Free Republic

ANNAPOLIS — Maryland health advocates are lauding Gov. Martin O'Malley’s proposal to increase the state’s cigar tax, but critics say such an increase would create another financial burden for consumers and business owners. Mr. O'Malley, a Democrat, proposed a state budget Wednesday that would raise the 15-percent excise tax on cigars, smokeless tobacco and other noncigarette tobacco items — a group collectively known as other tobacco products (OTP) — to 70 percent. The OTP tax has gone unchanged since 1999 while the cigarette tax has gone from 36 cents to $2 a pack during that period. Health advocates argue raising...

A new Institute of Medicine report unintentionally highlights the fatal folly of censoring truthful information about cigarette alternatives until their manufacturers can generate the sort of costly, time-consuming studies that federal regulators demand before approving new drugs. Under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, a "modified risk tobacco product," which is any tobacco product identified as safer than cigarettes, can be legally sold only after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) certifies that it will "benefit the health of the population as a whole, taking into account both users of tobacco products and persons who do not currently...

A couple of months ago I posted a thread that I was trying to quit smoking and asked for advice. I tried going cold turkey, but only managed a few days. I finally went to the doctor and got a prescription for Chantix. I'm right at three weeks smoke-free now. I quit taking the Chantix about a week and a half ago (horrible nightmares and seriously screwed up sleep) and I'm past the 'cravings' stage. I really only think about smoking a couple of times a day, but I'm not fighting the urge to smoke any more. This is the...

Reason’s Jacob Sullum discovers another example of nannies amok: "Yesterday the Boston Public Health Commission voted to ban the use of electronic cigarettes in workplaces, including outdoor areas such as restaurant patios. It says it is simply “clos[ing] a loophole” by “treat[ing] e-cigarettes like tobacco products.” But since e-cigarettes do not contain any tobacco and do not generate smoke (merely a propylene glycol vapor containing nicotine), that is a puzzling way to characterize the decision. The official justification for banning smoking in workplaces is protecting employees and other bystanders from the toxins and carcinogens generated when tobacco is burned. Let’s...

Barack Obama, a former smoker, urged Americans to stub out their cigarettes on the "Great American Smokeout Day," adding he knows just how hard it is to quit. ... Obama, a longtime smoker, quit in early 2010 a year after entering the White House, his former spokesman Robert Gibbs and First Lady Michelle Obama have said.

A U.S. judge sided with tobacco companies on Monday, granting a temporary injunction blocking rules requiring new warning labels that use graphic images like a man exhaling cigarette smoke through a hole in his throat.

Eight current and former NYPD officers have been arrested "on federal charges including gun trafficking and conspiracy to smuggle cigarettes" as reported by William K. Rashbaum for The New York Times: "the charges allege that the officers — five are still on the force and three are retired — were involved in smuggling more than a dozen illegal handguns as well as M-16 rifles and shotguns, the people briefed on the case said." It's been a rough month for the NYPD. Earlier this month a former detective testified at the corruption trial of a fellow officer that "it was common...

“(It) doesn't matter how big the warnings are. You could have cigarettes that were called the warnings. You could have cigarettes that come in a black pack with a skull and a cross bone on the front, called ‘Tumors’ and smokers would be lined up around the block going, "I can't wait to get my hands on these fucking things!” – Denis Leary ‘No Cure for Cancer’ There are certain areas of government hypocrisy that we as a society have come to accept as normal. These subjects are always met with a shake of the head and shrugged shoulders when...

PLEASANT HILL -- To get a good deal, Paul Brodman used to buy cigarettes online. Little did he know, those smokes weren't the bargain they appeared to be. There's no getting out of paying state taxes simply by buying cigarettes online. Earlier this month, Brodman received a bill for $1,398 from the State Board of Equalization for back taxes and penalties he owes for 100 cartons of cigarettes he bought online from an out-of-state retailer in 2007 and 2008. Initially, Brodman thought it was a mistake. "We smoked them; we didn't resell them," he said. "I wasn't selling them on...

FRANKFORT — Revenue from Kentucky's cigarette tax is in free-fall, but more Kentuckians kicking the unhealthy habit isn't the only reason for the decline. State officials say more and more people are turning to cheaper alternatives — little cigars and roll-your-own cigarettes — that aren't covered by the state's 60-cent-a-pack tax. The little cigars look much like cigarettes but are wrapped in brown paper. They cost about $1.25 a pack, compared to about $3.25 for the cheapest pack of cigarettes. The move to small cigars and roll-your-own cigarettes is a national trend. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that states...

TORONTO . Aline Ajami's nightmare began when a stranger appeared at the Toronto apartment where she lived with her parents. He said his name was Kamal Ghandour and that he was connected to the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. There was a problem, he said. Ms. Ajami's uncle owed him money. As a result, the uncle was being held hostage by Mr. Ghandour's associates in south Lebanon. He would be killed, Mr. Ghandour warned, unless Ms. Ajami did exactly what she was told. That encounter in February 2008 was the start of what an Ontario judge, in language more reminiscent of...

Hundreds of bars, restaurants and stores across Minnesota are running out of beer and alcohol and others may soon run out of cigarettes -- a subtle and largely unforeseen consequence of a state government shutdown. In the days leading up to the shutdown, thousands of outlets scrambled to renew their state-issued liquor purchasing cards. Many of them did not make it. Now, with no end in sight to the shutdown, they face a summer of fast-dwindling alcohol supplies and a bottom line that looks increasingly bleak. The Ugly Mug doesn't have enough beer to get through the baseball season. "Our...

Given that the FDA now would demand graphically unpleasant images be plastered all over cigarette packages perhaps a useful trend could emerge. For example, why not superimpose photos of auto accident victims, the more severe the injury the better, on cell phone telephone bills? Condoms passed out to children at their schools could be adorned with close ups of the various and more nasty symptoms of STDs. Abortion clinics could have wall murals of the dismembered fetus. Homosexual marriage licences could be decorated with various photos of AIDS "victims" in the last sickly throes of life. All journalism texts might...

On six packs of beer they will put pictures of gosh-awful ugly women who you will be tempted to sleep with if you drink the contents. Ice cream containers and packages of steaks will have photographs of cottage-cheese thighs and clogged arteries. Table saws will have pictures of severed fingers and New Year's champaigne will have images of crippled livers. The possibilities are endless. The government has decided that it has the power to put images on the packaging of consumer products in order to protect the public health and the public good. So, it seems natural to speculate a...

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Rotting teeth and gums. Diseased lungs. A sewn-up corpse of a smoker. Cigarette smoke coming out of the tracheotomy hole in a man's neck. Cigarette packs in the U.S. will have to carry these macabre images in nine new warning labels that are part of a campaign by the Food and Drug Administration to use fear and disgust to discourage Americans from lighting up.

Dozens of new designs were made, but a winner has been chosen! All kidding aside, I mentioned last November that large labels like the one above are coming... Beginning September 2012, FDA will require larger, more prominent cigarette health warnings on all cigarette packaging and advertisements in the United States. These warnings mark the first change in cigarette warnings in more than 25 years and are a significant advancement in communicating the dangers of smoking. From the FDA "These warnings mark the first change in cigarette warnings in more than 25 years." It would be frightening if boredom with the...

Dead bodies, diseased lungs and a man on a ventilator were among the graphic images for revamped tobacco labels unveiled on Tuesday by U.S. health officials. Proposed in November under a law that put the multibillion-dollar tobacco industry under the control of the Food and Drug Administration, the new labels must be on cigarette packages and in advertisements starting in October 2012. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg were to announce the nine new warnings at the White House, but the labels were released early Tuesday at http://www.fda.gov/TobaccoProducts/Labeling/CigaretteWarningLabels/default.htm. They show images that may disturb...

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - Coming to a store near you: nine more reasons not to smoke. The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday is set to release nine new graphic health warning labels for U.S. cigarette packs, representing the most significant change to cigarette packs in more than 25 years. The new labels will take up half of a pack of cigarettes and also will appear on advertisements. Cigarette makers have until the fall of 2012 to comply. Mandates for new warning labels were part of a 2009 law giving the FDA authority to regulate tobacco. The announcement follows reviews...

City Hall for the first time is directly blaming Big Tobacco for the burgeoning black market of bootleg cigarettes on city streets. Newport maker Lorillard, the country's No. 3 tobacco company, consciously oversupplies the Poospatuck Indian reservation on Long Island -- knowing full well bootleggers buy in bulk and then flood city neighborhoods with unstamped, cheap smokes, a city official told The Post. "If Afghanistan is the seed of the heroin trade, then Lorillard is like that with cigarettes," said Eric Proshansky, a deputy chief in the city Law Department. "Lorillard knows its cigarettes are being bootlegged into the city,...

NOTE The following snippet is a quote: losangeles.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel11/la050911.htm Southern California Man Sentenced to 25 Years in Prison for Convictions in Smuggling Schemes, Including Plot to Bring Surface-to-Air Missiles Into United States LOS ANGELES—A Southern California man was sentenced this morning to 25 years in federal prison after being convicted on a series of federal charges related to schemes to smuggle many items into the United States, including surface-to-air missiles designed to shoot down aircraft. Yi Qing Chen, 49, of Rosemead, California, received the 300-month sentence from United States District Judge Dale S. Fischer. Last October, following a two-week trial, a...

SPOKANE, Wash. | As quests for freedom go, it’s not exactly the fight against apartheid in South Africa. But cigar smokers around the country are fed up with smoking bans that prevent them from enjoying stogies in cigar bars with friends. A rising number of states have moved to exempt cigars from indoor smoking bans, often by establishing cigar bars or smoking lounges inside cigar stores. Pro-cigar groups have sprung up nationally and in most states, spreading a message that their product is fundamentally different from cigarettes. Cigar smokers are not interested in exposing the general public to their pungent...

As a critical thinker, I never bought the media’s sales pitch that Obama was the messiah we were all waiting for. [...] As for the media’s anti-Republican hysteria? Granted, not all journalists referred to Bush as the devil, but many portrayed him as one. In Decision Points, though, we meet a greyer, funnier, and humbler man, who lost a sister to leukemia but also treasured simpler times. On quitting cigarettes (page 1): I have a habitual personality. I smoked cigarettes for about nine years, starting in college. I quit smoking by dipping snuff. I quit that by chewing long-leaf tobacco....

A 34-year-old Bowie man acknowledged in federal court Friday that he participated in a ring that distributed more than 17 million black-market cigarettes, a scheme that prosecutors said cost the government more than $2.6 million in taxes. Chun Chen, who goes by Eddy and owned a carryout restaurant in Maryland, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit extortion in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt... The far-reaching probe became public last fall, when then-Prince George’s County Executive Jack B. Johnson (D) and his wife, Leslie, now a council member, were arrested. Jack Johnson was indicted in February on bribery charges. Leslie Johnson...

WOO! HOO! Let's all celebrate! WILLIAM RIVERS PITT has gone 100 days without smoking. I just knew you had the fortitude to pull it off, Will! Oops! Has anyone noticed that with all the early hoopla by Pitt about quitting cigarettes that there hasn't been a self-promoting post by him on this topic since his Day 50 THREAD, "Fifty days. No smokes." So what does that tell us? It tells us that Pitt is back to sucking down the cancerous fumes again. Let us do some math to prove my point. Pitt's "Fifty Days, No Smokes" thread was posted...

Republican legislators think they have a way to keep Minnesotans on welfare from spending their benefits on booze, smokes and lottery tickets: They'd keep them from taking more than $20 in benefits in cash. Right now, welfare recipients can use their electronic benefits cards to withdraw much of their monthly allotment in cash. The proposed legislation would require more people on welfare to get a second card to use for cash withdrawal, and would limit that to no more than $20 a month.

It seems like we've seen a new tobacco tax increase pop up every day at the state level over the past few years. Though a dubious revenue raiser and all-around ill-advised policy change, tobacco tax hikes are politically palatable ways for politicians to "balance" their budgets on the backs of an unpopular minority without making difficult decisions about how to shrink the size of government. Most recently, Illinois (surprise!) is looking at a 102 percent cigarette tax increase to help fund a massive ongoing spending project. Nevermind the fact that roughly 80 percent of such tax hikes at the state...

Link only due to Copyright agreement.

California is one of the most heavily taxed jurisdictions in the world. If that weren’t bad enough, for the next few months Golden State residents will have to deal with an annoying little man in tights pedaling around the state to stump for even higher taxes. Lance Armstrong, who recently retired from professional cycling to lobby full time for higher taxes, was in Los Angeles earlier this week for a press event with California state Senator Don Perata to announce the launch of a campaign to raise the state tobacco tax. A measure that would raise the cigarette excise tax...

EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. (AP) -- A lawsuit that led to a $10.1 billion verdict against cigarette-making Philip Morris USA before it was tossed out by the Illinois Supreme Court has been revived by a lower court, sending the case back to the county once tagged as among the nation's most lawsuit-friendly turfs. The unanimous ruling Thursday by the three-judge panel of the Mount Vernon-based 5th District Appellate Court cleared the way for the plaintiffs to argue that a favorable 2008 U.S. Supreme Court decision in an unrelated case may be applied to reinstate the questioned Madison County one involving Philip Morris'...

And they said he had a short fuse before- lookout staffers Not so sure I'm buying it, but Michelle Obama is suddenly making the dubious claim that Barry kicked his smoking habit and has not had a smoke in more than a year's time. The unambiguous statement came in the midst of a lunch/interview with select reporters assembled to mark the first anniversary yesterday for her "Let's Move" anti-childhood obesity campaign. As Mrs. Obama's session with her press corps touched upon various topics, the First Wookie was asked if Obama quit smoking, she said, "Yes he has, yes he has. Very...

Coming soon to a grocery store near you: Those nutrition labels slapped on everything from cereal to soda pop will soon be required on packages of meat. The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday morning that the new rule, slated to start Jan. 1 of 2012, requires that 40 of the most common cuts of poultry, pork, beef and lamb include labels that disclose to consumers the total number of calories, the number of calories from fat and the total grams of fat and saturated fat. ...The rule will apply to whole cuts of meat and poultry, including boneless chicken...

An interesting five minute video on cigarette taxes and crime.

The modest one-liners of the dangers of smoking, now featured on cigarette packs, may soon turn into gory images and messages that will cover nearly half the pack. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration unveiled 36 jarring labels Wednesday aimed at escalating efforts to warn smokers of the fatal consequences of cigarette smoking. These labels represent the agency's exercise of its new authority over tobacco products and the most significant change in cigarette warnings since companies were forced to add the mandatory Surgeon General's warning in 1965. Some of the proposed images include a man smoking from a tracheotomy hole,...

29-year-old pummeled 54-year-old at Hialeah assisted living facilityA fight over a cigarette led to a deadly fist fight in Hialeah Thursday, with one man dead and another charged with his murder. Frank Joshua Alonso, 29, was arrested and charged with second-degree murder after he beat a 54-year-old man to death at Superior Living of Hialeah at 70 East 21st Street, an assisted living facility, on Wednesday night. Police said Alonso and the victim began a verbal argument over a cigarette that quickly came to blows, with both men hitting each other with chairs. At one point, the 54-year-old fell to...

Rob Klotzback, a central Florida man, has launched a new brand of cigarettes. Bama's Cigarettes, available in five states including Florida, are creating a small stir thanks to the O around the brand name. Reading the package the way most folks would, "Bama's" becomes "Obama's." Klotzback insists the O around the brand name is just a flavor ring. But he he had to be aware of the publicity such a package design would give him. And with Obama's smoking habit being well-known, the connection's almost impossible not to make. Bama's Cigarettes sell for just over $4 a pack in Florida,...

Caught this from today's DittoCam. I am guessing it is an electronic cigarette. (Image at link or here: http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/2362/rushcigz.jpg ) Does anyone know what brand he is using? I have seen this item explode on the market but don't know which one is "the right one" to get. Again, anyone know what Rush is using? And does anyone have any recommendations?

Caught this from today's DittoCam. I am guessing it is an electronic cigarette. (Image at link or here: http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/2362/rushcigz.jpg ) Does anyone know what brand he is using? I have seen this item explode on the market but don't know which one is "the right one" to get. Again, anyone know what Rush is using? And does anyone have any recommendations?

Chicago loses an estimated $120 million a year — and the U.S. billions — on uncollected taxes on cigarettes. But that could change with the Sept. 2 sale of a little-known Illinois company that produces cigarette tax stamps that are used throughout the country. States have struggled for more than a half-century to control rampant cigarette tax evasion, the result of stamp counterfeiting, cross-border smuggling, sales of unstamped products and other illegal activity.

BUFFALO (AP) — A federal judge has temporarily blocked New York state’s plans to tax the Seneca and Cayuga nations’ sales of cigarettes to non-Indian customers. Judge Richard Arcara Tuesday granted a request by the tribes for a court order that stops the state from imposing a $4.35 per pack sales tax on cigarettes sold by reservation retailers starting on Wednesday. The ruling delays those collections for at least two weeks. It wasn’t immediately clear if the state will go ahead with taxes on other tribes. Attempts to collect the tax in the 1990s resulted in sometimes violent protests on...

The Onondaga Nation will likely stop selling national-brand cigarettes next month and rely solely on Indian-made brands at its smoke shop south of Syracuse, a nation attorney said Thursday. “Unless something changes, as of Sept. 1 we won’t be able to sell major brands that are untaxed,” said lawyer Joe Heath. “It doesn’t make that much sense to sell them at the same price as people can get them at the convenience store across the street.” The Onondagas sold 1.2 million cartons of cigarettes last year tax-free. On Wednesday, the state will require wholesalers who supply Indian reservation stores to...

Give a hoot, don’t pollute. Eat only dolphin-free tuna. Organic arugula rules the world! All those are familiar mantras that give off the notion that your government knows better than you, at least when it comes to whatever damage you want to do to your body. But lately, the federal government seems to be targeting goods and services that penalize specific segments of society. Case in point: A 10-percent tax on people that use tanning salons, which women operate 67 percent of indoor tanning businesses and are the most frequent tanning clients. And don’t forget the Botox tax, another tax...

Have you ever smoked? Ever sneak a cigarette when you were a teen, behind the school or someplace where your parents didn’t see you and your friends thought you were cool? How about now as an adult? Are you a social smoker, only lighting up when it’s acceptable at a club or restaurant, or perhaps at someone’s home or a party? Ever meet some guys at a cigar bar for some male bonding involving thick tobacco smoke and good times? Way back in the days before smoking was seen as a major health issue, it was deemed cool to smoke....

Just over one-out-of-four Americans (26%) continue to believe cigarette smoking should be against the law in this country, a finding that's changed little from previous surveys. Sixty-three percent (63%) disagree and say smoking should not be outlawed, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Interestingly, even 18% of those who currently smoke think their habit should be illegal. Thirty percent (30%) of those who have never smoked agree. But Americans are inclined to think that government pressure won't change smokers' habits. Forty-five percent (45%) say more government regulation of tobacco is at least somewhat likely to reduce the...

A coalition of prominent public health organizations is rallying behind a new report that shows just how valuable cigarette smokers are to cash-strapped states’ economies. Citing a “mountain of evidence” to compel North Carolina legislators to increase ‘sin taxes’ on smokers so they can “save lives,” hidden in the smokescreen is the ultimate goal of harvesting hundreds of millions in revenue by exploiting cigarette smokers’ addictions as opposed to trying to help them quit. One might assume the North Carolina Alliance for Health (NCAH), an organization whose membership roster includes the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, the American...

While purchasing alcohol and drugs with your EBT (Food Stamps) card is illegal and is not condoned by this blog, it is surprisingly easy to do. Often it involves nothing more than a stroll to your local bodega. If you do not know what a bodega is, you are probably one of the fools paying for this program via your tax dollars. Since my last post Drug and Booze Stamps Compliments of USDA has made this site a haven for people in Brooklyn googling on how to purchase Beer with their EBT cards, I am offering the below training course...

Warning: Leftists are targeting smokers. And socialism is bad for your lungs (especially if you’re living under Canada’s healthcare system). Yes, the hysterical anti-smoking lobby fundamentalists are on the march again. In addition to raising taxes on cigarettes because they “care” (as opposed to lowering taxes on nicotine patches), Australia’s nanny state loving pets are now telling companies that tobacco packets with discernible brand names, images, and colors are sinful, and must be removed. Next stop: America! On Thursday the successful Washington-based Australian blogger and editor, Tim Andrews, made the excellent case on Australia’s popular 2GB radio that this isn’t...

There is no credible evidence that plain packaging will reduce smoking. None. Zero. Zip. Zilch. This is a fantasy made up by Kevin Rudd to justify this proposal. Nothing more. The reason for this is two-fold. Firstly, with cigarette advertising already banned, plain packaging will remove the only method of brand distinction available. As a result, brands will have only one thing to compete on: price. So they’ll drop prices. The result could, paradoxically, be an increase in smoking rates. Secondly, this will create black market in cigarettes. Trademarks are the strongest protection possible against counterfeiting, and when you abolish...

Thursday, April 1, 2010 7:10 PM EDT P.A.C.T. Act is signed into law By Christopher Michel Olean Times Herald With President Barack Obama’s approval, the U.S. Postal Service is now prohibited from shipping cigarettes - a devastating blow to the Seneca Nation of Indians’ $330 million tobacco industry. On Wednesday afternoon, President Obama signed the Prevention of All Cigarette Trafficking Act into law, nearly two weeks after the bill received its final approval in Congress. In addition prohibiting the mailing of cigarettes, the new law provides for stricter requirements in reporting cigarette sales from tobacco merchants and increased penalties for...

KOSMO! highlighted the concerns raised by the Muslim Consumer Association of Malaysia secretary-general Datuk Dr Maamor Osman over a claim by an Australian academic that cigarette filters might contain traces of pig’s blood. Calling on the authorities to verify the claim by Sydney University Prof Simon Chapman, Dr Maamor said such statements should not be brushed aside because the cigarettes contained a type of protein of which the content had not been fully disclosed. Prof Chapman, whose comments were published in The Daily Telegraph, said a Dutch study had supposedly found 185 different industrial uses for the animal including using...

Note: The following text is a quote: Eight Area Men Sentenced on Federal Racketeering Charges Involving Conspiracy to Transfer Cash and Checks to the Palestinian Territories ST. LOUIS, MO—The United States Attorney’s office announced today that eight members of a criminal enterprise operating out of five St. Louis area convenience stores have been sentenced on charges of federal racketeering or related charges. As far back as 2000, the RICO conspiracy has involved bank fraud, receipt of stolen property, conducting an unlicensed money transmitting business, purchasing contraband cigarettes for resale, evading reporting requirement on exporting monetary instruments, and transporting monetary instruments...