Arkansas Blog

it is about time.

Congratulations, UALR!! Borrowing an old nautical term, the smoking lamp is going out --- permanently --- in more and more places. I look forward to the day when my great-grandchildren ask me to explain the quaint "No Smoking" signs they see occasionally in old buildings. "Was there really a time when you could smoke cigarettes in public places? Wow. I'm sure glad I didn't live in those unenlightened times." That's what I want to hear.

NOW if the Ledge would just fix their half-baked, half-assed, half-pregnant ABOMINATION that still allows you to be poisoned at, for example, the legendary White Water Tavern...while you can actually enjoy yourself ALL NIGHT at, for example, The Afterthought!!

Our Ledge SUCKS.
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More precisely the Ledge spits, in chambers and on the floor of the General Assembly.
Our Rep recently posted a staffer's release in the local paper about how legislators were going after those evil novelty lighters as responsible for maybe a half dozen fire fatalities in the last decade. Nice easy feel good legislation that selectively ignores the fact that if you reduce the number of smokers you reduce the demand for lighters and the number of deaths from fire and tobacco related disease. That would make way too much sense. More to the point again it would break the cardinal rule of Arkansas politicians to always pander to the lowest common denominator. Exemptions to the ACIA need badly to be rectified. We'll just have to see if the proactive members of the ledge can pull it off.
Congrats for UALR's decision.
FYI the Little Rock Parks board is discussing tobacco free opportunities at a third public meeting August 14, 2008 at the Dunbar Community Center. I missed the last meeting but understand that so far public comments are quite in favor of protecting nonsmokers, reducing litter, helping smokers quit, and keeping kids from ever wanting to begin a nicotine addiction.

[Borat] Great Success! [/Borat]

Helping smokers quit.. Boy that's a belly laugh. I have never witnessed one sincere attempt at helping smokers quit in Arkansas.. not even an insincere pamphlet. But I hear I've been funding it for over a decade with my purchase of tobacco products.

Thanks for the heads up.. Whitewater will get my cash upon my next visit to an LR watering hole.

'Springs, old buddy, your tobacco taxes have never financed any cessation support. I do not know to what you are referring. In fact, the measly $127 million in tobacco tax is dwarfed by the $617 million in fed and state taxes spent on smoking related costs. AR $0.59 taxes are the 38th lowest in the nation. If we were to accommodate the actual subsidy we pay for allowing tobacco companies to do business a pack would cost $9.65.

Now what cessation assistance that is available in AR is financed from the Master Settlement Agreement. Your taxes are a drop in the bucket to the profit that tobacco companies use to pay this. Hell, they spend $160 million/annually on marketing in AR alone. From MSA funds through voter mandated Act 1 of 2000 the Arkansas Dept of Health funds a quitline w trained interventionists to help smokers find the means and ways for their individual efforts to be successful in quitting and staying quit.

It is damn hard to quit smoking. There is no silver bullet. But there are evidence based tools that have been shown to make it easier to quit and stay quit. Taxes are the first. A 10% increase in the cost of tobacco is shown to decrease youth initiation by 7% and overall 4%, The next biggie are tobacco free environments. Reducing where and when people can light up is a tremendous aid in quitting. Cessation counselors will tell businesses that the first step toward helping employees quit is to make their workplaces tobacco free. The ACIA, lame assed as it is, is a real step in the right direction.

Arkansas actually is ranked pretty high up there in funding effective tobacco prevention. Notice I say prevention cause getting smokers to quit is just a small part. If we can create a community where tobacco is not seen as a normal part of our lives then kids, called "replacement smokers" by the tobacco industry, will have a much better chance of never becoming addicted.

It is hard to quit. Quitting often takes several attempts over years to be successful. Try calling 1-800- QUIT NOW and see if someone can hook you up w a few of the parlor tricks for overcoming nicotine. Keep trying but don't think blaming anyone for not helping enough is gonna make a difference. You make the difference, dude. Good luck.

Oh, there is a really sincere pamphlet available here. I built it and I sincerely hope you can quit.
http://www.tobaccofreemc.com/You%20can%20kick%20a%20nicotine%20habit%20shift.pdf