KLB

Swansont's question was a legitimate question and was not a straw man argument. A straw man argument is changing the meaning of someone else's statement and arguing against a claim that was not made. Swansont was not addressing arguments made by others, rather Swansont was posing a question of his/her own. If you are going to chastise someone for a straw man argument then take the time to understand what a straw man argument is. It is really hard to see what you point you are trying to make here. Government creates lots of rules that business would rather not have. There are times when government must set baseline rules of conduct for how businesses are allowed to conduct themselves. As pointed out earlier, occupational health & safety as well as public health are two of these points. Theodore Roosevelt implemented the first work place safety laws and banned child labor much to the dismay of business. Based on your line of reasoning, there should be no minimum wage standards, yet without minimum wage standards companies that wanted to pay their employees a fair living wage couldn't compete against competitors who used low wages to undercut the competition (look at what imports do). Without a public smoking ban, an employer couldn't take measures to protect the health of their employees in a restaurant or bar setting for fear of being at a competitive disadvantage. Public smoking bans level the playing field for businesses and help protect the health of employees in those businesses affected by the ban. Public consumption of alcohol is banned in many areas and businesses can not allow drinking in their establishments without a liquor license. Why; because public drinking can pose a public nuisance. Cow brains are no longer allowed to be sold to consumers because they might cause the human form mad cow disease. More people die each year from cigarette smoke associated diseases than from mad cow disease. Why should a business be allowed to allow people smoke in their establishment but not be allowed to serve cow brains as their specialty? Don't avoid this question, answer it. Why should people have more rights to smoke in public and create health risks for others, when they do not have the right not eat cow brains that if it poses a health risk at all, it only poses it to themselves. So the government doesn't have the responsibility to protect the public health in general? First this isn't some fringe minority group trying to gain protections. Non-smokers make up 75% of the population. This is a matter of the majority saying they no longer want their health compromised by a minority. This is not about smoker rights. This is about public health. I will say it again, THERE IS NO IMPLICIT OR EXPLICIT RIGHT TO SMOKE IN PUBLIC. Second, as has been pointed out earlier in this thread the claim that smoking bans will hurt businesses (other than those selling cigarettes) is a red herring. It has been shown time and time again that blanket smoking bans in public buildings DO NOT HARM BUSINESS and in fact blanket smoking bans can actually increase business as people who avoided bars and restaurants previously are now going out more often. This is a very important point that those trying to defend the supposed rights of smokers like to ignore.

This is a strawman argument and a red herring. I never once mentioned the office environment. Why should two work environments be treated differently as far as occupational health and safety regulations are concerned? If something is hazardous to one group of employees it will be hazardous to another group of employees. In some places there just aren't a wide range of job options for low skilled workers. This means that if they want a job where they can earn a decent living to feed their family or if they need to take a second job that fits around their schedule the HAVE to take a job working in a bar or restaurant. Saying one doesn't have to take a job working in a bar is like saying one doesn't have to take a job in a coal mine so there shouldn't be any air quality standards in mining health and safety regulations. If your choice between jobs was one that could bring home $600 per week in tips and wages or a job bringing home $300 a week in wages and you had a family to feed and doctor bills to pay, which job would you take? Saying one has a choice not to work in a bar is a farce. Since the days of Theodore Roosevelt (oh wait another Republican) there have been occupational health and safety laws. It is understood in our country that the federal and state government not only can regulate workplace safety, but actually have an obligation to ensure safe working environments. Bars and restaurants are not just places of pleasure, they are places of employment and governments have the obligation to regulate air quality standards in those places of employment. In regards to having a choice not to eat in a restaurant, this too is a red herring. You admit that smoking should be banned on airplanes, yet when one is taking an airplane, they are oftentimes traveling to a destination where they will be staying in a hotel and will have to eat at restaurants as they obviously can not eat at home. So it becomes impossible to avoid cigarette smoke in public areas without smoking bans. Every year I have to go down to Tennessee for business meetings and for an entire weekend I am subjected to smoke filled bars and restaurants. I have no choice in the matter. If I want to succeed at my business, I must network with others thus I must go to the bars with others attending the conference. Furthermore, the hotel the conference is held in as with all hotels in that area allows smoking in various areas in the hotel and there are no special HVAC considerations in place to ensure that cigarette smoke does not get recirculated throughout the entire facility. So for an entire weekend every January I am unavoidably subjected to second hand smoke (even in my hotel room) and at the end of the conference I invariably feel ill, have shortness of breath and all of my clothes stink. This isn't a conference that I can just choose not to attend; I'm obligated to attend this conference because of my business. Furthermore even in the white collar "office environment," one is forced to go to restaurants and/or bars to entertain clients or prospective clients in order to build up good relations, build up client loyalties and grow one's business. This means that as part of making a living, one is forced to go to smoke filled environments from time to time unless there are public smoking bans. I'm now going to throw smokers obscene claim that non-smokers have a choice not to go to bars if they want to avoid smoke on its head. I will counter that if smokers want to smoke while drinking if there is a public smoking ban, they can mix their own drinks at home. This is no different than telling the 75% of the population that does not smoke that if they want to avoid health damaging cigarette smoke, then they should stay home. Why should the vast minority of the population force the vast majority of the population to avoid places that pose a public health hazard just so the minority can continue to consume something that is known to pose acute, chronic and life threatening health risks for all exposed to it?

Given the way buildings are engineered, smokers CAN NOT BE ISOLATED from non-smokers without forcing smokers to smoke outside in designated outdoor smoking areas. The reason is that HVAC systems do not expel air to the outside, instead they recycle air to conserve energy (e.g. spend less money heating/cooling the air). The ONLY way that smokers could be able to smoke in a building without affecting other people in the same building is to have a sealed room that was kept at negative pressure in comparison to the rest of the building AND all of the air in the "smoking" room was expelled directly to the outside rather than being recirculated. In regards of having a choice not to patronize a bar or restaurant that allows smoking, the State of Maine had a very compelling explanation why this is not feasible for many people. It is called needing to make a living to feed one's family. One of the primary reason the State of Maine banned smoking in these types of establishments along with other public spaces is because employees of those places do not have a choice to avoid these smoke filled environments. If one's skill is waiting tables, etc. and one doesn't have any other skills, then one has to work in a restaurant. This effectively removes that person's ability to choose whether or not to be in these types of environments. They either live with the smoke or go unemployed. Furthermore the State of Maine felt that there was strong evidence that a bar tender, waitress, etc. that worked eight hour shifts in these smoke filled environments actually inhaled as much cigarette smoke as a chain smoker. As such if they attracted smoke related lung damage this could be considered an occupational disease. So the smoking ban wasn't just a matter of public health, but it was also a matter of occupational health and safety. The only one trying to politicize this are those trying to defend public smoking, by declaring that smoking is some kind of right or by dismissing reports and people as trying to be politically correct. This isn't a political issue. It is an issue of public health and public health should not have to worry about the political restraints of what is popular. If something poses a public heath hazard, it should be regulated. Cigarette smoke has been proven in so many ways to pose a public health risk as such it should be regulated in a way to protect the public health. I have no idea what your point is here, but it looks like to me you are simply trying to off handily dismiss scientific evidence provided to you from so many directions because it does not fit your political agenda. Look if you really want to prove that smoking should not be banned from public places as a public health risk, then provide some scientific proof that smoking and second hand smoke is not a public health risk. Oh and I want that proof to meet the same high standards that you seem to think 40 years of surgeon general reports, federal occupational health & safety regulation and NIOSH exposure limits don't meet. Regardless of how hard you try to wrap this issue in individual rights and try to blast smoking bans as liberal political correctness run amuck, the fact remains that: 1) there is no individual right to smoke in public places; 2) the latest reports detailing the risk second hand smoke poses was brought forth by a surgeon general appointed by a conservative Republican President who could really care less about political correctness; 3) the latest surgeon general's report is the 29th report in over 40 years on the hazards associated to smoking; 4) the latest report is the accumulation of over 20 years of research and studies that have slowly built a definitive case that second hand smoke poses a public health risk; 5) it was the surgeon general C. Everett Koop, who was appointed by President Ronald Regan (the greatest of the conservative heroes) that started reporting on the health risks of second hand smoke back in the 1980s. One would think that if this were really a left wing political correctness conspiracy to deny people their rights, that appointees by conservative right wing Presidents wouldn't be the ones leading the charge. --Edit-- Left wing conspiracy comments are in regards to Pangloss's comments in post #29:

For claiming to be a moderator I can't believe you are carrying on this line of discussion or accusing me of making snap judgments. You are labeling everything you don't want to believe as non-science and off handedly dismissing everyone who has disagreed with you in the thread. What you are doing is no better than the creationists dismissing evolution because it doesn't fit their beliefs. I HAVE NOT MADE SNAP JUDGEMENTS ABOUT THE HEALTH RISKS OF CIGARETTE SMOKE. It is based on a life time of seeing more and more reports showing the health hazards of smoking. I'm no biochemist nor am I a physician, so sometimes I have to rely on the scientific process of peer reviews and summaries by scientists and physicians who understands these things more than me. I can not think of anyone more qualified than all of the surgeon generals since 1964 who have gone to great pains and effort to educate the public about the health risks associated with smoking. These are not liberal activists appointed by Democratic Presidents, they have been surgeon generals appointed by Presidents from both sides of the political divide. In the latest case the surgeon general was appointed by a president who can not be accused of being a liberal nor political correctness. Furthermore I can look at the mix of chemicals in cigarette smoke and then fall back upon my training as a firefighter and hazardous materials specialist to know that cigarette smoke contains a deadly combination of chemicals that in any other setting would have very strict release and exposure limits. Just look at the chemicals I took pains to list earlier in this thread. Many of those chemicals have what amounts to a zero allowable exposure where in a workplace. If smoke with this mixtures of chemicals were to come from any source, other than cigarettes, employers would be required by federal regulations to provide respirators and/or other respiratory protection to their employees exposed to the smoke. Just look at what is in cigarette smoke; it contains radioactive particles, chemicals used in the Nazi gas chambers, known carcinogens, etc. These are chemicals whose release is regulated in any form other than cigarettes. You act as if there is no science behind the claims that smoking is a serious health hazard, well let me tell you every federal work place health & safety regulation in the federal register is based humans being killed, seriously injured, maimed or being made cronically ill. If seeing humans die in gas chambers because of a chemical in cigarettes is not scientific proof that that chemical kills, than nothing is. I don't need to read the report to tell me stuff I already knew based on the occupational health and safety training I had to go through simply to be able to carry out my occupational responsibilities. A simple understanding of how exposure limits are determined by the National Institute of Safety and Health (NIOSH) and knowing what the exposure limits of some of the 250 toxic and radio active compounds released by cigarette was more than enough information to know that it was not safe to be exposed to cigarette smoke in any manner. Honestly, given the known health risks associated with the compounds in cigarette smoke and given the fact that it is proven that smoking cigarettes themselves pose very serious health risks, we have our burden of proof mixed up here. Cigarettes are a drug delivery device and should be treated as such. This means that the burden of proof should not have been on proving that second hand smoke posed a public health risk. The burden of proof should have been the same for cigarette smoking as it is for any other product releasing such dangerous chemicals or any other drug delivery device. If the burden of proof for cigarettes were the same as it was/is for other products of this nature, it would be that cigarettes pose no public health risk. If any other drug had been found to pose as a high likelihood of the health risks cigarettes directly pose or pose via second hand smoke, they would have been pulled off the market decades ago. The fact is that cigarettes have been given a burden of proof pass that no other drug or drug delivery device would have ever been given simply because it was not politically correct to ban what is a very dangerous substance and which has no safe dosage. I take great exception to your claiming that studying lung tissue samples from smokers and non-smokers is not scientific. This experiment can be and has been conducted time and time again and the results are repeatable. This has nothing to do with rights, this is an issue of public health and as I pointed out above no other drug that has been shown to be as hazardous to human health as cigarettes has been allowed to stay on the market. By not banning cigarettes, but banning smoking in public buildings society is granting a special exception to cigarettes out of acknowledgement that there are millions of people who are addicted to cigarettes and that it is going to be awhile before all smokers have been able to kick the smoking habit or have died off. If we can find public smoking areas that don't impinge on the right of non-smokers (entering a building, sitting in the only available rest area, ride in a closed airplane environment, etc -- all should indeed be smoke-free), then that's what we should do. Society at large (via governments) can dictate to businesses how they are allowed to conduct business and society (via governments) can prohibit activities like smoking or public drinking if they pose a public nuisance or pose a possible public health risk. 75% of society is made up of non-smokers and if non-smokers are fed up with 25% of the population creating a public nuisance or public health risk, then it is within their right to ban smoking within public buildings. I will also point out that most communities have fairly strict regulations regarding strip clubs but it is hard to argue that strip clubs pose a public health hazards. Somebody tried to point out auto emissions as a public health risk and this is a prime example of society regulation via government. The emissions standards for automobiles continually become more restrictive and are leading us in the direction of zero permissible emissions.

For claiming to be one who wants debating to be based on science, you sure seem bent on ignoring mountains of scientific evidence and try to argue your points using red herring comparisons. I don't understand why you continue to try and peg the banning of public smoking with political correctness and refuse to avail yourself of around four decades of scientific studies about the hazards of cigarette smoke in general. I remember as a kid in school being shown slices of lungs from deceased smokers and non-smokers. It was very obvious to me as a kid that smoke was bad. It doesn't take any major science study or illogical jump in logic to see that if cigarette smoke is hazardous to suck through the end of the cigarette butt that is filtered that it is still going to be hazardous no matter how it gets inhaled. Even the cigarette companies now acknowledge that there is NO safe level of smoking. Public drinking by some doesn't normally pose a public health risk to bystanders, yet public drinking is banned in most places because it can create a public nuisance. Furthermore there are safe levels of drinking and moderate drinking might actually have health benefits. Our democracy hasn't collapsed because of banning public drinking and nobody argues against bans on public drinking as political correctness run amuck. Why then are you and others like you still trying to defend public smoking when it is more of a public nuisance than public drinking, is a proven health risk to both smokers and those subjected to second hand smoke AND the fact that there is no safe level of smoking.

What's your point? The fact remains, that there is conclusive documented proof of the health risk posed by Cigarettes. It is the fact that there is over forty years of research showing the health risks of smoking along with the fact that breathing second hand smoke causes immediate (acute) health discomfort for many non-smokers (asthma, tightness of breath, irritated eyes, upset sinuses, etc.). Non-smokers are not so aggressive against public smoking simply because it "smells" bad. They are aggressive against public smoking because of the concern they have for their own health. You obviously haven't been a non-smoker dealing with people who ignore non-smoking areas and vehemently declaring that they have a right to smoke where ever they please.

My point was that government can decide to regulate these types of activities and that those who keep claiming they have a right to smoke in public are... well... blowing smoke. No one ever claims we have a "right" to ride a roller coaster or eat a tuna fish sandwich will except in jest. I do constantly hear smokers claiming that they have a "right" to smoke where they want, which just isn't true, but the tobacco industry tried to convince us that smokers did have this right. I'm sure with enough digging I could provide the proof that the tobacco industry did this, but it would take a while (don't tempt me because when I find it I'll expect you to read it and then report on it to everyone else). But it is a right that has been building up via legal precedents over many years based on the fourth amendment Well we now have forty-two years of surgeon generals from different political persuasions generating some 29 reports on the health hazards of smoking and over twenty years of scientific reports building up that second hand smoke is also hazardous to everyone's health. There is also a brand new almost 700 page report on this subject. There are hundreds if not thousands of scientific reports on the health risks related to cigarette smoke both primary and second hand. I can't help it if you won't read all of these reports to see that smoking is a public health concern, but the PROOF IS overwhelming. I personally don't think Einstein's theory of relativity has undergone as much scrutiny as the issue of whether or not cigarette smoke is harmful to smokers and those subjected to second hand smoke. Besides it doesn't matter how much "scientific proof" there is, smoking is a really dirty stinky habit that makes everyone's clothes stink, and ruins the taste of food and drink. For non-smokers second hand smoke irritates the eyes, makes breathing hard for asthmatics, makes us feel miserable and is basically unbearable. In my early twenties I missed out on huge parts of normal social life because I could not physiologically take being subjected to the levels of second hand smoke one would find in bars and night clubs. Smoking is a bad habit practiced by less than 25% of the population that does make others miserable. If the 75% of the population that does not smoke decides that they are tired of putting up with being made miserable by second hand smoke then they can work to get as many public smoking bans enacted as they want. This is a democracy and on issues like this it is majority rule. Banning smoking is not a right or left issue. It is an issue between smokers making life miserable for everyone else and threatening the health of everyone else and everyone else saying enough is enough. I simply think the surgeon general's report will give the majority the ammunition they think they need to do what has needed to be done for a very long time.

As I pointed out above, there is no inherent right to smoke. The right to smoke is a lie created by the tobacco industry. In many areas of the country you are not allowed to consume alcohol in public places or businesses unless the business has a liquor license. Even then there is no right guaranteeing that a person who wants to open a bar will get a liquor license. The local or state government can regulate what businesses are allowed to serve alcohol and can dictate whether the consumption of alcohol is permitted in public places. The same goes for cigarettes. If a city or state wanted to ban smoking in all public spaces (indoor or outdoors) they could do this and there would be no constitutional defense smokers could use to fight such a ban in the courts. I'll go one step further. According to the American Heart Association (http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4731), only 23% of American's over the age of 18 years smoke. This means in that by trying to demand that smoking still be allowed in public places like bars, less than 1/4 of the population is subjecting 3/4 of the population to their unhealthy habits. This isn't a matter of civil rights; this isn't a matter of personal choice. This is a matter of public health and whether or not an addiction of a small minority can put the health of the majority at risk. In the past the tobacco industry and smokers tried to cast doubt on the health risks smokers pose to non-smokers via second hand smoke. The surgeon general's report was to be absolutely definitive to put an end to that debate so that our country can move forward and decide how to address this public health threat. My personal hope is that within the next ten years all fifty states will have enacted public smoking bans along the lines of Maine's.

I personally didn't view this as a right vs. left decision. I viewed this as a rule of law issue and a balance of powers issue. What I took from this decision is that the Sepreme Court basically said that the President didn't have the authority to create the military tribunals, this was a responsiblity of Congress. The Supreme Court did leave open the option for Congress to write a law that does what Bush wants. Sure the extreme right and left want to paint this as a right or left issue, but this is only to stir up their base. They try to paint everything as a left vs. right issue. Those who buy of on this line of BS are missing the fact that this is a matter of balance of powers between the President and Congress (both of which are in Republican control).

I used to work in a trucking terminal in Alaska and my boss was a chain smoker but our terminal manager had banned smoking in any facility buildings. As a result my boss ended up spending a great deal of his time in the cab of his truck with the engine running conducting business on his cell phone. At -50 and colder it gets a little to cold to be huddling up out side to keep warm but our terminal manager would not allow any smoking in any of his buildings. Living in Alaska, I was always amazed at what smokers would go through to smoke their cigarettes. Sometimes I thought they valued that smoke more than the digits on their hands.

There is no difference, a bar and restaurant CAN NOT serve alcohol without a liquor license. It is the local city or town that gets to decide whether or not a bar or restaurant gets the privilege to serve alcohol on premise and under what circumstances. There is no inherent right to get and serve alcohol simply because you want to open a bar. There also is not inherent right to get to allow smoking in a public place of business.

Okay, I'll go back and quote the politician I love to quote but didn't like as a politician (if that makes any sense): "Free enterprise left totally free will destroy itself." Former Republican Govener of Alaska Wally Hickel. "The Wit and Wisdom of Wally Hickel", Searchers Press, Anchorage Alaska, 1994 ISBN 0-9644316-02 Quite simply business can be so short sighted that they won't see what could be good for their business because they are afraid to do what's right. Side note: I voted against him but my copy of his book is signed by him. Does that make any sense?

One of the greatest lies the tobacco companies perpetrated on to the public is the "right" to smoke in public places. There is no more of a right to smoke in public places then there is a right to drink in public places. In most places you can not go walking around in public buildings, or on public streets for that matter, drinking an open can of beer. Since there is no way I could get harmed by sniffing second hand beer fumes, yet I can be harmed by cigarette smoke, what gives smokers any more rights to smoke in public places than drinkers have rights to drink in public places? Again the "right" to smoke in public places is a lie. There is no such right. --edit-- Posted written without seeing pangloss's editorial correction so I'll give him slack but the statement is still valid.

Here in Maine smoking is prohibited in all public buildings. The only exception is for private "members only" clubs/organizations (e.g. VFW or Elks lodge) where the membership votes to allow smoking. The public smoking ban was implemented a few years ago and it has been wonderful. I can now go to a bar and actually breathe. Before the ban I never went to a bar and almost never went to a restaurant because couldn't stand the smoke and I didn't want to breathe it. Now my wife and I go to these places on a regular basis. The ban was very liberating.

To learn from mistakes of the past and try to avoid them in the future or in the case of Iraq avoid them today. Maybe we can't right old wrongs, but at least we can try to avoid repeating them.

Okay here we go again, screwing with Ken's brain. I can't add to this new line of discussion, but I'm finding it very interesting, so please keep it up. I'll replace brain coggs later if needed.

There may have been strife all along, however, the British and other empiral powers (e.g. France, etc) really didn't help matters and they really laid the primary foundation for the problems we are seeing today in the Middle East and Africa.

My understanding is that the British and French gained control of vast parts of the Ottoman Empire after WWI and it was the British and French that ended up drawing most of the borders in the Middle East. It was their arbitary drawing of borders and installing of monarchs in their own images that set the stage for the mess we have today. This meshes up with what I understand about Middle East history. Really we should blame the roots to the problem in Iraq on the British. It was all their fault.

You are quite right on this one. We have a 80 year plus mess on our hands.

I couldn't quickly find a list of chemicals released when burning synthetic fabrics, however, I'm quite certain that it is worse than cigarette smoke. I know from my firefighting days they used to lecture us about all of the deadly chemicals in the smoke generated by a normal house fire. Eventually we just started calling all of the deadly chemicals we couldn't remember the names for "methyl ethyl death". Agreed, this is just a more precise way of saying what I meant. Yes flag burning can mean exactly this especially when done in the country the flag belongs to. When the American flag is burned in foreign countries like the Middle East, I think the meaning is entirely different, but there is still a message. Absolutely; I'm really shocked that my Senators voted for the flag burning amendment. I think it is time to put together a rational and compelling letter explaining why there should be no flag burning amendment and ask that in the future the vote against one. Maybe we all need to do the same thing. I want people to reframe from burning our flag out of their own free will, not because they would be thrown in jail if they do.

It just shows how out of touch congress is.

What kind of poltical thread is this? There isn't one bit of disagreement best I can tell.

Okay I think I see a rare chance for agreement. I agree with what was said in posts numbers 2, 3, 4 & 5. Whoa is that weird or what. Look I think the flag should be treated with respect because it represents our country and I think we should respect what the flag stands for. I do not believe, however, it is possible to legislate respect for something, nor should we create a constitutional amendment that limits the first amendment, which is the most important amendment of the constitution in my eyes. Furthermore we shouldn't be adding silly little petty issues to the constitution nor should we be writing anything into the constitution that limits peoples rights.

I'm discussing more than just the NSA terrorist surveillance program and there seems to be a growing number of Senate Republicans who are not satisfied with the President's legal position as they are holding hearings on some of the issues revolving around signature statements. President's typically get away with signature statements when Congress doesn't have the political strength or will to stand up to the President and take him to court. Since the days of Andrew Jackson, signature statements were a challenge from the President to Congress to challenge him in court. They are in short a Presidential bluff. The difference this time is the sheer quantity of them that Bush is using to avoid a veto show down. In reality the signature statements are a challenge of Congresses power and I think the concern over the balance of power is starting to tip Senators including Republican Senators from the position of party loyaties to protecting congressional powers.