heh. i’m a smoker. i was living in san luis obispo, cali, when thy became the first city to ban smoking in public buildings. i couldn’t fault that law. why should non-smokers have to endure? a few years later, i moved to san franciso…. right before they became the first metro to ban smoking in public buildings! and soon after, the entire state went smokless. c’est la vie….

we have some pretty heavy taxes on tobacco, and it looks like it may get another tax increase, which would put it at the highest rate in the nation. some of the revenue from these taxes goes toward medi-cal and other health programs, and some of the revenue, of course, goes toward anti-smoking campaigns aimed at children. advocates of the tax cite significant reduction in smoking, especially among minors, in states that levy these heavy taxes on tobacco, the reasoning being that the tax makes smoking cost prohibitive (again, especially among minors), though they do acknowledge the consequence of increased smuggling and related criminal activity.

it’s a tough one to weigh. bump the tax, bump the crime. ease the tax, bump the consumption. one thing for sure: smoking is killing me and it’s sucking my wallet dry. and i can’t seem to quit.

as for trying to appeal to recipients; forget that route. it’s not the guy on the street who buying them, it’s merchants. and where there’s smuggling, there’s usually racketeering. the more profit to be made in the crime, the more aggresive the element. if they’re dealing with heavies, some of these merchants may have found themselves with no option.

KEvron

How long do you think we have to wait before Day passes on this cozy bit of advice to doctors and smokers:

CHICAGO - The federal government’s new advice to doctors for helping smokers quit recommends the drug Chantix, which has recently been linked with depression and suicidal behavior.
…
Another issue with the quit-smoking guidelines, released this week by the U.S. Public Health Service, is the lead author’s past connections with Pfizer. Dr. Michael Fiore, an expert on smoking and health issues, was a consultant to the maker of Chantix. But he said he cut those ties in 2005.

“I guess this is one of those “devil you know” scenarios, eh?”

Exactly. the ciggie gansters are at least efficient and client responsive due to the competition in the market. I say stick with them.

;)

All part of the Agorist revolution….

Hmm, I buy my smokes from the nearby reserve so is Stocky saying the First Nations is an organized crime syndicate?

Funny thing is throbbin, she is right, but that is also an arguement for legalization. If marijuana is legalized, no one will have to go to the Hell Angels for their stuff, the could go to a buddy, a corner store or grow their own.

And, since suddenly the barrier to entry is gone, there would be more players in the market and the price would drop, thus taking away the profit motive that keeps the Angels in the business in the first place.

There are only two kinds of people that want pot to remain illegal - uptight, ignorant social conservatives and the Hells Angels.

Cigarettes are a way for the government to have a tax on morons.

hell’s angels?! down here, those dirtbags deal mainly in meth, and leave the grass to the cartels south of the border. with the passage of medical marijuana legislation a few years ago, home growers have literally come out of the closet, making deep cuts into cartel profits.

true story: my ex’s kid brother grows. he’s been designated by a couple of dozen or so friends as a “caregiver”; for each recipient, he has a card stating that he is their caregiver. for each one, he is permitted to grow x number of plants (sorry, i don’t know the figures nor the specifics about the designation process). anyways….

he used to grow with a friend of his. the lived next door to each other, and ran the operation between the two homes. eventually, they had a falling out, and the friend ended up taking some growing equipment which was not his to take. me, i’d've taken the loss quietly. not ex-in-law. he called the police, brought them into his home, showed them the set-up, showed them his caregiver cards…. a they treated like a theft, nothing more (you need to understand that, despite the state passage of the medi-pot law, the fed still considers pot a controlled substance, and the state and the fed have been going back and forth since passage). ex-in-law could have been opening up an ugly can o’ worms, but he didn’t bat an eye. the balls on that kid!

KEvron

My initial thoughts are that it’s money wideye. They’re losing too much of it to the underground economy they created, of course given the bunch we’re talking about I would not be the least bit surprised to find something else buried in the mud.

I’m not conspiratorially minded, but I agree with Robin. The Conservatives have adroitly inserted two memes into public discourse, both of which surface frequently in the moronosphere:
1) Indians are terrorists. Blockades and protests are terrorism. Therefore we don’t have to negotiate with them cuz we don’t negotiate with terrorists. (That has a fine, manly ring to it, doesn’t it?) This, of course, conveniently disregards that difficult fact that the Conservatives also refuse to negotiate with groups like the Inuit. But it sounds real impressive.
b) Indians are criminals, therefore…well, you’ve got the patter down by now.