Thursday, August 29, 2013
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The Property Rights Newsletter August 30, 2013 - Issue #728 "The history of free men is never really written by chancebut by choice; their choice!" - Dwight D. Eisenhower |
 Electronic Cigarettes: Since smoking bans are all about the second hand smoke, no one could complain about simple water vapor. Water vapor comes off your morning coffee, your soup at lunchtime. There was a problem, a big problem! Big Pharmaceutical wants to be the only retailer of other Nicotine Delivery Systems. Since Electronic Cigarettes cut into their gum and other sales, they were doomed to be banned. Anything that gets in the Antis way of making money has to go. See photos of the new industry that has scared the Antis. Electronic, but Maybe Not Online. The Food and Drug Administration is considering a ban on online sales of electronic cigarettes, as part of a package of regulations the agency is readying for the increasingly popular devices, people familiar with the matter said. E-cigarettes aren't yet regulated by the agency, which is poring over scientific research about the devices as it fine-tunes its proposed rules. FDA spokeswoman Jennifer Haliski confirmed the rules were being developed but declined to comment on whether the agency had a deadline for putting them out for comment. 
Nevada Patient Dumping: San Francisco on Wednesday threatened to sue Nevada over the practice of "patient dumping," in which the state allegedly sent hundreds of indigent mentally ill patients on one-way trips to California. Rawson-Neal bused more than 1,500 psychiatric patients to locations across the United States, 500 to California. The investigation discovered 24 patients were sent to San Francisco, including some who made multiple trips, and that 20 sought and received emergency medical care once they arrived, Herrera's office said. "Homeless psychiatric patients are particularly defenseless from the kind of lawless 'patient dumping' practices Nevada officials engaged in."
If Obesity is a Disease, Then I'm Harry Freaking Potter. In case you haven't heard, get out from under your rock and pay attention now, obesity was recently labeled as a disease by the American Medical Association. That's right, obesity has joined the ranks of cancer, heart disease, and everything House ever diagnosed. 
Energy Drinks: Democratic 'veterans of the tobacco wars' take aim at energy drinks. "We were all veterans of the tobacco wars," Durbin said during a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on energy drinks, in reference to colleagues who want to crack down on the industry. "We're getting the same run around from these energy drink companies. They are openly, openly advertising to kids and denying it."
Talking cigarette will now tell you to quit smoking. Researchers from Stirling University's Centre for Tobacco Control Research in the UK created two talking cigarette packets with different messages. The technology behind the recorded messages is similar to the one used in singing birthday cards where a message plays when the lid is opened. Public Health Officials Lying About Harm from Second-Hand Smoke. Bayer said that the attitude made him wonder about the decades-old anti-smoking crusade that many have engaged in, specifically wondering if any of the claims proffered by anti-smokers as reasons to oppose smoking had any truth to them. He found that many of the common claims against smoking really have little evidence to back them up. Smoking Bans: When Will Simply Smoking be Illegal? I imagine that only an outright ban of smoking tobacco would be enough to finally create a backlash where a majority of voters, including a great deal of non-smokers, would stand up and say we've gone too far. And I also realize that there are more cancer dangers out there for non-smokers than second-hand smoke. Honestly, there are probably more carcinogens coming from cars sitting in traffic and sizzling fajitas at your favorite restaurant than most people encounter from smokers nowadays. 
Listen to WWL News: Multimedia Feed for The Think Tank with Garland Robinette. 8-28 11:35am Garland: Cigarettes and the legal age. If cigarettes are so bad for you, why aren't they banned? Jan Johnson, Florida State Coordinator of the Citizens Freedom Alliance and the Smoker's Club.
NY: Doctors support raising the smoking age. Teenagers looking to buy cigarettes in New York may have to look elsewhere if a city council proposal is approved and signed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The proposal would raise the legal age to buy any form of tobacco from 18 to 21. But will it be effective in limiting smoking among young people? Dr. Sanjay Gupta: Why I changed my mind on weed. I traveled around the world to interview medical leaders, experts, growers and patients. I spoke candidly to them, asking tough questions. What I found was stunning. World Smokers News: See today's breaking news about smoking. World Smokers Blogs: Watch instant postings to your favorite blogs. |
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Thursday, August 22, 2013
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The Property Rights Newsletter August 23, 2013 - Issue #727 "Everyone thinks of changing the world,but no one thinks of changing himself." - Leo Tolstoy |
President Obama update: Obama casually pops Nicorette during White House ceremony [VIDEO]. Obama has a well-documented history of using gum control to stave off his smoking urges, but it's rare to catch the president getting his nicotine fix in public. Ever-conscious of the many cameras that capture his every move, Obama waited for just the right moment
Social worker attacked with box cutter in dispute over nicotine gum. Police say Smith drove to the police station with blood pouring from his face and needed 22 stitches. Johnson told police Smith had broken a promise to buy him Nicorette gum. 
More thoughts on harm reduction or why if you keep smoking cigarettes its not the end of the world. "If, God forbid, I live to ninety and some pipsqueak of a health researcher tells me to cut down on my drinking, I shall poke them in the eye with my walking stick. The biggest risk factor for virtually all diseases is age. For those who are elderly, every other risk factor fades into insignificance (which, perhaps, is why Leonard Cohen plans to start smoking when he's 80). It is no wonder that they "do not care" about the trivial health risks of drinking a bottle of wine a day. Rather it is a wonder that they don't drink more."
The Real Reason Behind Public Smoking Bans. Don't count on lighting up a cigarette while you're at the beach. "I discovered the evidence was really weak," explained lead author Ronald Bayer, a professor at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. "The evidence of harm to non-smokers on the beach or in a park from someone smoking is virtually non-existent." 
NJ: Doubling Down on Gambling in Atlantic City. Known simply as Revel, the newest addition to this gambling city was going to be different. There was no smoking in its 47 stories. Revel is sorry. Deeply, dearly sorry. And it is an expensive apology. It now allows smoking. "We're asking our customers for a second chance."
TN: Smoking opponents take fight outside in Chattanooga. If smokers had a map showing where they are allowed to light up in Chattanooga, the boundaries over the past five years would seem as shifting and unreliable as, well, smoke. The number of outdoor smoking bans also has increased. 
USA: Computer Snag Limits Insurance Penalties on Smokers. The Obama administration has quietly notified insurers that a computer system problem will limit penalties that the law says the companies may charge smokers. A fix will take at least a year. The glitch could mean that insurers could charge all smokers the maximum allowable surcharge to get around the ratio problem, which would end up penalizing younger smokers with higher penalties than they might otherwise have received. But it is unclear what insurers will do.
UK: Bullies' Bulletin #1. Our worldwide summary of how freedoms are being classified, stamped, licenced, restricted, abolished - and occasionally enhanced. "Behavioural Insights Team." Wales: Wales Merthyr Town stadium named after E-cigarette, the Cigg-e Stadium. Brent Carter, Merthyr Town's business development manager, said: "For the football club itself it brings stability for next three years. We have got an academy with 180 kids here and it's great for the community." 
World: Health ministers want to take the alcohol out of wine. They have been likened unflatteringly to candyfloss and wine gums, but low-alcohol wines are set to become the next weapon in the government's war on problem drinkers. Ministers have become so concerned about levels of wine drinking among the middle classes that they have launched a campaign across Europe to redefine "wine" to include drinks that contain little or no alcohol.
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 World Smokers Blogs: Watch instant postings to your favorite blogs. |
Thursday, August 15, 2013
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The Property Rights Newsletter August 16, 2013 - Issue #726 "Nothing made by brute force lasts."- Robert Louis Stevenson |
Armed man gets 20 days for threatening pregnant smoker with a gun. In the heated exchange that followed, he called the woman a "white trash" prostitute, and told her she "better put the smoke out now," according to charging documents filed in Whatcom County Superior Court. She ignored him and kept walking. Then, the woman told police, Palmer pulled out a handgun and pointed it at her from a distance of about 10 feet. Minutes later officers pulled over the Dodge truck. They found two Glock semiautomatic .45-caliber handguns in the center console of the truck. Prosecutors dropped a charge of second-degree assault with a deadly weapon in a plea bargain. Instead, Palmer pleaded guilty to felony harassment. (20 days?!)
Interview with Dr. Travis Baggett on tobacco use and other health problems among homeless people. Dr. Travis Baggett is an instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Managing Editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. Narcissists, Psychopaths, and Other Bad Guys. What do personality labels contribute to popular discourse? By Steven Reidbord, M.D., Psychology Today. A patient of mine recently observed that the increasing use of the the term "psychopath" in popular media is really a disguised way of criticizing selfishness. Dressing up selfishness as an odd and frightening clinical disorder - slapping a diagnostic label on it - makes for catchy news copy, and grants pundits emotional distance between themselves and those monsters who look just like us, but who lack the empathy and remorse that make us human. I immediately thought of how narcissism had its heyday in popular culture very recently as well, and to similar ends. Narcissists and psychopaths care only about themselves, and have no qualms about hurting and sacrificing others when it suits their purposes. These are dangerous people lurking among us; all the more reason to publish lightweight magazine and newspaper pieces on how to spot them in the wild. 
Bloomberg Administration Trying to Snuff Out Cigarettes. In his apparent quest for total control of New Yorkers' lives, Mayor Michael Bloomberg has another trick up his sleeve. Gothamist reports the Bloomberg administration is "quietly working to explicitly categorize electronic cigarettes as tobacco products and enact a sweeping ban on flavored e-cigs." But that's not all. According to the report, the administration is attempting to raise the legal smoking age to 21 and prohibit cigarette advertising in stores. So, an 18 year-old New Yorker could decide to put his life on the line in the Military, but wouldn't be considered mature enough to purchase cigarettes. Bloomberg's latest antics only reinforce his absurd desire to rob New Yorkers of their freedoms. From soda bans to cigarette bans and beyond, his administration is embarking on a very slippery slope. Under its overzealous health agenda, it could arguably ban beer, hot dogs and just about anything else that doesn't meet its liberal health requirements.
Boycott the XX Commonwealth Games in Glasgow 2014. There is a campaign underway to boycott the Winter Olympic Games in Russia because of their discrimination of gays in Russia. I suggest we start a campaign to boycott the Glasgow Games because of discrimination of people who smoke. People should not be discriminated against because of their religion, sexual orientation, race, or any life style choices. Scotland: Smoking: a crime worse than urinating on someone's shoes. Friends often ask me why I stand up for smokers' rights when I'm not only not a smoker but actively suffer when people smoke heavily in my presence. Well, I'm not sure if it's the sanctimoniousness, the thin-lipped puritanism, or the sheer pleasure they clearly take in telling others how to live their lives; but whatever it is when I hear the acronym ASH, it makes me want to puff on a fat stogie like it's going out of fashion. UK:The places where the pubs are boarded up. The Great British Beer Festival is under way - a celebration of real ale and British pub culture. But in some parts of the UK, pubs are in perilous decline. So what happens to all of these abandoned pubs when they have pulled their final pint? Towns like Blackburn with large Muslim populations have seen some of them converted into Islamic centres or mosques in recent years. World: Smokers Blogs. Watch instant postings to your favorite blogs. |
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Thursday, August 08, 2013
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The Property Rights Newsletter August 9, 2013 - Issue #725 "Ambition is a dream with a V8 engine."- Elvis Presley |
 If you are really concerned so much about your health then don't ban smoking... Buy a gas mask. MT: Are Great Falls "smoke shacks" violating the Clean Indoor Air Act? The owners say they meet international standards for ventilation in smoking lounges. Smith argued the rooms are a net positive for second-hand smoke. USA: Old tobacco playbook gets new use by e-cigarettes. And what have the FDA, CDC, anti-smoking groups and pharmaceutical funded philanthropic organizations done to encourage better solutions than their ineffective NRT products? Nothing. Consumer oriented e-ciggies threatens market share of both the traditional tobacco and pharmaceutical companies. It also reduces state revenue from punitive taxes and the MSA. The Tobacco Control playbook has never been about health. It's all about money. USA: The Great Menthol Coverup. Last week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, as part of a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, released a report saying that menthol cigarettes likely pose a greater public health risk than regular cigarettes. The only problem with the report is that it ignores data (including FDA's own research) showing menthols to be safer. Lebanon: Courts Kill Smoking Ban. When the law banning smoking in enclosed public spaces passed, some Lebanese wondered if it was a priority. Smokers and business-owners bet that the law would not even be implemented. But it did not occur to anyone that the courts would spearhead the effort to render it ineffective. New Zealand: South African chef "too fat" to live in New Zealand. Immigration officials said Albert Buitenhuis, who weighs 130kg (286 pounds), did not have "an acceptable standard of health". He now faces expulsion despite shedding 30kg since he moved to the city of Christchurch six years ago. Scotland: Will the persecution of smokers ever stop under Conservatives? By Brian Monteith. In June this year, our Coalition Government agreed a general response to the European Commission's Tobacco Products Directive (TPD) at a meeting of European health ministers in Luxembourg. Unfortunately, because the Conservative Public Health Minister, Anna Soubry, avoided the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee, Members of Parliament were denied the opportunity to discuss the directive and the ramifications of its proposals are only now beginning to emerge. UK: Everything Not Forbidden Is Compulsory. The past few days have seen a few developments on the medicines regulations front, ranging from the release by the MHRA of new guidelines concerning the procedure and requirements for acquiring Marketing Authorisation for e-cig related substances and associated devices, to the full text of the advice from Sir Francis Jacobs QC to ECITA. We've also seen the UK release of the Vype cigalike by British American Tobacco. UK: Petition from Forest - No, ThankEU. Under a new Tobacco Products Directive EU bureaucrats want to ban slim and menthol cigarettes. They want to outlaw packs of ten, and prohibit small pouches of roll your own tobacco. They want to severely regulate the shape and size of cigarette packets, and increase the graphic health warnings. If, like us, you support choice not control, make your voice heard NOW! World: Smokers Blogs. Watch instant postings to your favorite blogs. Translate this Newsletter to other languages including; Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Welsh. |
 Movies everyone should watch... more than once! |
Thursday, August 01, 2013
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The Property Rights Newsletter August 2, 2013 - Issue #724 "Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth."- Albert Einstein |
Mayor Bloomberg's big soda ban is still dead. A state appeals court Tuesday upheld a lower court decision blocking the mayor's controversial ban on sugary drinks over 16 ounces, ruling that the Bloomberg-controlled Board of Health had overstepped its powers. "The Board of Health overstepped the boundaries of its lawfully delegated authority when it promulgated the [ban] to curtail the consumption of soda drinks," Appellate Justice Dianne Renwick wrote for the court. "It therefore violated the state principle of separation of powers." Bloomberg, in a statement, called the Appellate ruling a "temporary setback" and vowed to appeal the matter to the state's highest court, the Court of Appeals.
Anti-Smoking Researcher Misleads Public with Invalid Comparison of E-Cigs and Nicotine Inhaler: Correct Analysis Shows that Nicotine Inhalers Have Higher Amounts of Six Carcinogens. By Dr. Michael Siegel. On his tobacco blog last week, Dr. Stan Glantz argued that nicotine inhalers are safer than electronic cigarettes as a harm reduction product based on a comparison he made between the amounts of several carcinogens in e-cigarette cartridges and nicotine inhaler cartridges. Actually, the comparison was between levels of these chemicals in the vapor produced from these cartridges. The data were taken from a paper by Goniewicz et al. that reported levels of various constituents of e-cigarette vapor and used a nicotine inhaler as a reference product. FDA Preliminary Scientific Evaluation of Menthol: Inadequate for Regulatory Action. By Brad Rodu. This is the opening salvo in FDA regulatory action that could eliminate or restrict around 30 percent of the American cigarette market. There were no significant findings: "... menthol in cigarettes is not associated with increased or decreased smoke toxicity." There were no significant findings: "... a clear relationship cannot be drawn." British American Tobacco: Pursues 'Safer' Cigarette. London-based British American Tobacco (BAT) said Monday that it would launch a 6-month controlled study of "reduced toxicant" cigarettes in which effects on respiratory function will be evaluated in current smokers. It follows an earlier, shorter trial published last month that evaluated the prototypes for effects on blood biomarkers of toxicant exposure. Australia: Now The Australian Medical Association Says "No Evidence." And, underlining the need for caution when assessing the effectiveness of plain packaging, the study found there were "no significant differences in the proportion of plain and branded pack smokers who thought frequently about the harms of smoking or thought smoking harms had been exaggerated."
Indonesia: Seeks Compensation From US in Tobacco Spat. Indonesia will seek compensation from the United States for pulling its clove cigarettes from shelves despite a World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling that deemed the ban discriminatory. Indonesia's trade ministry said it had lost between $200 million and $300 million annually from the 2009 ban. Indonesia claimed that the livelihoods of over six million citizens depended directly or indirectly on the production of clove-laced tobacco.
Jamaica: Tobacco use and citizens' rights. SINCE the imposition of the "smoking ban" last Monday, July 15, more and more voices of concern are being raised regarding certain aspects of the regulation, including tourism interests, business owners, as well as parliamentarians from both sides of the House. And it is not true, as Attorney General Patrick Atkinson is reported in the press as saying, that the opposition is only from smokers seeking to continue their unhealthy habit where and when they please. There are many non-smokers, including myself, who have been very concerned, not only with the untidy and hurried way in which the legislation was brought into effect, but also with aspects of the regulations which are clearly excessive and overreaching. A society's laws and regulations ought to protect the rights of its citizens, without impinging on the rights of others. Once our laws overstep these bounds into "this is what is best for you", we enter the realm of morality laws. This is what dictatorships and fundamental theocratic states do - it has no place in a free and democratic society. 
UK: Freedom2choose - The Alice in Wonderland World of Risk Factor Epidemiology - Second Hand Smoke = Fraudulent - The 2 Sigma Scandal of Medical Science - and more.
UK: Lads' mags given 'modesty bag' deadline by The Co-op. "The publishers of these magazines now have until 9 September to start providing their own modesty bags, after which any lads' magazine which does not have the relevant bag will not be supplied in our stores." World: Smokers Blogs. Watch instant postings to your favorite blogs. |
 Read - Lighten Up with James Leavey |
