It’s crap like this that tempts me to become a libertarian. Stupid do-gooder Democrat ass-hats. Where is Patrick Henry when you need him? Oh well, I guess I’ll be finding a new city next year. It was nice knowing you, Philly.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
82 Comments
Recent Posts
- Day 14: Louisiana Senator Approvingly Compares Trump to Stalin
- Day 13: Elon Musk Flexes His Muscles
- Day 12: While Elon Musk Takes Over, We Podcast With Driftglass and Blue Gal
- Day 11: Harm of Fascist Regime’s Foreign Aid Freeze Comes Into View
- Day 10: The Fascist Regime Blames a Plane Crash on Nonwhite People
Smoking ban where? Everywhere? On the street? Sales banned?
What kinda ban we talking about.
Oh, and Boo, stop smoking. Best thing I ever did.
This is the bill, a close version of the bill that passed.
link
And even if I do quit smoking, I don’t want to live in a city than bans it. This used to be America.
Can’t smoke in a bar in California… how’s that for fucked up.
Butt then again if I see one more asshat toss their lit cigarette out a car window… I will go Chenel (as in postal)
Ah. But you don’t have a child with asthma.
Besides I didn’t see where it prohibited smoking in private locations and outdoor cafes seemed to be excluded.
Yeah, I know not very helpful when you’re an addict.
Ouch
Tobacco… the republican drug cause I know of no “progressive” cigarette…
It bans smoking in bars and restaurants. It might have an exception for (small) bars and for outdoor seating, but it still kills off the bar culture. I know that is a nuisance for someone with asthma to be have to struggle to avoid exposure to smoke. It’s also a nuisance to have to take an elevator to go have a cigarette. If bars could thrive without smokers there would be smoke-free bars springing up everywhere.
It’s just one more example of the majority taking their rights much more seriously than some minority group. We already pay for schools, roads, and other general expenditures with insane taxes that do little or nothing to help us quit or provide us with health care.
It’s outrageous how smokers are discriminated against. How would everyone like it if a beer cost $4.50 and all the money went, not to alcohlics anonymous or rehabilitation centers, but to help the keep the teetotalers taxes down?
Fine by me. I don’t drink beer anymore. ;0)
good financial decision.
But, do you feel comfortable getting a tax break from sin taxes? And even if you do, don’t you think the revenue raised should be earmarked to help the sinners?
Yes I do actually. Sin taxes are regressive for the most part. I’d rather have fairer taxes for all. But if you do have sin taxes, yes, apply them to programs that help people get off their addictions.
ps. It was also a good health decision. Let’s say I overindulged on a lot of things when I was younger.
aka fat chick, I would actually support a tax on junk food, with the funds raised used to support better nutrition and health education in the schools, as well as to pay for single-payer health care. So I guess I’m literally putting my money where my mouth is. 😉
And as one who lost both parents to the effects of smoking, and for years had a persistent cough that may have been caused by being around smokers for too damn many years (it took about 6 years of marriage to a non-smoker and 3 years of unemployment to finally get rid of it), I appreciate the attempts to allow me and those like me to breathe freely. Besides, how can we bitch about corporations and automobiles spewing pollutants into the air when far too many of us are polluting our own personal space?
‘Nuff said…
That’s just the kind of fat backlash I’ve been waiting for lo these many years. That’s why I’m not a big fan of the smoking bans, I always had a feeling that fat would be the next crusade.
Ok, let’s say we start taxing junk food, where do we draw the line? Chips, but not pretzels? What about corn chips? They’ve got a good bit of fiber (well some of them do). Are they a junk food? What about ice cream, do we tax that, but not frozen yogurt? What about ice cream made from skim milk? How about granola bars? They’re really not that healthy. Do we tax them?
And how much more nutrition and health education do we really need? Kids know how bad smoking is and they do it anyway. So do adults. Does education and information stop them? Sure, some people, but not everybody. We’ve been beating people over the head with information about fat, cholesterol, and the big, bad transfats and there are still fat people in the world. If it’s all about education, how do you explain that? I’ve been to Weight Watchers, half of the women in this country are considered overweight, I’ll bet most of them have also been to Weight Watchers. We know what we should be eating, we just don’t do it.
Sorry if any of the above sounds hostile. I’ve been watching the anti-tobacco crusade for however long it’s been ongoing and as much as I understand the deceptions by “big tobacco” and the real medical problems stemming from firsthand smoking and secondhand smoke, I feel like the whole movement has gone just a little nuts. I see fat as the next target and as a fat person who has made certain food choices and lifestyle (relatively sedentary) choices, I resent the idea of the government having anything at all to do with what goes in my mouth.
why not junk food? I personally would have no problem with it — I’ve cut back a lot on what I eat, but I still do indulge, so it’s not like I’m advocating taxing someone other than myself.
As for nutrition, there’s been a lot of discussion about the junk that shows up on school lunch menus, especially the kids who get the free/reduced price lunches. I’d also like to see an overhaul of physical education classes — it’s hard to learn how to move for fun if you’re always stuck in the outfield because you’re a klutz at sports. (Hell, if I was starting a school, I’d fill the gym with the Dance Dance Revolution games — that’s how you get the kids moving! If those had been around when I was growing up, I might not have spent so many hours with my books and my junk food…)
Oh, and I don’t mind the government having a hand in what goes in my mouth…at least when it comes to ensuring the food is relatively safe; then again, with the Bush misAdministration in charge, that’s no longer a given…
I know. I’m being very callous here.
Hasn’t killed bar culture in Los Angeles or New York, which both have such bans. Just kills smoking bar culture, something I would know nothing about, being pretty allergic to the substance myself. Sorry, Booman!
It has had a terrible effect on bar and restaurant owners in NYC.
But bar culture is what it is because of the people that go. If you change the people that go, you change the culture. So, yeah, there will still be bars (less of them) but they won’t be the same.
Ask some Manhattanites what they think of the smoking ban. I’ve only a met a couple that like it, and they had special reasons like asthma or allergies.
And of course, I am one of those people. I had some terrible lung ailments in my youth (in part due to in-house smoking by a parent) and can barely breathe now when smoke is present. Or heavy bus fumes. Etc. So I’m one of those people that can finally go to bars to hang out. So I love it. But I understand – it’s a big shift. A classic case of the freedom to smoke impinging on the freedom not to smoke. Few freedoms are absolute.
It had a severe effect in NYC. The numbers are all skewed because the city puts out numbers of all the new ‘bars and restaurants’ and count things like McDs, BK, Starbucks… all as new ‘bars and restaurants’ – those are the ones going up in all the bars that are closing down.
I’m a little surprised by the vehemence of your response. Smoking in bars has been illegal in California for several years. The question actually goes beyond the comfort of bar customers and becomes, literally, a life and death health issue for the employees who spend their entire work day in a haze of second-hand smoke. Despite dire predictions of business failure if anti-smoking laws were enacted, bars in California actually saw their business go up. The smokers just learned to go outside — trust me, no one is going to steal your half-consumed drink — and people who had avoided bars came back in droves.
I live in LA for three years. People looked at smokers like they had two heads. This is the mid-atlantic. This is Philly, the dirtiest, filthiest, grungiest, fattest, most out of shape, worst dressed, least hip, least health conscious place on the East Coast. A smoking ban is so “California”. It’s not Philly. I chose to live here for a reason. I can put up with filth and grunge, and people can put up with me and my habits.
I think Chris really got to the heart of with this from last week:
Smoking ban? Pffft.
Would you look at that. I got quoted. I’m going to be walking around on an ego trip for the rest of the night.
I wish you took orders. I’d assign you to explain to the unitiated how silly it is to ban smoking in all bars and restaurants when we have to wade through six inches of trash and sewage to walk down the street.
I’ve never been good with orders, but I’ll see what I can do. You write “we have to wade through six inches of trash and sewage to walk down the street” and I’m going to fulfill my obligation as a native and mention that it was way worse when I was a kid. And now the mandatory bad joke. How do you know somebody is from Philadelphia? They can’t get over how clean New York City is.
When Scotland went smoke free this year the pubs in all the major cities saw significant increases in customers much to the surprise of the many folks predicting doom and gloom. So, loss of business is not a foregone conclusion. And, frankly I’m not surprised. I like bars. I like having the occasional drink, but I’m borderline allergic to tobacco smoke, so I don’t go into bars where there’s smoking. I know lots of people in the same boat.
you can see how the mess with studies here. That’s a Bloomberg study. Sounds great until you talk to a bar owner.
was split between the studies and interviews with pub owners who’d mostly ordered less beer and other consumables in anticipation of a bad first week of the ban only to find themselves selling out of key drinks like Guiness. They were quite surprised, but honest enough to admit that they’d been wrong about the effects, at least in the short term. For the longer term, we’ll have to wait and see, but in the short run at least things are going fine.
There are still bars all over California, and no smoking. No smoke choking you when you’re trying to eat or drink or breathe. No smoke clinging to your clothes when you get home.
Smoking is intrusive. It’s air pollution. I stopped going to bars because of the smoking. Smoking is banned in restaurants and bars in just about every city in the civilized world by now. I’m surprised it took Philadelphia this long.
Please calm down and relax. These bans have been implemented in Ireland, Italy and now even England. And you know what? Even the smokers have reacted positively to them and after some experience consider them a good move.
Please remember that the ban isn’t on smoking per se, but on your smoke and the smell of it spreading all over. I’ve often had my clothes stink of smoke simply because I sat too close to the smoking area, or gone to the jazz club to hear a band I like.
The other factor as to why smoking gets banned is because so many of your fellow smokers are, well, litterbugs. Where do the ashes go? And have you noticed how many cigarette butts can line the gutters and sidewalks?
You should enjoy your pipe, your cigarette or whatever you smoke, but it can’t interfere with others enjoyment. Or do you think DUI laws discriminate against beer drinkers?
Not helpful for someone who wants to quit either. How do you not start up again? Or is it the fact that on of your children has asthma the major motivator?
Seriously, I need some help w/this one…
Other than saying, “You’ll get cancer.” That stresses me out even more. I have tried repeatedly and did the two week quits, but I end stressed out always start up again.
Seriously, Steven, I am at the quitting is easy point!!! But how do you not start back up?
And, please don’t say I didn’t quit, because I did.
Not starting back up is hard. You have to avoid people who smoke. What they really need is a drug that makes you feel sick to your stomach any time you think of cigarettes.
Drug company that came up with that would make billions.
Not starting back up is hard.
Know how many one week quits I’ve done?
You have to avoid people who smoke.
That is easy enough. Come to think of it, of all of the people that I know, only one smokes, other than me.
after her first heart attack — when she was laying in the hospital emergency room, wondering which breath would be her last, she decided enough was enough.
Unfortunately, the damage had pretty much been done… 🙁
Nicotine Nasal Spray is the best substitute I’ve ever come across and the only thing that kept me from going back. It goes straight to your brain and is very satisfying. I also used Wellbutrin and that patch in conjunction with the spray. I got off the spray because it’s wildly overpriced just chew the gum now, which is okay. But this is a serious outlay of cash, so I don’t know. I smoked three to four packs a day, so the money wound up being about the same for me, but for lighter smokers it’s a raw deal. I also went out of my mind for about three months and started drinking more heavily. It’s always a mess.
the last time I quit I found that I didn’t drink as much. The two cravings kind of feed off each other, at least they do in me. Cut back on one and the other comes easier.
But, I also find that every failed attempt to quit brings a stronger addiction and makes the next try more difficult. So, I’ve of the mind that I need to get serious before I make anymore failed attempts.
Is that nicotine spray over the counter or prescription?
Prescription. Once it goes OTC the price will drop.
Cant take them–bad reaction w/my anticonvulsants.
Thanks.
I CAN’T drink, so that is a non-issue for me. Wasn’t supposed to when I was in my teens either, but, oh well..
I smoked from the time I was 11 until early 2004 when, in my mid-fifties,I had a fatal heart attack; (fatal yes but they managed to bring me back).
I don’t smoke now and I don’t miss it at all. I know if I were to start smoking again my chances of living even another year would be almost zero.
So it was important enough for me to quit that I did, and my desire to live is important enough for me to not start smoking again.
Having said all that, I’m still with BooMan that banning behavior in privately owned places where peopleare free to choose to enter or not is not my idea of the kind of constitutional liberty I thought this country was supposed to be about.
In fact, I’d be far more inclined to support a smoking ban outdoors in public places and on public thoroughfares (like sidewalks) where smoke is more likely to intrude upon people who need to use those particular places or thoroughfares than I would be to tell private business owners what they can and cannot allow within the confines of their own establishments.
During one of the times that I quit, I noticed that I was more sensitive to different smells. Walked into a bar once and had to leave, not because of people that were smoking–someone had on way, way too much Georgio!
On another note, I do have friends that don’t smoke. And, a couple of times that we have gone out to eat, we sat in non-smoking and it didn’t bother me in the least.
But, not being able to smoke in a bar is ridiculous.
As for the constitutional rights argument, that doesn’t fly w/me as there are more important constitutional rights to worry about than a “right” to smoke a cigarette, such as First Amendment rights, free and fair elections, right to privacy,…the list is endless.
I agree there are many constitutional rights in jeopardy that are far more important than the right of a proprietor of his own business to decide what kind of personal behavior he can allow in his own establishment.
But just because there are other more important issues doesn’t invalidate this one.
I wish people would put as much energy into the establishment of a single payer health care system as they do the “right to smoke”.
And I smoke!
While I am now desperastely poor as a result of a catastrophic health event, I think most people won’t be too attentive to the benefits of having an effective single payer health care system for all until they themselves are adversely impacted by health issues directly.
For many people, even those who believe themselves to be liberal and well-intentioned, health care for all is a grand concept, but it remains just that, a concept, rather than an attainable goal worth investing their time and energy in promoting.
For many people, even those who believe themselves to be liberal and well-intentioned, health care for all is a grand concept, but it remains just that, a concept, rather than an attainable goal worth investing their time and energy in promoting.
Then I have to seriuously question their claims to be “liberal”.
My point exactly.
Should have said “anyone’s” claims to be liberal [who is unwilling to act for a single payer system].
Must be nice.
You have a Mayoral candidate named Nutter??
As a shrink, all I can say is oh my. But my thoughts are considerably less pc.
As for you guys, smoking is bad. Get therapy. Get meds. But get off the stuff.
We don’t need any more progressives dying young. Or dying old, for that matter, of COPD or other bad stuff. We need you around for many years to come.
Yeah, Michael Nutter is an attractive candidate in a lot of ways, but he has been a crusader on this smoking ban. It’s not a plus in my book.
If there was a better choice, I’d probably be working on her/his campaign already. Nutter does good things and then pisses me off.
I have a really bad feeling that the primary is going to be a total fucking nightmare.
it’s gonna be a shitfest
…but those of us who don’t smoke, for whom smoke is a health hazard, for whom the clean lungs of our children trump the rights of someone to inhale a dangerous drug and exhale it into our common air.
What you do in your house, car and smoking OK hotel room is your right. I don’t want to breathe the residue of your habit even if I’m hunkered down over the 9-ball in the dumpiest pool hall.
Yeah, well, I know I’m outnumbered. I don’t understand why they can’t just do something less draconian.
Like, let me think…
Set aside a subset of the bar and restaurant licenses for smoking establishments. Most places would be smoke-free but some would allow it.
After all, you may not want to be exposed to cigarette smoke while you’re hunkered down over the 9-ball in a dumpy pool hall, but I don’t want to have to place to go to have beer and a smoke and watch the game.
Yeah, well, I know I’m outnumbered.
Give it up Booman, you can’t win.
It’s not just indoors. Ever try to walk INTO your favorite coffee shop without holding your breath? You smell like smoke for a few hours simply getting your kids an Italian soda.
I’ve never seen so many smokers as I see here in Portland. And although we’ve got liberal minded people here… NONE of them know how to stow their own butts.
that’s just went 100% non-smoking, after a major remodel…and considering it’s adjacent to one of the major cancer centers in the Northwest, it’s surprising it took that long…
Right–14th Amendment, equal protection under the law in a public/private place. People shouldn’t have the privledge of blowing that shit in my face! (Plus if you’re a single guy, you get a great conversation starter if you go outside and see a girl smoking).
I’m with you brother. Every time I try to imagine Dirty Franks or McGlinchey’s as non-smoke filled rooms, I feel a little sick to my stomach. What’s a drink without a smoke?
Yeah, next they’ll pools of urine on the bathroom floors. Dirty Franks is doomed. They should sell now.
“ban pools of urine”
Yeah, and after they mop up the pools of urine, they’ll crack down on women using the men’s room and then where the hell will we be? Toronto? Maybe they’ll allow smoking in all the new casinos.
There are worst places to end up.
For the record, being up here does not cut down on the women/ mens room deal… actually, maybe so since we tend to design with the entire community in mind…
going through our own smoking ban right now tho’, and since it’s summer it ain’t so bad, but once the winter hits, ho boy… and we had designated, closed off, ventilated smoking rooms, but the argument was that the wait staff shouldn’t have to be exposed… however, the wrinkle in that is that all the wait staff working the smoking rooms would sit down and have a butt with you, and the rooms were so well vented, ala Vegas Casinos, that you didn’t get the sense you were in the room at all.
It’s just brutal that they took those away. Not cool at all. Fine, no smoking inside, no smoking in covered patios, or the workplace, but leave my smoking room and outdoor patio alone.
Wouldn’t those two fine establishments be classified as small taverns that can be exempted for 2 years? I can’t imagine going into certain bars and not being greeted by a cloud of smoke. It’s just wrong.
The smoking ban is based on the right of government to regulate workplace safety and one of the big pro-ban arguments is that it will cut down on worker illness and absenteeism. Who wants to bet that not one dime of the insurers’ savings gets passed on to either consumers or business owners?
As for NYC, there are still places to drink and smoke- they’re called private clubs and in order to show that they are “genuine” they can not pay their staff who are (supposedly) members of the club working voluntarily. So bartenders and waitresses who used to work for minimum wage plus tips are now working for tips only.
What? No poll?
[grin]
What no brownie?? 🙂
It’s like 1965. People smoke everywhere! There’s only one restaurant in town that even has a no-smoking section.
I went into the local hardware store a couple of weeks ago and the guy behind the counter was smoking. When he came out from behind to show me where something was, he brought the cig with him.
When I go into the Soutern States, I can see the accountant, thru the open door to her office, puffing away. The manager has a cigar in the corner of his mouth at all times.
The doctors here don’t even ask you to stop.
Inside the front door of the local Walmart, there’s one of those little hot dog eateries and all the employees on break sit there in clouds of smoke.
When my son and his family came from CA, I didn’t want to take them anywhere. But, the DiL wanted to stage an egg hunt for the grandboys so off we went to Walmart, the only variety store in town. I thought she would have a cow even tho I warned her of what to expect. “I want to say something to them so badly,” she hissed. “Mind your manners, girl,” I told her with a smirk, “This ain’t Cal-i-fornia.” LOL!
I’m pretty much a libertarian when it comes to personal behavior. I hate seatbelt and helmet laws, for example, and of course the drugwar. My instincts would be to say yeah, right, to your piece, Boo, except for the killer exception: the workers. You can’t get any more rightwing than to argue that people who don’t want to work in dangerous/toxic environments should “vote with their feet” as Reagan liked to say, and get another job.
Everybody left of Bush knows that’s bullshit because jobs are not a choice, they’re a necessity beyond the control of most of us who were not born to the ruling class. As a progressive would you advocate dismantling OSHA? Should OSHA be dumped because a majority wants to enjoy the products made or served by poisoned workers?
Irritating as it is, I think the worker issue has to destroy anti-ban arguments from the left. I’ve never found a reasonable argument on that point.
Maybe some enterprising outfit will figure out how to make robo bartenders and the bans can be revisited.
I wish I had an adequate description of how I feel everytime I’m exposed to cigarette smoke – a knife in the chest is as close as I can get.
Not only can I not be inside a building with smokers, I have to hold my breath when I encounter a smoker on the street, or when I run the gauntlet of a group standing outside an entryway to smoke. Even being in a small area, like an elevator, with someone stinking of cigarette smoke makes me feel ill.
Even if only one-in-a-hundred, or one-in-a-thousand, people share my discomfort, it’s still a legitimate reason for drastically reducing areas contaminated with second-hand smoke.
Less than 1% of the population use wheelchairs, but we still require wheelchair access to public spaces.
The right to access is not based upon numbers, but upon need, and the practical appreciation that the majority can absorb the costs of accomodation (financial, social, etc.)that cannot be borne by the individuals that need it.
Btw, Tasmania recently banned smoking is pubs (hurrah), and you should have heard the death-knell from pub owners. But there hasn’t been an appreciable change in pub business – probably because people who previously avoided smokie environs are now going out more often.
And, sorry Boo and fellow smoking froggies, I love it. I go out to restaurants and bars more … if people want to smoke fine, that’s their decision, but I’m not going to expose myself to it first or second hand.
Um, the smokers have had it their way for decades…and I have to admit I’m kind of liking the idea of going to say, Drinking Liberally in winter, without inhaling 2 packs worth of secondhand smoke while I’m there.
Sorry.
Well, I am going to be grumpy about this smoking ban…
What will we do after sex?
I’ve never had sex in a bar or restaurant. Have you, Boran2?
Not even in the can?
I can’t remember. Should I worry about using the can when you’re around?
Just be worried in general when he’s around. He’s a madman!
Takin’ the 5th.
Have more sex of course.