A nice robusto Arturo Fuente after a good meal is great!
Posted on 06/05/2007 9:58:50 AM PDT by rwh
JACKSON — A coalition of anti-smoking experts remains undaunted by the crushing March defeat of Wyoming’s first-ever proposed smoking ban and is gearing up for another fight — one, the group says, is inevitable.
Group members admit they may not win the next time around either because of the state’s Libertarian streak, but, they say, it’s certain that smoking will one day be banned in Wyoming’s public places — including bars and restaurants — because science is on their side: namely that secondhand smoke kills about 50,000 nonsmokers yearly in the United States.
Comprehensive smoking bans are already in place in seven of the eight states bordering Wyoming, coalition members note, with Nebraska being the sole exception.
“They (tobacco proponents) know they’re not going to win eventually — so they delay, delay, delay,” said Dr. Robert Shepard, co-author of the Helena Heart Attack Study, which showed the incidence of heart attacks in Montana’s capital city was reduced by 40 percent following a smoking ban in all public places.
“Get on board,” said Frieda Glantz of the Americans for Nonsmokers Rights Foundation. “It’s no longer ‘are you going to go smoke-free?’ but ‘are you going to be the last to make it happen?’”......
The coalition came together to discuss strategies for reducing smoking, implementing a smoking ban and educating the public about the dangers of smoking and secondhand smoke. Shepard spared few words when referring to the coalition’s enemy — “Big Tobacco” — calling tobacco companies “truly evil.” He especially was critical of the industry’s attacks via “front groups” like beer and tavern associations on those pushing for smoking bans.
“You kill 435,000 people a year in the United States — 5 million worldwide — and you think we’re accusing you of being callous and deceitful?” he said.
Because of the industry’s deep pockets, Shepard told coalition members it is sometimes best to pursue smoking bans at the city level — where, unlike the federal and state levels, tobacco money has little hold.....
The most common argument used to counter the health claims used by proponents of smoking bans is that smoking is a personal rights issue, Shepard said, that “smoking is a legal substance.”
The argument amounts to a “red herring,” he said, an attempt to “change the subject.”
“Tobacco is legal — true,” Shepard said. “In this context it means that because tobacco is legal, we cannot put restrictions on it.”
But Shepard pointed out, alcohol, penicillin and lead are also legal substances, yet the government has seen fit to place restrictions on them.
“This whole ‘it’s legal’ argument is total nonsense,” he said. “This is a health issue. The free exercise of your rights cannot harm others.”
“We’re not prohibitionists,” Glantz said. “We’re not saying people can’t smoke, we just don’t want them to smoke in ways that harm other people. I don’t want to have a heart attack because I’m exposed — not by my choice — to secondhand smoke.”
Nonsmoking laws are even friendly to business, according to Mark McNulty, senior research scientist for the Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center at the University of Wyoming. McNulty, who was also a presenter, said out of 22 “credible” peer-reviewed university studies, 21 show that smoking laws have no net effect or a slightly positive effect on business at bars and restaurants.
McNulty found in a recent study of bar and restaurant tax revenue from Laramie and Cheyenne, Wyoming’s two smoke free cities (Evanston has also passed an ordinance and is set to follow), that overall business has not been negatively affected there.
But, McNulty stressed to audience members, that some individual business owners likely were negatively affected by the bans, although, he noted, that it’s impossible to get data on individual businesses because “that’s proprietary.”
“Don’t ever say that nobody is going to be hurt, because they are,” he said. “But the bottom line is the net effect is going to be positive.”....
Some local bar owners dispute medical claims that second-hand tobacco smoke is a carcinogen and some don’t. Regardless of their stance, however, most don’t want to see smoking banned in businesses for one simple reason: smoking is a personal right.
Bar owners piped up in response to a recent gathering of nationwide anti-smoking experts in Jackson to discuss tobacco-free policies.
The consensus of the experts was that smoking bans are in the interest of public health, and those who fight them are merely postponing the inevitable.
A bill that would have banned smoking in most indoor public places in the state died in the Legislature last year.
“Coming to a bar is an optional activity, and if you don’t like smoking, then stay the hell out,” said Cliff Crowder, longtime owner of the Rezeride Roadhouse Saloon near Kinnear......
I couldn't have said it better myself, and I am a non smoker!
It looks like these groups are just going to keep shoving this down our throats until they get their way.
The last I heard, the World Health Organization has been unable to pinpoint one death on second-hand smoke.
When are these pinheads going to try and bar driving motor vehicles, swimming and riding bicycles?
Never.
I can see how second hand smoke could get one killed or injured, when some busybody gets in my face about it, I may not respond in why anticipated by the busybody.
“This whole ‘it’s legal’ argument is total nonsense,”
Care to offer any reason as to why you think that’s the case??
A nice robusto Arturo Fuente after a good meal is great!
The bans on smoking indoors were justified by highly inflated statistics about SHS deaths. The only justification for the bans on outdoor smoking is that ... well, actually there is no justification offered. It’s just prohibition by stealth.
(BTW, I am a non smoker — a lot of us can’t see the reason to ban smoking in public places outdoors.)
Here’s an interesting article on hormesis:
http://www.dimaggio.org/Eye-Openers/poison_is_good_for_you.htm
A nice robusto Arturo Fuente after a BAD meal is even better!.......
“Wyoming’s public places — including bars and restaurants”
Wow, Wyoming must be really rich to own all the bars and restaurants.
Whoops, the group members let the mask slip a little here.
That nasty libertarian streak, bane of control freaks everywhere.
That statement has been found fraudulent in a federal court.
The number has been cited 20,000 times, but not scientifically proven even once.
I have no problem with any and all indoor bans -- so long as designated places which meet scientific mitigating measures are allowed to continue existing.outdoor bans of any kind, including urban parks and every beach in the United States.
They did better than that. In the largest scientific study ever done on second-hand smoke, the WHO failed to find a single real, physical harmful health hazard, and identified a few minor beneficial results.
That's why it was promptly "buried", over ten years, now.
The bans on smoking indoors were justified by highly inflated statistics about SHS deaths.
When the death certificate is filled out if the decased EVER smoked or was EVER exposed to it, it is listed as a smoking related death, no matter what the actual cause may have been.
Anti-smoking experts? Where does one get a degree in "anti-smoking"? None needed... Just be more concerned, more compassionate than the next guy and BINGO! you're an expert!
secondhand smoke kills about 50,000 nonsmokers yearly in the United States.
Gee, I can remember just afew years ago when we had the FReeper Smokers Lounge going, they were claiming 5.000/7,000 deaths a year from shs. Fewer people smoking with fewer and fewer places to smoke, yet they're claiming a tenfold increase in the number of shs deaths?
They couldn't provide one death certificate then that said shs as cause of death and they can't prove it now, but what the hell that added zero ought to scare some folks away, eh?
But Shepard pointed out, alcohol, penicillin and lead are also legal substances, yet the government has seen fit to place restrictions on them.
Minors can't buy tobacco anymore than they can buy beer. Legally, that is.
McNulty, who was also a presenter, said out of 22 “credible” peer-reviewed university studies, 21 show that smoking laws have no net effect or a slightly positive effect on business at bars and restaurants.
But, McNulty stressed to audience members, that some individual business owners likely were negatively affected by the bans, although, he noted, that it’s impossible to get data on individual businesses because “that’s proprietary.”
Well then who did the credible peer reviewed studies if it's impossible to get proprietary data, eh?
Oh, to be an expert, an advocate, a public watchdog, oozing altruism and saving other people from themselves.
And picking up a pretty darn good paycheck at the same time.
That too!
Nanny state Ping...........
They are pulling out the Helena “study” crapola........these people are seriously deranged.
Please note the name of the whacko woman from ANR..............GLANTZ. I wonder the relation between Frieda and Stanton?
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