Wednesday, December 17, 2014
The Property Rights Newsletter Issue #785
December 19, 2014 - Issue #785"You're making me angry! Very angry!" - Marvin the Martian. "Don't take life so seriously. You're not getting out alive." - Bugs Bunny |
 A paper by Maggie Simpson and Edna Krabappel was accepted by two scientific journals. A scientific study by Maggie Simpson, Edna Krabappel, and Kim Jong Fun has been accepted by two journals. Of course, none of these fictional characters actually wrote the paper, titled "Fuzzy, Homogeneous Configurations." Rather, it's a nonsensical text, submitted by engineer Alex Smolyanitsky in an effort to expose a pair of scientific journals - the Journal of Computational Intelligence and Electronic Systems and the comic sans-loving Aperito Journal of NanoScience Technology. One journal congratulates the authors on their paper being accepted. (Alex Smolyanitsky) These outlets both belong to a world of predatory journals that spam thousands of scientists, offering to publish their work - whatever it is - for a fee, without actually conducting peer review. When Smolyanitsky was contacted by them, he submitted the paper, which has a totally incoherent, science-esque text written by SCIgen, a random text generator. (Example sentence: "we removed a 8-petabyte tape drive from our peer-to-peer cluster to prove provably "fuzzy" symmetries’s influence on the work of Japanese mad scientist Karthik Lakshminarayanan.") USA: Hey Legislators Vaping Products Don't Belong in the MSA! Congressmen push for e-cigarettes to be captured by the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) in a longshot bid. Their arguments are flawed, but if they were to succeed, regulatory changes would dramatically change the segment. 
AZ Apache Tonto National Forest. Congress gives Native American lands to foreign mining company with new NDAA. Controversially, the measure is attached to annual legislation that funds the US Defense Department. The House and Senate Armed Services Committees quietly attached a provision to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would mandate the handover of a large tract of Tonto National Forest to Resolution Copper, a subsidiary of the Australian-English mining company Rio Tinto, which co-owns with Iran a uranium mine in Africa and which is 10-percent-owned by China.
AZ: Pima County Mulling policy that would ban it from hiring smokers. Rule would also include insurance surcharges and possible nicotine tests. DOJ Banning Smoking in Federal Prisons. Only exemptions for 'religious reasons' and staff. The rule will affect the estimated 80 percent of prison inmates that smoke. The religious exemption for prison inmates is likely aimed at Native Americans, who have a history of ceremonial tobacco smoking. One commenter argued that the regulation would create a "substantial burden" on the "religious exercise of Native Americans," though the government decided to permit smoking as an "authorized inmate religious activity." France: Anger over 'Nazi style’ badges for homeless. La Ligue des droits de l'Homme, a human rights group, said it was troubled by the resemblance "of this card and the yellow star that the Jews had to wear during the Second World War." Gambia: Gambian diplomats guilty of tax-free tobacco fraud. Immunity waived, found guilty. "The public should have confidence that in cases where our tax systems have been exploited, all steps will be taken to ensure that diplomatic staff cannot commit offences and then hide behind diplomatic immunity." Hungary: Bill would make tobacco companies pay one-time healthcare contribution. The proceeds from the tax would be earmarked exclusively for financing state-funded healthcare. New Zealand: War on smoking 'needs cash.' The Government is not taking New Zealand's smokefree goal by 2025 seriously enough and will not get there unless it invests more money into quit services. Russia: Longer working hours for tobacco-addicted civil servants in Russia's south. Putin said that Russia planned to continue its cooperation with the WHO on smoking. South Korea: Smoking Is About to Get a Lot Pricier. Following the National Assembly's vote, the average cost of cigarettes will nearly double. UK: Car smoking ban. Isle of Man residents consulted on government plans. The bill would also see a ban on the display of tobacco products in shops on the island, where around one in five residents smokes regularly. |
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Friday, December 12, 2014
The Property Rights Newsletter Issue #784
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December 12, 2014 - Issue #784 "Toward no crimes have men shown themselves so cold-bloodedly cruel as in punishing differences of belief." - James Russell Lowell | |
Paul cites high cigarette taxes in death. Republican Sen. Rand Paul says that politicians and taxes are to blame for the police chokehold death of Eric Garner. "Obviously, the individual circumstances are important, but I think it's also important to know that some politician put a tax of $5.85 on a pack of cigarettes, so they've driven cigarettes underground by making them so expensive," the Kentucky Republican said Wednesday on MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews." He continued, "But then some politician also had to direct the police to say, 'Hey, we want you arresting people for selling a loose cigarette.'" A New York City grand jury decided Wednesday not to return an indictment in the July death of Garner. The 43-year-old father of six died after being placed in a chokehold by a city police officer who was arresting him on suspicion of selling untaxed cigarettes.
Michael Bloomberg Funded Pro-Tobacco Tax Study by Obamacare Architect Jonathan Gruber. With just days until Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber testifies before Congress, a 2008 study has resurfaced which reveals that former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg funded research by Gruber on the benefits of tobacco taxes. The study also included assistance from now-Center for Disease Control (CDC) Director Tom Frieden. CASAA Call to Action: Ask Your Legislators to Support a Change to the Tobacco Control Act. Representatives Boehner, McCarthy, and Upton wrote a letter to the Secretary of Health and Human Services suggesting that the grandfather date of February 15, 2007 for "new tobacco products" under the Tobacco Control Act (TCA) be changed. Such a change would result in tens of thousands of e-cigarette products not being summarily removed from the market, so we believe this presents a huge opportunity for consumers. Watch Video: Smoking Bans - Banning Freedom. Restaurants and bars are private places. They have owners, just like homes. Skoble argues that restaurant and bar owners should be able to set smoking rules for their establishments, much like you can set smoking rules in your own household.
South Africa: Why you should let smokers smoke and over-eaters eat. The numbers show that it is simply not true that the results of unhealthy behaviour impose a cost on society. Smoking may be the greatest cause of health disinformation, with liquor second, followed by sugar, salt, junk food, obesity, sedentary lifestyle, alternative or complementary healthcare and traditional healing. Health fanaticism has become so tyrannical that critics are muzzled. Lies repeated often enough acquire the appearance of truth. Canada: Fat Class Warfare. The War on Fat echoes the same old obsessions of Prohibitionism, a paranoid concern about the inability of the lower classes to care for themselves that verges on bigotry, an imaginary crisis blown out of all proportion in order to justify abuses of power and the self-congratulatory superiority lurking behind the curtain. Their obesity concern trolling is a combination of classism and nanny statism that brings to mind the days when their ideological forebears thought that the way to deal with the poor was to sterilize those who seemed less capable than the rest to improve the breed. The breed being culled while the elites try to teach their less evolved cousins to survive by eating their arugula. Australia: Schools ban Christmas candy canes over 'obesity' concerns. "As a community, we believe it is necessary to examine and challenge the hidden messages we send out to children at Christmas." | |
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Thursday, December 04, 2014
The Property Rights Newsletter Issue #783
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December 5, 2014 - Issue #783 "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." - Abraham Lincoln |
Effort to repeal Smoker's Bill of Rights goes too far. Last week State Rep. Wes. Culver of Goshen told Goshen News Statehouse Reporter Maureen Hayden that he again plans to carry proposed legislation on behalf of the Indiana Chamber of Commerce that would eliminate the so-called "Smoker's Bill of Rights" that was passed into state law back in 1991. That law prevents employers in Indiana from discriminating against employees or potential employees who smoke. Indiana is one of 29 states that protects the rights of smokers in such a way.
House Leaders Rush to Defend E-Cigarettes From Possible FDA Bans. Republicans call for change to FDA rules proposal on e-cigarettes. Senate Democrats harried electronic cigarette companies throughout 2014, pushing hard for new rules and restrictions on the booming multibillion-dollar industry. Now, congressional Republicans - fresh off a November election landslide - are standing up for e-cigarettes and pushing back on pending regulations critics fear may allow administrative product bans. Public Health Policy Needs to Address Social Practices. A new U.K. study suggests a shift in public policy is needed to address "lifestyle diseases," the major cause of death and disability. Dr. Stanley Blue, a lecturer in social sciences at the University of Manchester, claims public health practitioners should pay more attention to efforts that can break social habits and practices, rather than focusing on individual behavior. Constantine Smoked In Tonight's Episode. In tonight's episode of Constantine, titled "Danse Vaudou," the series' title character finally did something that fans had been clamoring for, and told wouldn't come: He lit up. Constantine, of course, was a chain smoker throughout 300 issues of Hellblazer, and his smoking was a key component of the story. 
Drinking Coffee Can Lower Alzheimer's Risk By 20 percent. All It Takes Is 3 Cups A Day. The research was presented at the 2014 Alzheimer Europe Annual Congress, and found that people who drank coffee regularly - all you lifers out there - were less likely to develop the debilitating disease.
MORE: Articles about coffee. |
 SIDS Update: Nearly 55 percent of U.S. infants are placed to sleep with bedding that increases the risk of sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, despite recommendations against the practice, report researchers at the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and other institutions. Eating disorders are a scourge in need of a strategy. The committee's new 75-page report, Eating Disorders Among Girls and Women in Canada, was much anticipated by parents and clinicians alike, who know all too well how dire the situation is. UK Child Eyes Protection: Supermarkets to cover up newspaper front pages over fears children could be corrupted by graphic pictures and even headlines. Waitrose and Tesco have said that they are working on new display methods that will show only the mastheads of some newspapers - keeping explicit content out of the eye line of children. The move comes following months of pressure from campaign groups No More Page 3 and Child Eyes, who have heralded the decision a victory. Winnie the Pooh banned from Polish playground over his 'dubious sexuality' and 'incomplete wardrobe.' "The problem with that bear is it doesn't have a complete wardrobe," Coun. Ryszard Cichy is quoted as saying. |
