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(Wichita Falls Times) Interesting Proposed legislation would give federal government "unprecedented authority" to crack down on tobacco.   (trnonline.com) divider line 80
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Amigajoe [TotalFark] 2002-06-16 01:14:18 PM  
cough cough

 
Amigajoe [TotalFark] 2002-06-16 01:15:19 PM  
They aready have unprecedented authority to crack down on the citizens, why should tobaccy get a free ride?

 
K-Dogg 2002-06-16 01:16:21 PM  
this will give me my good excuse to quit. I would love to quit, but the only way i will any time soon is if they quit making them.

 
CheezieDanish 2002-06-16 01:16:43 PM  
Why not put the alcohol content on beer cans?

 
9/10 2002-06-16 01:17:30 PM  
The dangers of smoking have been rammed down our throats for three decades now. Anyone who takes up smoking and doesn't know the dangers of it deserves what happens to them. It's a little thing called PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. If you smoke for thirty years and get cancer, emphysema, etc., it's YOUR OWN FAULT. You have to live with your choices. NO ONE is forced to smoke. People need to grow up.

Oh, and the tobacco companies lying about it makes no difference. The dangers are well-known ... and if you choose to smoke anyway, too bad for you.

 
Qinopio 2002-06-16 01:18:44 PM  
Legalize everything!

 
b403 2002-06-16 01:20:51 PM  
yha, like this bill is going to pass.

in other news, anyone remember the family guy episode with the tabacco lobby? :)

 
CheezieDanish 2002-06-16 01:20:55 PM  
People need to grow up.

The government needs to grow up. Like you said, no one is FORCED to smoke, it's their own personal choice - so why should the government have anything to do with a person's own personal choice?

 
luckynoone 2002-06-16 01:21:31 PM  


Thats right mon, illegalize the cigarettes, legalize the weed and everyman lives in harmony, no more killings on the streets.

 
Popo Bawa, the sodomizing ghost of Zanzibar 2002-06-16 01:22:06 PM  
We're doomed.

 
b403 2002-06-16 01:22:50 PM  
9/10: tell that to all the 11 year old girls who don't know their head from their ass lighting up prior to forming any idea of "personal responsibility".

making that statement, yes i realize, it can lead to visions of asses being lit on fire.

 
GrymReeper 2002-06-16 01:23:20 PM  
I give this bill a <20% chance. When the tobacco and farm lobbies start buying boobies for our legislators, this thing will die in committee. I’m a tobacco addict, currently not using, however, I don’t want those nincompoops in D.C. telling me what I can or can’t smoke. Wait, I guess they already do…

 
gilga 2002-06-16 01:23:48 PM  
Tobacco is wacko if you're a teen.

'Nuff said.

 
andonbray 2002-06-16 01:25:14 PM  
Alcoholic beverages will be next. They aren't good for you either. The government needs to protect you from yourselves.

 
Qinopio 2002-06-16 01:25:24 PM  
A little education and common sense is all you need...

 
Henchman 2002-06-16 01:26:17 PM  
Anyone wanna bet they're going to tie this to Al-Quaeda?

 
luckynoone 2002-06-16 01:28:10 PM  
"Philip Morris, which broke ranks with other cigarette makers a couple of years ago and said it could support some federal regulation of tobacco, said it favors many of the proposals outlined in the bill, including new warning labels and tougher marketing and manufacturing regulations."

Hmm... doesn't philip morris make most of their money off of kraft and miller lite products? Besides, if they are so supportive of all the anti-smoking crap, then the government might let them live while other companies fail to pass FDA standards. Does anyone detect some illegal economic stuff going down? or have I just been smoking too much green to tell?

 
9/10 2002-06-16 01:28:33 PM  
06-16-02 01:22:50 PM B403
9/10: tell that to all the 11 year old girls who don't know their head from their ass lighting up prior to forming any idea of "personal responsibility".


Then some adults need to be locked up for selling to underage buyers. There are laws against it ... and if someone is buying it and giving it to them, they're breaking the law, too.

I have an uncle who quit smoking cold-turkey after lighting up for over 30 years. He started smoking in high school. He saw an American Lung Association presentation concerning what smoking does to your lungs, and it scared him so bad that he immediately threw out every cigarette he had ... this was almost fifteen years ago, and he hasn't lit up since. He saw the personal responsibility light.

 
utter_bastard 2002-06-16 01:30:15 PM  
I say go for it. I for one would like to know what is actually in them. If I saw all the vile crap that I was inhaling I might actually think about quitting.


Actually I should quit because they are too farking expensive. Especially considering my measley paychecks.

 
Henchman 2002-06-16 01:31:08 PM  

 
Godamnlimey [TotalFark] 2002-06-16 01:32:29 PM  
The gubmints interest in this is financial,I seem to
remember reading somewhere that 50% or 60% of direct health care costs are due to tobacco related illnesses.

 
luckynoone 2002-06-16 01:34:33 PM  
a person who smokes...

a pack a day person will save $15,000 over the next 10 years if they quit

a 2 pack a day person will save $30,000 over the next 10 years if they quit

Thats $30 you can spend on boobies, or a nice BMW.

HMMMMMM...... BMW OR BAD BREATH AND CANCER?

 
SaintNick 2002-06-16 01:35:25 PM  
If we're to continue living in a free society, people have the right to do stupid things. But since we're not, welcome to the Nanny State.

 
fry1138 2002-06-16 01:37:03 PM  
Land of the free?

 
Shiver_Me_Timbers 2002-06-16 01:37:04 PM  
derrr

 
Close2TheEdge 2002-06-16 01:39:26 PM  
I'll believe they are serious when the US stops exporting cigs to countries where sales to minors are both legal, and promoted. But that's why this won't happen. Taking away cigarette exports and the US trade deficit goes sky-high. It's our dirty little secret.

Despite the sanctimonious posturing, our government has no problem exporting death to the Third World.

 
frank2 2002-06-16 01:40:55 PM  
Yes please US government protect me from cigarettes because I am too stupid to do it myself.

 
anonymous 2002-06-16 01:43:23 PM  
HMMMMMM...... BMW OR BAD BREATH AND CANCER?

Both!! I wan't it all, baby!

-Kevin

 
Crakmine 2002-06-16 01:45:02 PM  
Luckynoone forgot one bit, "And mon, de chip and pizza sales be up 600 percent mon!"

 
Jand 2002-06-16 01:46:58 PM  
I wonder if the list of ingredients will fit on a pack of cigarettes? It doesn't matter, no one who smokes will care, but it will give the Gladys Crabbitz's of this world more nag material.

I don't smoke, but good grief, is it really that big of deal? We should thank smokers for lowering the crime rate. All of those dark hiding places that muggers used to hide in are now being used by smokers who have become social pariahs. Walk into an alley behind a business sometime.

I don't like being around someone smoking, but I'd take that over being around some nagging, Gladys Crabbitz busybody anyday.

 
CrazyCurt 2002-06-16 01:49:15 PM  
After tobacco will come alcohol for sure. Once they've made it a crime to smoke and drink then what next? Fattening foods? Off with your head. Non-Christian literature? Off with your head. Stinky shoes? Off with your head. I smoke an ol' briar pipe and if that's taken away from me by overzealous, power-mad politicians I never even voted into office ( I'm a Libertarian, we never win ) then I'm moving out of country. Heck at this rate Cuba just may have more freedoms in ten years than the United States.

 
excipher 2002-06-16 01:52:16 PM  
Damn, alotta nonsmokers here. And Some quiters, too. I see.

Luckynoone that two pack a day guy ain't gonna make it ten years and if he had all that money he saved by not smokin' he wudda spent it on alcohol.

Fry1138 This is not the land of the free but the land of the taxed.

And the bright side of all of this is that you will now know exactly how much battery acid is in a pack of marlboro lights.

 
gregw 2002-06-16 01:52:59 PM  
What's the big deal about smoking? People who die early of smoking related diseases are saving us all a bunch of money keeping them alive in nursing homes. Think about it...

 
Ash 2002-06-16 01:53:54 PM  
why should the government have anything to do with a person's own personal choice?

The dead don't pay taxes.

 
mochunk 2002-06-16 01:55:31 PM  
All I can say is, The term "unprecendented authority" when talking about the government on anything is .

 
CrazyCurt 2002-06-16 01:57:38 PM  
Oh and one very puzzling thing. The anti-tobacco lobby claims something like 400,000 people a year or some crap die from "Smoking Related Diseases". What's not widely known is that the person who dies from emphazema (sp?), cancer, et al, may not have been a smoker but gets listed on death certificate as having had a smoking related disease. That's right, people dying in big cities because of excessive pollution and children who croak from asthma are listed as victims of smoking related diseases.

My theory is that the anti-smoking, blame-all-scoiety's-ills-on-smokers campaign is propped up financially and politically by oil companies. Because of the smoking related diseases trick on death certificates we really don't know who is dying from smog and who is dying from smoke. If the oil magnates can keep people pounding down smokers no one's going to want to give up their fume-belching SUV, or demand different fuels, are just walk. My theory anyway. Probably wrong, but maybe not, and that's scary.

 
lord_humungous 2002-06-16 01:59:02 PM  
Dunno about alcohol being next - the 'fat america' issue has been popping up quite a bit lately. The next thing the Gubmint will be protecting us from is unhealthy food. You know, like twinkies. Which of course will also help the war on that evil, evil marijuana.

 
scraping-fetus-off-the-wheel 2002-06-16 02:01:56 PM  
As long as I don't get a pack with the cancer warning then I'm gonna be just fine.

 
jjorsett 2002-06-16 02:07:12 PM  
If tobacco is so bad, these blowhards should be voting to ban the stuff. Let people go get it from dope dealers and smugglers. Then we can have the DEA kick in their doors and throw them in prison, and Ted "Bloviatin'" Kennedy can gas on about how we're 'cracking down' on the smoker scum.

 
excipher 2002-06-16 02:11:41 PM  
the "fat america" tax already popped up with a proposed tax on soda.

I wanna see a tax on tax proposal materials such as pen and paper. This will benefit everyone more than taxing stupid behavior. Tax the people that are doing stuff. It's more profitable.

 
dingiswayo 2002-06-16 02:16:02 PM  
instead of taxing soda, why not stop subsudising the ingredients that go into junk food (like corn syrup)? it's kind of sad that we live in a world where it's cheap to buy happy meals for the kids than to feed them a balanced home-cooked meal of chicken, pasta and salad.

 
Rubble 2002-06-16 02:29:47 PM  
The FDA already has WAY too much power. Bastards.

 
PlatinumDragon 2002-06-16 03:34:30 PM  
No, no, no, we said "LEGALIZE CANNABIS," not "ILLEGALIZE TOBACCO"!

Morons, but I guess the latter means another potential market for the CIA to muscle in on.

Someone else above said it: Prohibition doesn't work.

 
Alcoholocaust 2002-06-16 03:34:37 PM  


More warnings? Well no shiat, smoking cigarettes kills you! You'd have to be a total farktard NOT to know that already. What's next, warning labels on kitchen knives saying "this cuts things?"

 
askheaves 2002-06-16 04:13:26 PM  
What's next, warning labels on kitchen knives saying "this cuts things?"

My Hot Pockets have a warning telling me that the delicious dinner pastry I've just had in the microwave for 4 minutes might be hot.

I have no problem keeping cigarettes from kids, as we've already decided that they're not smart enough to legally make decisions. What I don't like is the huge tax on them. I started smoking about 4 years ago, and people were biatching then about how much a pack cost... like, $1.81. Now, I just paid $4.62 for a pack in a nice conservative state like AZ. From what I hear, it's $8.00 in super-nanny state California. God damn! And do you know where that markup is going? Between Legislative Branch imposed taxes and Judicial Branch imposed taxes, the balance of the $1.00 pack of smokes is going directly to the govs. Results vary by state.

The taxing isn't necessarily about getting money for the government so much as it is a goal of theirs to make it so expensive that everybody quits. Hell, weed is cheaper that smokes now. I'll bet crack is less expensive. Why do I hide from my parents that I smoke? I'm 23! I'm a closet smoker. I could probably share stories with my parents about weed, but smokes? Never. Damn, I wish I could just make my own decisions without the government helping.

 
kirby666 2002-06-16 04:18:26 PM  
Mmmm Nicotine....Mmmm THC.....Mmmmm Boobies.....Mmmmm Doritos.........Mmmmm THC.....Mmmmmm Boobies

 
Tairngire 2002-06-16 04:23:01 PM  
Frankly, I don't give a damn whether you smoke or not. But, if you are being a self righteous asshole and light up anywhere near me, I will punch you in the face. I don't want your damn second hand smoke, and cigarettes make everything smell and taste like the exhaust of a Chevy Nova. Either that, or ass.

Smoking disgusts me.

 
kirby666 2002-06-16 04:31:04 PM  
wah wah wah says Tairngire

 
Githerax 2002-06-16 04:58:17 PM  
I said it before on a thread about corporate-owned prisons, the gov't is going to continue to create criminals any way they can. It's not enough to enslave someone on paper, so they're going to find reasons to arrest and imprison everyone.

Mark my words, again. It has been happening for decades, it will continue to happen. And no, I'm not an NRA nut.

 
LawyersRock 2002-06-16 05:07:38 PM  
Askheaves -
The judiciary doesn't impose taxes.

 
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