes in the hallway, including a stern letter in September, Mr. Mossotti finally agreed to take his two-a-day cigarette habit to the sidewalk, he said.

“You can’t smoke in bars because of the whole secondhand smoke thing, so it doesn’t surprise me,” he said. “But it is irritating.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/16/nyregion/16smoke.html

[MidtownGuy]

Along this line of thinking, I want cars banned. When I walk down the street, I'm breathing hazardous fumes. Cars aren't necessary in Manhattan and the proximity to my lungs and mouth are a danger to my health. Car drivers may want the pleasure of that automobile, but it is too likely that I may breath a stray fume. Even in my apartment, tiny bits of invisible smoke may penetrate my bedroom and go into my mouth while I sleep.

I want frisbees banned at the park. My neighbor was struck by a frisbee while trying to safely recline in the park. Frisbees are frivolous and can be dangerous when they strike someone in the face.

I want french fries banned. They are causing my health insurance payments to go up because people just can't stop themselves from eating artery clogging, unhealthy french fries. Filthy.

How dare people get wifi. There is evidence coming in that wifi and other such radiation causes cancer. It's going right through my apartment! Ban it all. Cell phones...nothing but producers of cancer. I have a nifty trick with dixie cups and string that will be much safer for us.

I definitely want the eating of meat BANNED. Consuming red meat produced by today's factory farm methods has been proven carcinogenic. The meats are filled with chemicals, contribute to millions of gallons of chemical runoff, cattle grazing leads to the destruction of the rainforest, and raising meat for human consumption is just generally bad for the planet with 6 billion mouths to feed.

Meat is endangering me even when I am personally not eating it, and others choose to eat it out of selfishness. It is a burden on the medical system. When I smell the meat cooking in my neighbors apartment, it makes me retch and reminds me of dying monkeys in the Amazon. It is so unpleasant for me. I'm very delicate...did I mention that?

Ice cream, hamburgers, transmission lines, rocks that stick out of the ground ...I want it all banned.
:rolleyes:

[Ninjahedge]

Uh huh.

[Merry]

Six Years After Ban, Smoking Returns to NYC's Bars and Clubs

The worst kept secret in New York nightlife is that smoking is now allowed in numerous nightspots. Mayor Bloomberg's 2003 law was meant to effectively eliminate all smoking inside bars, and for a while it seemed to work. It was possible for non-smokers to spend a night at their favorite bar or club and not come home reeking of Parliaments, as smokers were forced to step outside to light up. Memories. By 2006, indoor smoking seemed to slowly reappear, starting with a handful of tiny little joints (http://ny.eater.com/tags/beatrice-inn) popular with A-list crowds and quickly spreading to just about any and every lounge and club with a doorman and a rope. Now, as soon as one person lights up, the rest of the smoking sheep follow along, and before can say Joe Camel, the whole room is filled with sweet Carolina smoke. Neighbors love it because it keeps noisy smokers off the streets, and smokers love not having to go outdoors for their fix. It seems the only places that are still enforcing the ban are the dingier and more low key bars that probably were the home of many a smoker before the ban.

One solution. >> (http://ny.eater.com/archives/2009/11/the_return_of_smoking.php#more)

From what operatives here have witnessed, It's obvious that the smoking ban is failing on a number of levels. Numerous lounge and club owners are turning a blind eye to their smoking customers breaking the law as they realize that the likelihood of the City catching them in the act is almost zilch. Meanwhile, non-smoking employees and customers, for whom the law was passed, are forced to inhale the second hand smoke. So what can be done?

Beyond increasing enforcement, what if the City created an opt-in clause that would allow bar owners to pay for the right to allow smoking? Their employees would know that they were working in a smoking-friendly environment, patrons would feel free to light up, and the City would see a bit of revenue. The annual charge (based upon capacity) would have to steep enough to make owners think twice about allowing smoking, but not so steep that no one would sign up. The fines for allowing smoking without a license would be steep, say four times the annual fee, so that owners will live up to their responsibilities.

Is it perfect? No. Workers stuck in the smoking venues may not find it so easy to relocate. But it would represent a huge step up from the free-for-all that exists today, allowing customers to know where they could have smoke free fun, reduce the number of venues that the City's enforcers have to inspect, and possibly bring in some money for our beloved and cash strapped City. Win, win win.

http://ny.eater.com/archives/2009/11/the_return_of_smoking.php