Maine: Maine Smoking Ban Drives Smokers Over Border

Join Together Online ^ | 1-23-04

[SheLion]

$1.60 a PACK taxes in the state of Maine........and this money is going to Maine Healthy Partners and their paychecks. Heh!

Maine smokers who pay taxes on cigarettes are supporting the Partnership for a Tobacco Free Maine to continue their abuse on us.

[Great Dane]

Read in the paper today, they now have a patch detecting smoke, whats next.

[Max McGarrity]

Well said. BTW, don't look for the little silver candy decorations on next year's cookies here in Kookiefornia.

[metesky]

Love the tag line, but why be a piker? Go for a 53' Hatteras rigged for bluefin tuna!

[metesky]

Did you get the Doc's name? We need people like him badly.

[Old Professer]

I tried that, too; the apples go out right away, but if you keep the flame on them the oranges burn pretty good.

[BriarBey]

So will the ACLU go to work for smokers? Our rights are being violated!!

[SheLion]

So will the ACLU go to work for smokers? Our rights are being violated!!

I've often wondered why they don't step in on this issue. They sure are quick for everything else!

[Mears]

Every time I see a chart like this I swear I'm going to move south and I'm a born and bred Bay Stater.

Of course anyone who gives the high taxed states their business is silly----there are ways around everything.

I always enjoy the stories of bootleggers selling butts on the streets of NYC.If I lived there I'd give them my business.

[SheLion]

Of course anyone who gives the high taxed states their business is silly----there are ways around everything.

It's been 3.5 years since I paid into the state coffers for cigarettes. It's been great!

[Just another Joe]

"I think they're going to find that people in New Hampshire are going to drive to Maine," she said. "In other states and cities there's not been a sustained drop in business."

BWAHAHAHAHAHA

This lady should be in comedy!

[SheLion]

This lady should be in comedy!

(I wonder how much she weighs.........)

[BriarBey]

I've often wondered why they don't step in on this issue. They sure are quick for everything else!


Maybe not enough people have approached them since most smokers have been convinced they are the scourge of the earth and buy into all this BS!!!

[xzins]

It seems to me the proper market way to handle this is to leave them alone and let them run their own businesses.

The 2nd best way would be to have them decide to be either a smoking or a non-smoking establishment. Then everyone gets a choice and if non-smoking places are the rage, then they'll run the smoking places out of business. If the $$ prove to be in the non-smoking area, then the smoking will start hanging up no-smoking signs in order to compete.

Choice: excised from the liberal dictionary except for one area -- the killing of the young.

[NCLaw441]

Forgive me, xzins, for using your post to make a rambling statement. Yours was the last post, so I just tacked on.

This is a thorny issue. I come from a home of smokers, but I have never smoked cigarettes. Tried a pipe freshman year of college, looked like a dork (which I guess I WAS). I am told I tried pot a couple of times during a drunken stupor, so never appreciated it (if it can be appreciated). My mother died at 43 of lung cancer. My father quit about 10 years ago, and seems to be going pretty strong for a former heavy smoker. My sister still smokes a lot, has tried to quit but "can't." I make no judgments on any of them, or others who smoke. Let me rephrase: I admit that I do see smokers as weak-willed, and I am disappointed when I learn that someone I admire turns out to be a smoker. Most smokers I have talked to about smoking say that they wish they could quit, but there are some who know the risks, or deny the risks, and smoke because they enjoy it. That's their call, and I am fine with that. We don't allow smoking in our home or in our cars, but we don't mind visiting the homes of those who smoke (although I really hate riding in cars with smokers...no escape).

If all restaurants were non-smoking, that would be just fine with me from a personal perspective, but I do seriously disagree with any local government policy that would restrict the right of the property owner/employer to determine whether, when and where smoking is allowed on his property. I believe employers should be able to fire or refuse to hire smokers, if they wish. I don't think smoking rises to the level of a right that is constitutionally protected (except in one's home), or even should be. I don't believe secondary smoke is harmful, just unpleasant for most people (even smokers. It seems that most, if not all, smokers, roll down their car windows when they smoke, and tend to hold their cigarettes away from their own faces..why is that?)

I am troubled by how angry smokers seem to get about this subject (I do understand how restaurant owners can get angry because of loss of patronage, but I it bothers me that whether you can smoke or not affects business so much. Do you have to smoke that bad?). But I think smokers, on the whole, are more tolerant of anti-smokers and non-smokers than the antis are of smokers.

Sorry for the rant, but there you go.

[SheLion]

It seems to me the proper market way to handle this is to leave them alone and let them run their own businesses.

The 2nd best way would be to have them decide to be either a smoking or a non-smoking establishment. Then everyone gets a choice and if non-smoking places are the rage, then they'll run the smoking places out of business. If the $$ prove to be in the non-smoking area, then the smoking will start hanging up no-smoking signs in order to compete.

Oh! But that's too easy!  Maine Healthy Partnership wants to use the "heavy hand" to enforce their own way of life, all the while, having their pay checks handed to them by the smoker's who pay taxes in Maine on cigarettes!

They forced all the restaurants in Maine to go smoke-free in 1999.  We lost a lot of smaller restaurants because of this ban. (But of course, "they" put the spin on it that it's the weather or it's the economy!)

We stopped going to our favorite restaurant for almost a year.  And the owner was real close to closing the doors, when they bought a very expensive liquor license in order to open the smoking section back up again.

They then remodeled.  Three big smoke eaters, and a beautiful glass enclosed non-smoking room.  It was great.  But now, all that money spent is going down the toilet, because you KNOW Maine Healthy Partnership won't be reimbursing anyone for their remodeling to accommodate all the patrons.  Oh no!  They could care less.

MAINE HEALTHY PARTNERSHIP'S ARE CHOKING MAINE'S ECONOMY!

[KantianBurke]

YAY! Go Virginia!

[SheLion]

Maybe not enough people have approached them since most smokers have been convinced they are the scourge of the earth and buy into all this BS!!!

For one thing: it's just done. The issue isn't put up for a vote.......

Plus, when the word got out about forcing the restaurants to go smoke-free in 1999, no one thought it could really happen, so no-one spoke up.

Well, it happened. When the word got out that all the bars, taverns and sports inns would be forced to go smoke-free the 1st of January, 2004....again......none of the business owners spoke up.

A group in southern Maine is or was working on getting this on the ballot. But it won't be on a ballot until November 2005. Another year and a half if not longer.

I guess we really are sheeple........being led around by the nose. Pity.

[Gabz]

Unfortunately Warner wants to raise it to 75cents.......

[Gabz]

Good rant.