[Dakmar]

I know this is a stretch, but what if a convenience store clerk is selling cigarettes to a five year old? Should the five year old be punished, or the clerk making the sale? It is the responsibility of businesses to ensure they are not making underage sales, and most do a good job.

[Phantom Lord]

Obviously the 5 year old analogy is a big stretch that would never actually happen. I am NOT suggesting that the current punishments for selling tobacco to minors be removed or reduced. I would say increase the penalties if deemed neccesary. I do not know if retailers need a license to sell tobacco products. If they do, yank it upon conviction of selling to a minor.

But consequences should be instituted on the minor purchaser of tobacco. And I would gladly venture to say that a vast majority of minors you see puffing away did not buy their smokes at the local gas station. I would say that they were purchased by someone else for them or stolen from someones parents. Be it their own or a friends. That is why i have also suggested penalties for the possesion and use of tobacco products.

Give all teenagers puffing away in front of the mall a $50 fine and we could wipe out the national debt in a week. Ok, thats a big stretch, i admit. But it would reduce, if not eliminate that regular scene. And how many kids start smoking when a 'friend' or someone in their peer group asks them "want a smoke"? I would gladly put money on it that the number is high, and that the question isnt being asked at a back yard BBQ. It is being asked away from their homes in public places such as the mall, the sidewalk across from school, movie theaters, and other places of public accomidation that teenagers heavily populate.