Arkansas Blog

Uh huh. Just like Christian Republicans ignore their yuckieness over abortion until their girlfriend or their daughter turns up pregnant. Hey 2008, 1927 just called and wants its Prohibition back!

Ok, Inchman. Try and grasp the irony of opposing natural gas pipelines cutting through your front yard and supporting the tobacco industry's subsidy that allows public smoking. You like picking up butts? Keep in mind the body count too, Boudreaux. Tobacco is the leading cause of death, by far.

Tobacco is sold by tobacco companies. It's not some benign wild flower that people pick. That hasn't happened since the colonial invasion of North America 400 years ago. Cigarettes and spit tobacco are highly sophisticated addictive substances marketed in even more sophisticated ways to addict what the industry calls 'replacement smokers', kids. So why does regulating where the industry gets to parade its product around piss you off? Do you want a spare lane for drunk drivers? Hell, drunk drivers in Arkansas only kill about half as many folks as secondhand smoke does. Tell me, do you blame smokers or the tobacco industry for these deaths?

The crux of a minimally enforced smoke free policy is to demonstrate how public safety officials can respond to a policy where education is the first priority. Tobacco free policies now give the public legitimate grounds to ask that a person's inconsiderate tobacco use desist. Should the behavior continue this becomes a public nuisance and only then becomes germane to public safety. If public tobacco use bothers others it essentially becomes an issue disturbing the peace. We lived in Eugene, Oregon when umbrellas and cigarettes were first prohibited at ball games. It took a while for folks to get the idea. Arkansans will get eventually get a clue too. What we really need to get a grasp on is that it is a particular capitalist entity profiting from nicotine addiction that opposes the public health. "Prohibition' bull shit is right out of the tobacco cartel's play book.

Sorry Zar......no sale. We're humans, remember Cyndi Lauper...humans just want ta have fun....Prohibition has never worked, never will. You'll just have to be satisfied with leading a healthy fun-devoid lifestyle for yourself and quit looking over your neighbor's fence. Booze was against the rules when I was a student at the U of A and we stayed half drunk all the time. (Sorry about the wasted money, Dad.)

As long as there are humans there will be whores, booze, drugs, cigarettes, cigars, pipes, fast cars, and dildos attached to shovel handles....humans just want to have fun. Complain to chasv....I didn't invent anything.

Bullshit, Compadre'. Why aren't you defending Chesapeake? The tobacco industry was convicted of fraud and racketeering like two years ago. I know I called it to your attention. Me thinks you're projecting your addiction. Adults don't choose to smoke. Adults have to choose to quit. If they can. 9 out of 10 nicotine addicts start as children. Hello? Children? Get it. Age of majority and all that?

How much do you think you've spent on cigarettes in your life? And you have gained what? Now stay with me here. Why is it an industry that, if not tobacco, would be illegal as hell, (At least a higher grade of narcotic like in 96.) you choose to defend? I say defend but all you are doing is picking up the PR mantle for transnational corporations.
You're voting republican and don't even know it.

And Z, do you dislike fat people?

No, Goof. You?
It's the smoke not the smoker. And really it's more the capitalists that profit from that smoke. And Inchman, you're only partly right. Though tobacco use had been going on for centuries no one started dying from it at pandemic rates until the 20th century and the growth of the transnational tobacco companies' marketing of mass produced cigarettes.

Know that I love ya Zar, but call me anti-authoritarian. It's no one's business what I've spent for cigarettes in my lifetime. What I got for all that money was enjoyment. How much are green fees at a golf course...how many world problems has golf solved. And sure my golf won't give you cancer, but my ball upside your head at 90 mph is quicker than cancer.

I don't care about the cigarette companies.....they have the same lack of values as Wal-Mart, Exxon, Halliburton. Eisenhower warned us about them...didn't say a damn thing about cigarettes. As a smoker I have made concession after concession, some I mind, some I don't mind. Like Elliot Ness's men, you are not going to get my cigarette until you pry it from my cold dead yellowed hand. My kids don't smoke because I smoke....and they hate it.

This isn't rocket surgery here. Watch one episode of Mad Men and see the world I grew up in. Commies were bad, certain cigarette brands were recommended by Doctors back. Lucy & Ricky, Rob & Lora smoked, watch Joe McCarthy at work and count the cigarettes being lit up behind him. It was a different world, maybe not so good...but it was mine. Go ahead and do all you can to keep kids from smoking. But dream not of Prohibition......it's not gonna happen.

Authoritarians will not be happy unless everything including taking a piss requires approval by the government. Include me out!

I just love capitalism Z. Let's talk about my favorite, McDonalds. Let's look at Phillip Morris vs. McDonalds over the next couple of days.

How many people in this nation rely on the cheap food of McDonalds vs. buying real nutritional food. It really pains me to see a single mother who is clearly obese walking hand in hand with her three year old son into a McDonalds. Ever see "Super Size Me?" Cheap food is cheap food for a reason. And it's addictive.

Go look at freshmen in college and see how much more they weight vs. when we were in college. And then if they don't live in a dorm but rather an apartment how many times is it just so much easier to get a Big Mac vs. cooking well.

Don't get on to DBI about his smoking, go grab my nephew who is now a sophmore at the U of A and looks like a fire plug at Maple and Razorback Road in Fayetteville. I'd rather he smoke than frequent McDonalds.

The causes of obesity are diverse and varied but to call cheap food addictive is a misuse of the term. A misuse , i might add, that the tobacco cartel likes seeing. Nicotine is addictive. Fast food, while in excess is not good for one, does not rewire the brain like an addictive substance does. You can eat a big mac safely. You cannot smoke safely.
Do note Inchman's reference to Madmen. The tobacco industry taught the world about deceptive marketing. I pretty much shared his views until I had angioplasty and started fuckusing on the tobacco cartel.
And you have hit on something important. There's a reason more poor and uneducated smoke more and eat shitty food. Capitalism.

Go Scofflaws Go!!