We should let the customers decide which businesses they want to patronize - smoking or non-smoking.
That's the way it should be, was for a very long time, and remains so in some normal places. But that is not good enough for the control crowd, and Washington, D.C. is the perfect example.
Prior to the enactment of the total ban there it was determined that more than 90% of eating establishments were already totally non smoking. Yet that wasn't enough. They will not be happy unless they have TOTAL control.
I hate having to walk through crowds of smokers who are loitering on sidewalks in front of public establishments.
I can understand that, but look at it from the point of view of the smokers, shouldn't they also have a place to go and socialize?
>.90% of eating establishments
100% in Boston before the bans.
Only seperate bars and music and night clubs allowed the tabak, but as you say, they wanted it all, including the banning of it on outdoor patios during our short summers, effective this last August.
I don't begrudge them that. They are victims of the law.
I am dissatisfied with the law that also makes it necessary for kids, who are going to lessons at the local music shop, to walk past the groups of smokers standing on the sidewalk outside the nearby bar and restaurants.