Strib Editorial Board: Pro-Death Pansies
By Mitch Berg
The Strib editorial board wants a statewide wmoking ban, and doesn’t want any plebeian concerns about “people losing their livelihoods and investments”, “separation of powers”, “informed risk” or any of that palaver about “debate” getting in the way!
In public health circles, hopes have been high since the November election that Minnesota might soon enact a straightforward smoking ban…Alas, its now clear that the path to success remains littered with obstacles.
In the Senate, the once straightforward smoking ban was so altered this week that passing it as is would be worse than the status quo. Thats because it not only contains new provisions for smoking in establishments with ventilation systems, it preempts local entities from having stricter protections from secondhand smoke — as many do now. Passing a bill with those two provisions would force Minneapolis, St. Paul, Bloomington, Golden Valley and a number of other localities to weaken their hard-fought bans.
And for what? Compromising in this way would compromise Minnesotans health. Last years U.S. surgeon generals report was unequivocal on this point: The only way to protect employees and patrons of restaurants and bars is to prohibit smoking. No other method will work.
So, Strib editorial board – why not grow a pair, and “prohibit smoking?”
Why are you futzing around with petty minutiae like banning smoking in bars?
Ban the sale and consumption of tobacco!
Since you, the Strib editorial board, are promoting yourselves as defenders of public health, and are showing your totalitarian disdain for the protestations of the plebeians, why not go all the way? Why not ban the leaf?
Oh, wait – you (or, rather, the gutless DFL simps that you’re in bed with) can’t figure out a way to do without the tax money that smoking raises the state?
SCREW IT! If it’s principle you want, then operate from principle!
Strib Editors – if you can’t push for a complete ban on all tobacco, in the interest of the “public health” you barber so ignorantly about, then shut up.
February 25th, 2007 at 11:47 am
The excuse for not banning tobacco will be “it’s so ingrained into the culture that we cannot overcome it.”
BS.
Cocaine used to be ingrained into our culture too. In fact, a certain well-recognized product around the globe used to contain fresh South American coca leaves in the original formula. Didn’t stop anybody from banning cocaine, did it?
February 25th, 2007 at 11:52 am
Would you also claim that opium dens were “ingrained into our culture”?
February 25th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Really?
Show me one. Now.
Because I know bar owners. I listened to them explain to me how eight percent annual grown before the ban became a seven-percent shrink, and layoffs, afterwards.
So you’re wrong. But, as you say, “that’s nothing new”.
And that’s not the “separation of powers” I was talking about. Re-read (or perhaps read for the first time) the article, and figure out what I actually meant before you insult me again (as you say, that’s nothing new, either).
February 25th, 2007 at 12:36 pm
Is there one dang issue that donkeyman can agree with Mitch on? Ever? He must come here just to see what he can write in disagreement and in such a petty tone as well. Peevish and stupid.
The left is all talk and symbolism. Freedom to them means the right to bitch about everything (except the reprehensible state of public ed. (unless it’s to ask for money to keep that boondoggle going) or smut-filled entertainment or sieve-like borders). Nope, they are all up in arms about a legal activity occuring on privately-owned property. Health is so all-important (except for the spread of STD’s & single-motherhood due to the moral vacuum caused by denigrating traditional family values). Must wear bike helmets, must not play tag or warball…watch out, watch out, watch out! In the meantime, kids are committing suicide in higher numbers than ever before in history. I’m thinking that we need to worry more about their spiritual well-being (and our own) than if they are wearing a helmet or inhaling 2nd-hand smoke. Pathetic in the extreme. They have torn down all the institutions and traditions that worked and this is what’s left: meddling. I guess they’re just cleaning up the bits and pieces they haven’t quite destroyed of our independent American values.
I do not smoke (I did looong ago) and I dislike sitting in a place where it’s allowed-it stinks and anyone can tell it’s not natural to inhale smoke instead of air. However, I have been in places with very good ventilation sytems and that should be an option. If it isn’t we’ll think twice about going back if we truly feel it’s too smoky. But the man or woman that bought the place, pays the taxes and all the FUN that goes with owning a business, can determine if they make enough allowing smoking or if it would be better to disallow it without “nanny” poking her nose in. Employees have the same option: go somewhere else to work. It’s not like bartending or waitressing is such good money that you just can’t picture taking a job elsewhere…..is it?
February 25th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
It’s called Oppositional Defiance Disorder, Colleen. Angryclown has it too, but in a much less acidic vein.
February 25th, 2007 at 3:00 pm
It’s very interesting that the Star Tribune should use the Surgeon General’s report as a basis for banning smoking only in restaurants and bars, when the report very clearly states that “there is no safe level of secondhand smoke.” This means, with no room for misinterpretation, that if somebody lights up a cigarette in Tokyo or Tehran or Tblisi, we all die. Empirical evidence bears out the Surgeon General on this point. That is, everyone born since the Native Americans began smoking tobacco, at least so far, has eventually died. The only acceptable public policy is therefore to immediately ban all production, distribution and consumption of tobacco everywhere, just as soon as the necessary preparations can be made for a world population that lives forever. :-^
February 25th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
Last year, St. Louis (MO) county attempted to pass a similar ban. It was Republicans that were pushing it. In the final public hearing, the council was shouted down by hundreds of casino employees, and roundly criticized in the comment period by a steady stream of bar and restaurant owners. Now I’m a former smoker myself, and went through a lot to quit. I think smoking is stupid. But people have a right to smoke, and private businesses have a right to permit it. If a restaurant doesn’t have a section where the air is clean, I will eat somewhere else.
The really silly thing is, prohibiting smoking in bars, which are patronized only by adults, doesn’t even protect the people who are most vulnerable from second-hand smoke: the children. So if these politicians really care, they should prohibit smoking in cars, homes, or anywhere else that children are present, or will be present at any time before all these horrible toxins can completely dissipate. Not to mention, the current tradition of smoking just outside the door of a building should also be prohibited, since that forces everyone entering the building to walk through a cloud of smoke. To enforce these laws, a huge force of smoking police need to be hired. And of course, for this important position, smokers need not apply.
Nick Kasoff
The Thug Report
February 26th, 2007 at 8:00 am
Actually, Kerm, it’s called “borderline personality disorder.” It’s what animates Colleen’s bizarre, anti-libral rants on this blog. You are afflicted with the less malign
“bootlicking toady syndrome.” It manifests itself as the craven desire to follow the orders of anyone who has a big hat or a tidy uniform. Mitch? Textbook sociopath.
February 26th, 2007 at 10:28 am
“borderline personality disorder”? Is there any chance of aquiring one?
And I’m not a toady, I’m a sycophant. I thought you could tell the difference.
February 26th, 2007 at 10:51 am
Mitch, unless you’re suddenly for prohibition, don’t encourage them. Between the anti-smoking law-passing crowd and MADD and their ilk, we’ll soon all be “clean and sober” and supporting the mob.
February 26th, 2007 at 11:14 am
Paul Says:
February 25th, 2007 at 11:47 am
The excuse for not banning tobacco will be “it’s so ingrained into the culture that we cannot overcome it.”
Paul – you almost have it. It’s the tobacco TAXES that are so ingrained into the governmental culture. They are terminally addicted to the tax dollars that tobacco sales bring in – so they will never ban the sales of tobacco. So much for DFL “principles”…..
Put me in the same boat as Nick. I quit smoking 14 years ago. I am to the point where I hate the smell worse than most who have never smoked do. But I would NEVER EVER dream of imposing my lifestyle choices on others the way Democrats push they lifestyle choices on the rest of the world!
LL
February 26th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
In response to those who argued that tobacco use should be banned, Napoleon Bonaparte once said that “this vice brings in 100 million francs each year. I will certainly forbid it at once–as soon as you can name a virtue that brings in as much revenue.”
Not much has changed in the last couple of hundred years.
.
February 26th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Yep and that is why the Stribs (and every legislator that supports this) claims that this is for “everyone’s health” ring so hollow. We all KNOW that if they truly cared about the health impact then the amount of tax revenue lost would be addressed in these bills.
LL