Free Nick Hogan-A political prisoner on your doorstep!

Old Holborn has gotten up a donation link for Nick Hogan, a worthy cause that I aspire to.  Give generously.

Hat tip to Anna Raccoon guest writing on Old Holborn's blog.

Nick Hogan video pulled by Facebook-WTF?

Yesterday I posted a video called Smokeing Ban Heros on Facebook, a video that was on Youtube for a couple of years but Facebook saw fit to pull it after a couple of hours? In the light of Nick Hogan's jail sentence for being an outspoken critic of the Smoking Ban Experiment I ask, is this justice?

I take you (unashamedly) to Chris Snowdens blog, who is more erudite than moi (me.)

here's the video again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bn6zye0nh8w&feature=player_embedded#

We smokers will NOT  be cowed!

Justice? What justice?

Smoking ban hero Nick Hogan jailed for six months!

Nick Hogan, a staunch enemy of the smoking ban, who has been bankrupted by this pernicious piece of legislation, has been jailed for six months for his stance against a law that is unprecedented in it’s ferocity against the hospitality industry.

Nick Hogan, 43, was sentenced to six months in prison for refusing to pay a fine imposed for flouting the legislation.

Two years ago Hogan, who ran two pubs in Bolton, became the first landlord convicted of breaking the law for allowing his customers to routinely light up in his bars.

Hamish Howitt                              Tony Blows

Nick is not the only landlord who, from long before this act of terrorism against hard working landlords/ladies, has fought the ban. Hamish Howitt  and Tony Blows have both been bankrupted for their opposition to this vile law that puts the onus on them to police the smoking ban experiment under the threat of a £2,500 fine if they fail to do so.

Last night his wife, Denise, 53, who is also a publican, said she was disgusted that her husband would be in prison alongside murderers and rapists.
'Criminals and bad people go to prison not law-abiding businessmen like my husband who are trying to earn an honest living,' she said. 'Nick doesn't deserve to go to jail, all he has done is speak his mind and people simply don't like it.
'Ninety per cent of people who come into my pub want to smoke, even the non-smokers think there should be a choice. These laws are ridiculous.'

That is what this country has come to Denise, hard working people are criminalised at the stroke of a pen to salve the bitterness of the righteous.

At the hearing, in January 2008, magistrates were told Hogan held a 'mass light-up' in his two pubs, the Swan Hotel and Barristers' Bar, in Bolton, on the day the smoking ban came into force in July 2007.
He was visited by inspectors from the local authority, who found letters taped to pub tables advising customers they had the 'freedom to choose whether or not to smoke'.

Nick, along with Hamish and Tony Blows were firm believers in the organisation called Freedom2Choose and it’s ethos, frequently writing on their forum. If only we could have done more to help hero’s like them. Although the good members of F2C frequently put their hands in their pockets to try and offset any fines these guys received from the heavy mob ‘enforcers’ of the state it was nothing but a drop in a very large ocean where these fines are concerned.
And, of course, there are no shortage of ‘righteous’ organisations waiting in the wings to gloat:

Deborah Arnott, chief executive of the anti-smoking group ASH, insisted it was a myth that the anti-smoking legislation had forced pubs out of business.
She said: 'Many pubs have shifted their focus to serving food, so they have changed their nature.'
She added: 'Mr Hogan is the exception, not the norm, because compliance rates for the ban are way above 90 per cent.'

What a load of shite from the leader of a fucking FAKE CHARITY! We, the smoking public, know differently Arnott!
I have met Nick and Hamish many times, (Tony Blows only once,) as both came to meetings I held in a pub outside Leeds, (the landlord there also fights the smoking ban.) Below is a video I took at one of those meetings that Nick addressed.

Please note that Freedom2Choose, the organisation, did not sponsor nor sanction this video or any content within.

As you can see Nick Hogan speaks passionately about the trade he loves, the trade that has now turned it’s back on him, the trade that has seen him martyred for them. When will the hospitality trade fight for it’s brethren???

Update: Homage to the smoking ban heros video pulled from Facebook.

Blogger Tags: Nick Hogan, Smoking Ban Hero, Nick Hogan jailed for fighting the smoking ban, Terrorism against the landlord, spite, hate, government persecution.

Anti-smokers plumb new depths-smokers are paedophiles

The anti-smoking Taliban have excelled themselves in France by equating smokers with child abuse. This is the most disgusting assault on smokers ever devised to date. Words fail me.

The picture and more debate on this comes from Taking Liberties and Chris Snowden has more to say on the subject.

I’m gobsmacked!

Blogger Tags: Abuse of the media, anti-smoking propaganda, child abuse, smokers and smoking

The NHS quit smoking helpline? That’s Rich!

Rich White, author of Smoke Screens: The Truth about Tobacco, has been having some fun and games with the national Quit Smoking helpline. Below is a transcript of the phone calls he had with them recently.

The fun just never stops where tobacco control is involved.  The NHS has now introduced a live web chat to encourage people to stop smoking. Myself and some others from F2C decided to log on and have a chat to see what it is all about.  A few things transpire:

• They do not want people to cut down smoking, they want quitters only
• They do not like answering questions and kept cutting me off when I asked some
• They are only interested in people quitting because it is quantifiable, but do not say how they determine what a success is or how they know if someone quit
• They do not offer advice, but refer us to local smoking stop smoking services - couldn’t we do that anyway?
• Tax-payers are paying for this abomination - during this time of economic crisis, money is being wasted on this.

The following are my four conversations with these jokers. The first three got cut off, the fourth one I decided to play along and unsurprisingly the conversation lasted until the end.

ATTEMPT ONE
You are now connected
Fabia:
Hi, you are through to Fabia, I am an NHS stop smoking advisor, how can I help you?
Rich:
Hi, I would like to cut down how much i smoke.
Fabia:
Okay that's good, are you looking at giving up all together in future?
Rich:
No.
Fabia:
Okay hope you don’t mind if I ask why you choose to cut down rather that stop smoking?
Rich: 
I just want to cut down to save a bit of money, but I enjoy smoking and don’t want to quit.
Fabia:
Research has proved though that cutting down would only lead to going back up as your body is used to its regular doze of nicotine so if you try to cut down it might be difficult because your body knows what it is used to and since you smoke cigarette will always be available for you to go right back to what you were smoking before.
Rich:
I understand you’re trying to promote these products, but I'm not going to use them and am not here to be told how to live.  Research funded by the pharmaceutical industry will of course ‘prove’ cutting down leads to going back up. In reality, many smokers cut down or quit all by themselves, just as other people drink less coffee.
Fabia:
I'm not promoting any products Rich as I have not said anything about any products I am only assisting you in your quit attempt the best way I can.
Rich:
I'm not trying to quit.
Fabia:
Okay well we help people to quit here but if you want to cut down you can just think of ways to distract yourself and keep busy.
Rich:
you only help people to quit? not cut down?
Fabia:
We strongly suggest giving up all together as opposed to cutting down.
Rich:
that’s not what I asked.
Fabia:
Does my answer not answer your question?
Rich:
No. I asked do you only help people to quit rather than cut down. You said you suggest giving up, evading whether or not you help people cut down
Fabia:
I’m sorry i meant to say we do not help people to cut down.
Rich:
why not?

ATTEMPT TWO
John:
Hi, you are through to John, I am an NHS stop smoking advisor, how can I help you?
Rich:
Hi, I would like to know why you don’t help people to cut down, only to quit?
John:
It’s entirely up to people if they want to cut down or quit.
Rich: 
I know that, but that’s not what i asked at all.
Rich: 
I want to know why if a smoker comes here about cutting down they get no help.
John:
In order to show a justifiable and quantifiable tax spend focus is placed on quit rather than cutting down.
Rich:
and what does that mean in English?
Rich:
That because tax payers are funding this sham smokers who only want to cut back are ignored? Is their health of no concern?
John:
Well you are more than welcome to use quit measures to cut down if you wish.
Rich:
let’s start again. I am here to cut down. Can you help with that?
John:
I am more than willing to provide you with the same advice I would provide those looking to quit.
Rich:
you said that quitting is quantifiable. I am curious, how do you measure success?
John:
Tax spend weighed against successful quit.
Rich:
no I mean what is a successful quit. I am assuming you don’t find people the day before they die and ask if they ever started smoking again, so what do you do?
 
ATTEMPT THREE:
Paula:
Hi, you are through to Paula, I am an NHS stop smoking advisor, how can I help you?
Rich:
Hi
Rich: 
I want to know how you measure a successful quit?
Paula:
Hi Rich we are not able to advise on that but here to offer help and support to insure a successful quit.
Rich: 
I know, I was talking to someone else and got disconnected before they can answer. I was told you only offer quitting help and not cutting down advice because quitting is quantifiable. How is it quantified?
Rich:
If you tell me I will be more inclined to use the service, otherwise I won’t be able to trust the data.
Paula:
When you cut down on the amount of cigarettes you are smoking you may smoke them more efficiently therefore no reduction in the risk to your health.

ATTEMPT FOUR
You are now connected
Duncan:
Hi, you are through to Duncan, I am an NHS stop smoking advisor, how can I help you?
Rich:
hi
Rich: 
I would like to quit smoking.
Duncan:
Ok we can help. Tell me about your smoking habit.
Rich:
what would you like to know.
Duncan:
What age are you ?
Rich:
22 
Duncan:
How long have you been smoking ?
Rich:
about 9 years.
Duncan:
And how many do you smoke per day and when you wake in the morning how quickly do you smoke
Rich: 
I don't know how many I smoke exactly, but I would say at least 40 as I smoke pretty much all day long. I have my first within 5 minutes of waking.
Duncan:
Have you tried to stop before and if so what made you start again ?
Rich:
No, never tried before.
Duncan:
Have you ever heard of Nicotine Replacement Therapy ( NRT)
Rich:
Yes, but I hear that it only works 15% of the time.
Duncan:
It works in more than 40% of the time and using your local stop smoking service ( LSSS) actually increases your chances of stopping.
Rich:
Ok that's good. Should I try NRT or go cold turkey? If it works 40% of the time does that mean willpower is more successful?
Duncan:
You would be much more successful using NRT than cold turkey.
Rich:
Ok I think I will try that then. Will I need to talk to someone once I've quit to say I've been successful?
Duncan:
You don't need to, it does help. Do you pay for prescriptions?
Rich:
I'm not sure, I've not had a prescription in years. I’m a university student, do you know if that means I will have to pay?
Duncan:
It means you wouldn't more than likely but go to your LSSS you, can get NRT on prescription from there.
Rich:
Ok. What about the e-cig?
Duncan:
That we don't have a lot of data on yet however it is prolonging the habit, it isn't designed to help you to stop.
Rich:
Ok. When you say NRT is successful 40% of the time, how long do those people stay quit?
Duncan:
It varies and the information can change on a daily basis depending of peoples choices.
Rich:
Is there a general minimum?
Duncan:
Not really as a lot will stay stopped for a good while, some can start again after 10 years or even 10 weeks, it depends a lot on the persons desire to stay stopped.
Rich:
Ok
Rich:
Thanks
Duncan:
No problem Rich and good luck.
Rich:
Thanks
Read Rich White’s blog.

Blogger Tags: National Quit Smoking helpline, deceit, follow the money! Rich White.

Britain, an anti-smoking island in a sea of European tolerance

Chris Snowdon recently pointed out a subtle misdirection which is routinely pumped out by British anti-smokers. That of our overly harsh ban being just something that is spreading across Europe.

In fact, it is quite the opposite.

[...] of the 27 EU states, only 2 - the UK and Ireland - will have a total smoking ban*. So who is really 'in line' with the rest of Europe here?

* Italy, France, Malta and the Scandinavian countries all allow designated smoking rooms

That was written on Tuesday, yet today Bulgaria emphasised the point even further.

Amendments aimed at qualifying the full ban on smoking in all public places in Bulgaria, due to come into force on June 1 2010, will be introduced by ruling party GERB, Bulgarian media said on February 18 2010.

The full ban, it was believed, would undermine Bulgaria's tourism and restaurant industry. The amendments will be more flexible to enable restaurant and bar owners to comply with the ban.

According to the amendments, owners of bars and restaurants with an area of up to 100 sq m would be able to determine for themselves whether their premises should be non-smoking areas or not.

It looks like Bulgaria have viewed the incompetent carnage suffered in the UK and Ireland and decided it's not for them.

They are correct, of course, as blanket smoking bans are a proven disaster in public health terms. Coercion isn't welcomed, as illustrated by continual reductions in smoker prevalence where freedom of choice is welcomed, whilst Britain and Ireland continue to suffer risibly disappointing results.

They don't seem capable of learning from their mistakes in this arrogant corner of the continent.

The rest of Europe are showing that they are a darn site more clever than the assorted walking automatons who populate our derisory legislature. Bulgaria are just the latest, supposedly inferior, nation to exhibit a more acute grip on reality.

Of course, every nation has its swivel-eyed idiots, and in Bulgaria the most ill-informed of these appears to be Ivan Kostov.

News of the amendments, however, was criticised by one of the right-wing parties in Parliament, the Democrats for a Strong Bulgaria. The party's leader Ivan Kostov said that the amendments were "not a European thing to do".

Look around Europe, Ivan. The 'European thing to do' is to offer choice, as 24 of your EU partners have decided is most effective.

Pursuing the blanket ban route is about as pan-European as morris dancers and leprechauns.

Fausty's Libertarian Blog: Call for Civil Disobedience on Cromwell day, 20th April

Methinks we protest to much?!?

Fausty's Libertarian Blog: Call for Civil Disobedience on Cromwell day, 20th April

Eat, drink and (smoke) be merry, for then you die!

You see, it's all about health...



Hat Tip to Hairychestnuts.

American Stop Smoking Society (ASSS) assess the E-cigarette

Protect your Family:

Do you have children? Call on your child's school to remove smokers' children NOW - before it's TOO LATE and your children die of CANCER! 

Ignore the Evidence:

Yes, the largest trial of 100,000 smokers over 40 years found no connection between lung cancer and passive smoking - but these people are scientists, not lawyers! What the hell do they know? 

Education for Smoker's Children - N0!!!

Why bother when they are probably going to die of cancer by the time they are 70!

Prohibition - YES!!!

We believe banning smoking could be as effective as banning alcohol was in America!

Segregation

ASSS is calling now for separate schools, beaches, and buses for smokers, at least as a temporary measure before implementing the final solution.

Health Care for Smokers - NO!!!

Why should smokers enjoy health care, just because they pay for it several times over with cigarette taxes? Like our hero John Banzhaf, we support killing smokers via denial of medical care. 

Are you a smoker? 

You murdering bastard! The best thing you can do is kill yourself. Contact us now for a suicide pack. 

Nicotine 

One dose of nicotine can make you an addict for life, as well as causing your veins to explode. (Unless the nicotine is contained in one of our sponsors nicotine cessation products, such as Nicocraap, in which case it is fine.)

Electronic Cigarette Warning: 

A warning message about the dangerous and disgusting Electronic Cigarette!



If it looks like smoking then...off with their heads:



All thanks to Leafar for giving me this link...I couldn't stop laughing.

Uncommonly common sense!

New Zealand, that bastion of of truth and integrity towards smokers and all things tobacco, has a Prime Minister that uncommonly rails against the healthist nuts. What has he said that so upsets the “give me the money” anti smoking quango’s?

A proposal to ban smoking at beaches and other public places doesn't have the support of Prime Minister John Key, who thinks it is too "nanny state".

OMFG! A prime mentalist that wants to loosen his grip on Joe Public? Off with his head! Wait, surely his detractors are thinking of the chiiiiiiildren… surely?

“The Auckland Regional Public Health Service last week said it would urge tougher measures in a submission to the Maori affairs select committee's inquiry into the tobacco industry and the effects of tobacco use on Maori.”

Oh no, not those drunken, brain addled, not fit for purpose Maoris, who lived off the land eons before us Europeans made them see the error of their wicked ways? Surely not. Those that must be obeyed would not resort to racism to bolster our  primal instincts that have been long buried, instincts like ‘you are not of my kith and kin so therefore you must be an enemy that I have to hang by the thumbnails.’

Mr Key told Breakfast on TV One that he personally disliked smoking.
"I've never smoked anything in my life and I don't like smoking," he said.
However, stopping people smoking in areas such as beaches seemed extreme. "I think it's a big step to do that, I really do. I think there are certain places where it might make more sense, maybe a park where there's kids."

Oh chit, should have guessed that ‘saving the chiiiildren’ would have been involved.
Now look, if I went to the beach I would not like to see lots of ciggy butts…or fish and chip cartons, or takeaway curry cartons, or soiled nappies ffs, it should be a matter of common decency to not be a prick and clean up after you have enjoyed the delights of the British New Zealand seaside.

“He said in large spaces like beaches it would be hard to demonstrate harm.”

No shit Sherlock, it has never been demonstrated that in confined spaces, say like a pub, or even your own home that SHS is going to make you drop down stone cold dead, but that doesn’t stop the ‘healthists’ saying so.
And the final word goes to this thinking politburo ‘man of the people,’

A politicians life is a drag

"I don't want to get into a nanny state where I am telling people absolutely how they run their lives in every form."
The ban on over the counter sales of pseudoephedrine was different and served New Zealand's interests, he said.
But banning smoking would not work any better than prohibition had stopped people drinking alcohol.

Banning alcohol eh, could never happen again, surely not?

Blogger Tags: New Zealand, smoking in outdoor places, bansturbaters, the voice of unreason.

The Anti Smoking League: Bastards.

ID cards for Internet users

The time is coming when this humble blog, and other blogs like it, will be "filtered" out because it champions the cause against bans, the smoking ban experiment in particular.

Alex Jones, of infowars fame, thinks governments are serious about this. Do you?

Lies, damn lies and Second Hand Smoke

Dissecting Antismokers’ Brains

As a smoker of many years standing, going about my merry way without a care and enjoying life to the full, I was completely caught unawares as to the storm that was brewing against me and my fellow smokers.  Oh, I knew about smoking bans, especially the ban in New York, but my apathy caught up with me as smoker bans got even closer to these shores, first Ireland, then Scotland…now I feel like a clubbed seal!  Where does all this denormalisation shit come from?

American author, Michael J. McFadden has written a pamphlet to help the likes of me understand the history, hysteria and just plain lies behind the anti smoking movement.  Along with Christopher Snowdon and Richard White, Michael is a ‘must read’ writer of note and much praise has quite rightly gone his way.

Here is the first instalment of his pamphlet, The Stiletto, to help the likes of you and me understand what drives the anti smoker and the likes of ASH et al.  First, part of the preamble by Michael:

“Smokers often find themselves in the uncomfortable position of defending their chosen practice against accusations by family, friends, or even complete strangers that they are harming people around them. That accusation has been the basis for smoking bans extending far beyond reason and is usually backed up by vague waves at "mountains of studies," claims that "all the experts agree," assurances that bans will be "cost-free" and "won't hurt employment," and the repetition of empty but powerful sound bites learned from MTV and professional press-releases.”

The Stiletto.

You CAN Stop This Ban!

Smoking bans are based upon lies:

Lies about the health effects of small amounts of smoke upon workers, lies about customer demands, and lies about the expected economic effects on bars, entertainment venues, and small restaurants.
The antismoking lobby lies about these things because they know politicians would never pass these bans based only on the demands of noisy extremists forcing unwanted laws on their fellow citizens. They lie because they know that if a ban’s true economic consequences were explored openly, business owners would unite in protest.
They lie simply because the truth does not support their goal of banning smoking.

These bans CAN be stopped if bar and other business owners work together in educating their staff and customers about the lies behind the bans and encourage them to speak out and contact their legislators.

Expose the lies.

Get people angry.

STOP THIS BAN!

The Health Arguments

Antismokers claim that scientific studies prove that second-hand smoke is killing workers.  If that were true then smoking bans might be justified despite business losses and social disruption. Because of the media power of billions of taxpayer dollars most people have come to believe that such claims are true.
They are not.  Quite plainly and simply....

THEY ARE NOT TRUE. 
There has never been a single study showing that the low level of smoke in bar/restaurants with modern ventilation systems kills ANYONE.  Even most studies of intense unventilated lifelong daily exposure fail the most basic research standard of statistical significance.
So why does the news keep saying secondary smoke is a killer? 
Simple: a lot of money, and a lot of trickery… for a “good cause”. They have no scruples at all about things like pretending that an asthma death simply taking place near a smoker, must have been caused by the smoker - regardless of evidence.
Antismoking extremists subvert our legislatures with campaign money, surprise legislation, and misleading press releases. They have over 800 million dollars a year to spend on “Tobacco Control” and they’re not afraid to use it to eradicate smoking.

They use a lot of that money to design studies giving the "proper" results and publicize those results over and over again as though they were new studies rather than just old recycled ones. The media accepts their propaganda unquestioningly since it's assumed they are the "good guys" and have no reason to lie.
Bad assumption.
The Antismoking Lobby believes its true end goal, the elimination of smoking, is important enough to justify all sorts of lying along the way.  And the most effective lie they've found is that "Secondhand Smoke Kills."

At New York’s 1975 World Conference on Smoking and Health, Antismoking activists were told that to eliminate smoking it would first be essential to “create an atmosphere in which it was perceived that active smokers would injure those around them, especially their family and any infants or young children…”
- Huber. Consumers Research Magazine. 04/92

When they first created this lie they had no evidence at all to support it, but began pumping money into creating what they needed.  Today, billions of dollars later, they can point to a pile of very equivocal studies, ignore their weaknesses and lack of real findings, and simply claim they all “prove” the need for smoking bans.
They do not. The great majority of them fail even the bare minimum standard of statistical significance. Some even indicate a protective effect from secondary smoke!
There's no way to disprove every single study in a few pages, but we can show the frauds behind the major ones used by Antismoking Lobbyists. These studies were all cited by the Surgeon General in 2006 to push his call for smoking bans. Read these five examples and realize that the same shenanigans surrounding these “major” studies also occur every day in reports about new ones.

The Great Helena Heart Fraud

(R.P. Sargent et al. Reduced incidence of admissions for myocardial infarction associated with public smoking ban…” BMJ 2004; 328: 977-980 & Rapid Responses)
On April 1st, 2003, the "Great Helena Heart Miracle" claimed people “protected” from smoke saw a quick 60% drop in heart attacks: “absolute proof” that bans protect innocent people!   Actually, the researchers never examined exposure to smoke, never corrected for confounders, and explicitly refused to reveal the data for nonsmokers while presenting the news as if it was all about nonsmokers!
The Helena study was deliberately distorted and used to manipulate people into supporting smoking bans which have then done enormous harm to their lives and livelihoods.
A final point: The actual initial study charts showed the drop only occurred in the first 3 months when angry smokers partied out of town in the warm fall weather. It bounced back to normal when the Montana winter got cold and smokers returned to town. Not a bounce back after the ban as Anti-smokers have repeatedly claimed. Just another lie, but only known to those with access to the internet pages of the British Medical Journal.

Update: A new study, based on government data and 1,000 times as large as Helena (315,000 heart attacks!) showed smoking bans actually have no effect on heart attacks. The Kuneman/McFadden study, available at SmokersClubInc.com, has been publicly confirmed by noted Antismoking physician Dr. Michael Siegel, and has been featured by the American Council on Science and Health. Meanwhile however, the news media has hyped repeated copycat studies in NY, Italy, and elsewhere while ignoring their defects and feeding the fires of fear that drive smoking bans.

Advancing falsehoods to promote social engineering of free people is abhorrent, but it’s being done every day by the Antismoking Lobby. And The Great Helena Heart Fraud Study is far from being the only example.

The 53 Bartenders Study

(Eisner et al. Bartenders’ Respiratory Health…. JAMA.1998; 280: 1909-1914)
Huge headlines were made in 1998 when a study claimed to show a dramatic improvement in the health of California bartenders after a smoking ban.

Those headlines never mentioned three important facts though:

• At least 24 of the 53 bartenders were smokers who obviously smoked less after the ban. All 53 were friendly enough toward the ban that they agreed to participate in the study: many others refused. Thus the study pool was strongly skewed from the very beginning!
• Most “improvements” noted were purely subjective: “I don’t notice my eyes itching as much.” or “I don’t think I cough as much now.”
• The one scientific difference, a small improvement in some Pulmonary Function Tests, was both below clinically significant levels and quite sensitive to both experimenter effect and patient effort.

Finally, if you actually read the study rather than the headlines, you once again find the claim of causality is not quite what it appears: Eisner actually wrote that “the possibility that unmeasured (infections) or reduced active smoking could still partially explain the observed improvement… reduced ETS exposure… was associated with improved adult respiratory health… smoking prohibition appears to have immediate beneficial effects...” (emphases added)

“Possibilities of unmeasured partial explanations… Associated with…. Appears to have...” Not quite the way the story made big headlines. Certainly nothing showing any long term harm. And quite certainly nothing like the definitive statement of causality that was blasted over the media.

The Restaurant Workers Study

(M. Siegel. Involuntary Smoking In The Restaurant Workplace. JAMA Vol. 270 #4, 1993)


In 1993 Dr. Michael Siegel combined six different studies to claim that secondary smoke was giving bar/restaurant workers a 50% risk increase in lung cancer. New York’s Mayor Bloomberg cited Siegel to justify NY’s ban, claiming Siegel had “carefully controlled” for workers’ smoking statuses.
If you actually read Siegel you’ll find that none of the six studies really “carefully controlled” for individual smoking status. Only one of them even asked about it. The others just used statistics.
In almost every case, Siegel seemed to pick careful subsets of workers to support his argument. If the males in one study had low lung cancer and the females had high… he picked the females. If the bartenders in another study had high and the food counter workers had low… he picked the bartenders. If the original authors cautioned against others using their data because it was unstable/unrepresentative, he simply ignored the warnings and used it anyway.
In the formal setting of the medical journal Siegel stated that, even with all the adjustments he had made, the evidence merely "suggested that there may be a 50% increase in lung cancer risk among food-service workers that is in part attributable to tobacco smoke exposure in the workplace."
"Suggested" there "may be" increased risk that was "in part" “attributable” to tobacco smoke? Well, once the media got the story the qualifiers went out the window. The NY Times and USA Today reported that Siegel’s study showed smoking bans were a “life and death issue” for workers with secondary smoke having a “devastating effect” on their health.
Just as with Helena and the 53 bartenders, the hype and flaws in the basic study design extended and grew to blatantly fraudulent proportions once the spotlight of the media was acquired.

Bans Reduce Bar Air Pollution by 81, no, 87, no, 93% !

(Many similar repeated studies in the past three years)
About three years ago two antismoking researchers hit upon a wonderful idea: measure the smoke in a bar before a ban, then do it again after a ban, and “discover” that there was less smoke!
Of course that wouldn’t get a $100,000 grant or a spot on the Six O'clock News by itself. So they took a visible element of smoke, the “fine particulate matter” (FPM), pretended that it was the same as deadly FPM from cars and industrial smog, and declared that bartenders were now safer because the “EPA’s hazardous level of air pollution” was reduced by various amazing amounts!
This particular scam has brought millions of dollars to antismoking radicals in cities all over the world where they keep “discovering” over & over & over again that there’s less smoke in the air if no one is smoking!
To call it “air pollution” and pretend they are measuring the same thing as the EPA is almost like taking a tablespoon of sugar crystals and saying it is “the same thing” as a tablespoon of cyanide crystals.
Once again, a clever and catchy scare story for the media: Bartenders dying from smoky “air pollution”. It’s a study that is being repeated in city after city for ban after ban in news story after news story. But once again, it’s simply an outright fraud when dissected.

The 30 Minute Heart Attack Study

(Otsuka, R. et al. Acute Effects of Passive Smoking…. JAMA. Vol 286. #4. 2001)
In July of 2001, Ryo Otsuka supposedly showed that simply sharing a room with a smoker for 30 minutes could kill you. The hype and fraud flashed around the world with the same roar that later greeted Helena, but again if you actually read the study rather than just the headlines you’d find that:

• The smoke level (6ppm CO) was 300% higher than smoking seats of pressurized airplanes. This was not just “a room with a smoker” or a ventilated bar. Other studies use smoke chambers with up to 40 ppm 2,000% more smoke than in a smoky airplane cabin!
• The study used nonsmokers who religiously avoided smoke in their daily lives, forced them to sign papers acknowledging potentially dangerous conditions and then stuck them in a smoke-choked room. The actual result? A small blood level change similar to what’s seen after a meal. The most amazing thing is that there were no heart attacks just from the stress!
• There was no control. Even a school science project would have had a sham model and “protocol signing” with subjects exposed to harmless but irritating odors and fog. The control study results would probably have been identical.
• Why wasn’t such a control set up? Could it be simply that the results would have negated the point of the study and the Antismoking grant money would have dried up? Perhaps… I honestly can’t think of any other reason. Otsuka’s study didn’t show a physical reaction to smoke: it showed a physical reaction to fear and stress… conditions promoted more by Antismokers than by smoke.

Otsuka is at fault for deliberately using extreme experimental conditions without reasonable controls. The media is at fault in not reporting those conditions or the likely reaction of extreme nonsmokers. And Smoking Prohibitionists are at fault for using this study to convince people that simply being near smokers for 30 minutes causes heart attacks.

This study and its abuse is an example of
fear-mongering in the ugliest sense.

Health Bites

The Antismoking Lobby has perfected the art of media sound bites. Short, sweet, sticky to the mind, almost totally void of meaning … but deadly in their effectiveness. They are just more lies though, and if you know them you can laugh when you hear them. Some to watch for:
Antismokers claim smoking causes 400,000 deaths a year.
(Actually, this is a computer generated imaginary number. And half of those imaginary deaths occur after age 72 … almost 20% of them after age 85!)
Antismokers claim scientific studies are unanimous and unequivocal in proving secondary smoke is killing thousands from lung cancer.
(Actually, the vast majority fail to find even a basic statistically significant link. The UN’s huge 1998 study actually found significant protection from lung cancer in children exposed to secondary smoke at home!)

Antismokers claim smoke contains 4,000 poisons and carcinogens.
(Actually, the EPA can only identify 432: the rest are theory. In toxicology “The dose makes the poison.” Nonsmokers never absorb enough smoke to even approach OSHA safety concern levels for any of them!)
Antismokers claim secondary smoke is just like Asbestos and Radon.
(Actually, sunshine, beer and sawdust are also all Class A Carcinogens.)

Antismokers claim having a non-smoking section in a restaurant is the same as having a non-pissing section in a pool.
(Actually, since pool water is changed about 1x/year and the air in a decent restaurant is changed about 50,000x/year, they’re not the same at all!)
Antismokers claim California’s extreme bans reduced lung cancer by 14%.
(Actually, that drop occurred in 1996… two years before their total ban!)
Antismokers claim that uncounted masses of hospitality workers are dying every year from secondary smoke.
(Actually, “uncounted” is absolutely right… they must all be stacked in a pile next to Saddam Hussein’s nukes and watched over by OJ’s “real killer.”)

Health Conclusion

All five are “Flagship Studies” repeated by radicals at public hearings. All five are the “best and the brightest” of the “mountain of studies” that supposedly “prove” smoking bans save lives. And all five are fraudulently used by antismoking lobbyists to scare people into supporting government mandated smoking bans.
Consider this question:

If they had the truth… Why would they lie?


Simple: people would never accept this degree of government meddling in their private lives just on the basis of annoyance. It’s the “threat to public health” based on these studies that has made bans politically acceptable.
Smoking decisions in individual businesses should be based on the needs and desires of their customers and workers. There is absolutely no justification from a public health standpoint for universal smoking bans. They are simply social engineering tools used to push a radical agenda.
Antismoking extremists are fundamentally no different from the Alcohol Prohibitionists of the last century, but their tools, tricks, and media techniques are much more sophisticated. Rather than try imme-diately for a socially unacceptable total prohibition they simply plan to keep reducing the number of smokers by more and more bans and taxes.
If smokers, businesses, and the wider public can be shown how much they’ve been lied to, the era of widespread smoking bans will be over. Smoking will continue to be banned in certain private venues by their owners’ decisions, but those decisions will be driven by the proven value of business owners seeking to please their particular blend of customers.
That’s how America was meant to work, and that’s the way it will work once again when the fraud built around secondary smoke is sufficiently exposed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright 2008 By

Michael J. McFadden

Author of Dissecting Antismokers’ Brains

Email: Cantiloper@aol.com

Visit: http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com

v.PA1h9g

Hat Tip to The Smoker’s Club

Blogger Tags: The Stiletto, Michael J. McFadden, Health fraud and Second Hand Smoke, Junk Science, The Smoker's Club.

The Fear Factor-Is this any way to treat our children?

Iron men? Do me a favour

Those Aussies have been teasing us for years about our weakness in comparison to their machismo. They're all Crocodile Dundee types, we're just whinging poms who couldn't win an arm wrestle with their Sheilas, apparently.

It appears it was all a sham. There is no bravery in upside down land, merely bravado.

These days they're just a bunch of Walter the Softys who run for their fragile lives at sight of a wisp of smoke in an open street.

Frankston City Council is preparing to impose blanket bans along three busy open-air shopping strips, including opposite the train station.

Lighting up in the designated exclusion zones during the planned six-month trial could cost defiant smokers fines up to $110.

An Australian male, pictured yesterday

It takes a Brit in their bubble-wrapped country to rail against such laughable bansturbation (a great article, but if you're Australian, don't read it as the language will shock your sensitive soul).

No wonder the poor weak things went home without The Ashes this summer ... they were no doubt terrified the urn might spill and harm them, as well as messing up the crease in their jeans.

The Big Debate, Marijuana, Nicotine, Alcohol-Actor Stephen Baldwin-VS-Ron Paul?

Actor, ex-junkie, failed Big Brother contestant, born again Christian Stephen Baldwin goes head-to-head with libertarian zealot Ron Paul to reach the higher moral ground.

No matter what you smoke, indeed if you do not smoke, you must watch this.

Which side do you come down on?

St Gillian of Merron

Described (underneath) by a local resident well known to many and this governments latest virus on smokers, Gillian Merron MP has hit the headlines again - but not in the manner she would prefer!

Beautifully described as "a pontificating, sanctimonious windbag who is always in our local paper telling what to eat and drink, it would be a joy to shove a lit cigarette up each nostril." I assume that 'the shoving' would be lit end first? Well, it wouldn't be much fun otherwise would it!

This doyen of the Health Ministry who is already constructing the 3 year smoke ban review at a cost of nearly £1,000,000 of our money has hit the headlines of her local Lincolnshire rag by defrauding the taxpayers (all of us mind!) of the princely amount of £6,305 in the furtherance of her lifestyle - this being for mortgage interest payments on her second home!

Bloody hell, I can only just afford the repayments on the one and only humble 'handyman abode'! And I don't even get any lavish expenses.

It seems that although Merron can dictate to the masses about where they can smoke, when they can smoke, even if they can smoke at all it seems she cannot control her own financial affairs - especially if it comes to ripping off the taxpayers! Make no mistake this is fraud, just as the smokeban is a fraud but on neither count will any of these government puppets be prosecuted. Why? you tell me. It seems they can march on doing whatever they like impervious to the laws of this land.

We now know that the smokeban was implemented on the back of lies, fabrications, manipulated statistics & junk science and believe me when I state that Merron will ensure the same garbage is produced for the review (even though she won't be on the leading side of the House at the time). Whatever is produced on her behalf will be trotted out as gospel to the ever eager anti tobacco earwigs but surely this repayment of £6,305 destroys her credibility to pass judgement on others for Sir Thomas Legg has passed the severest judgement on her - FRAUDSTER!

The question is of course, just how many other fraudsters are we up against in our crusade for freedom of choice?

See what they did there?

FOUR decades!

Imperial Tobacco reports first rise in British cigarette market in four decades

Imperial Tobacco said yesterday that the annual duty-paid cigarette market in the UK had increased by 1 per cent to 45.5 billion cigarettes in 2009, while the fine cut tobacco market grew by 21 per cent to 4,650 tonnes. It is the first time that the number of cigarettes sold in the UK has risen in almost four decades.

Yes, forty years.

Shall we file this in the same folder, labelled epic fail, as record youth smoking in Scotland, a halt in smoker decline in England, and 'alarming' jumps in smoker numbers in Ireland and Italy following implementation of bans which entirely eradicate choice?

Forty long years of steady progress reversed by a naïve, and historically illiterate, notion that humans are even remotely swayed by overbearing authority and shades of prohibition.

Big tobacco now has money to burn, quite literally.

Ms Cooper said that Imperial was in the final stages of integrating Altadis, the maker of Gauloises and Gitanes that it bought for €12.6 billion in 2008, and would be back on the acquisition trail soon.

Ooh, how must that sting the anti-tobacco hysterics? Even the aid of a recession can't dampen the sales of their arch enemies after the massive boost of the smoking ban that ASH, and their similarly head-slappingly inept coalition partners, pushed as the magic ingredient for a future without smoking.

As if that wasn't enough torture, the Telegraph wades in with a tip for sage investors.

The shares are trading on a September 2010 earnings multiple of 11.6 times, falling to 10.6 next year, which does not look expensive. The current year prospective yield is 4pc rising to 4.6pc in 2011 – well worth having.

The shares were first recommended on November 30, 2008, at £16.18 a share. They are now up 27pc compared with a market up 22pc.

However, the shares are a yield play rather than a capital appreciation play, although as debt is reduced the share price should improve. On this basis the stance remains buy.

Fill yer boots! With enemies like ASH pushing policies which increase consumption for tobacco companies on the back of human nature, who needs friends?

Mental imbalances and anti-smokers

Via the Ashtray Blog, comes more evidence of the psychological problems regularly exhibited by anti-smokers.

New Zealand tobacco control zealots, Quit, responded to the news that a respected researcher had deemed e-cigs perfectly safe, with the type of dreary and irrational reaction that we have come to expect from their limp, risk-terrified, and doom-laden colleagues worldwide.

"The strength of e-cigarettes is that they provide nicotine without the thousands of damaging chemicals found in cigarettes and tobacco, which is certainly a good thing," said a spokesman.

"Our concern is that, at face value, they appear to reinforce the behaviour of having a cigarette. It's reinforcing the wrong habit and potentially without addressing the addiction.

"We need to de-normalise smoking and e-cigarettes seem to role-model the wrong behaviour."

In New Zealand, e-cigs have been deemed harmful to no-one, are no threat to Quit's aspiration of living for a thousand years, don't make them have to wash their clothes more than once a month and don't force them to wash their hair like everyone else.

In short, there is absolutely nothing which could possibly make it any of Quit's business to intervene, but intervene they still do.

You see, it's still a bit like smoking ... and they just hate the fact that anyone is doing something that they don't personally like. Especially if they enjoy it.

Instead of lecturing governments, these bodies should be on a couch explaining their thoughts to a shrink. They need help.

Smoking, the debate is over, Isn't it?

Radio Five Live's  Tony Livesey talks about the smoking ban and new measures to stop smokers doing what they do...or don't do. The actual debate about smoking/smokers is around 9 minutes in but do enjoy the rest of the show.  ASH's Martin Dockrell, is a "must listen to" defender of the faith, oh, and he is an ex-smoker.



Get your own playlist at snapdrive.net!If you are an ex-smoker, hate smoking or just plain belligerent on the subject of the smoker I would like to hear your opinion, without malice aforethought, comments are not moderated.

I’m an alien, I’m an alien in…Bournemouth?

 Pic stolen (unashamedly) from posthumanblues blog.

I may like a smoke and a drink but I’m not paranoid…

I’m never going to have a crafty smoke in the pub toilet ever, ever again.

Hat Tip to Freedom2Choose forum member smochiewoochie

Blogger Tags: CCTV, Aliens, Paranoia, Government intrusion.

Oh, no, another brainfart that asks...

...am I alone?

I was drawn to a BBC documentary, called The Virtual Revolution which made me think upon the sheer magnitude and diversity of the Internet, not to say the beginnings of the World Wide Web (and it was a Brit that gave us the WWW dot, fame at last eh?) and how it was deemed as a panacea to the libertarians (WTF is a libertarian? Don't we all think we are libertarians???)  After all, the idea of liberalism started in the USA, San Francisco to be precise, go figure? In the hippy era of the sixties, yeah right?

 Yeah, frickin' right, to use an American expression.

Anyway, us Europeans are made of sterner stuff, we will not be led by mere dogma!?! Esecially us British? But I do not always blurb on about smoking issiues?

I want your children! Buy Me.

 

Anyway I digress, here are blogs that I are high up on my blogwatch list, but sometimes I can't bring myself to comment on because they make cry, laugh and occasionally think in equal measure, bastards! I don't want to think, it's too painful!

Captain Ranty, whom  I have known under another name, of which I will not divulge, I deem him to be a sincere blogger of whom I have the utmost respect and am trying to understand his concept of being a freeman, (I am Borg) because of it's compelxity, (who would have thought it would have been hard work to know that you were  free?) He is a worthy read.

Meanwhile Obnoxio is just being plain obnoxious about sportsmen (women do not spit) spitting! (Well Obo, mine's bigger than yours, you cockwaverer you*)

Meanwhile I was feeling guilty about writing this "under the influence" but I feel guilty no more. Chris Snowdon's blog, it's a revelation!

Talking about drinkin' and smokin'

If you can't understand the humour, then nor cant I, but I tried...and laughed my head off!

I put a * above but, for the life of me I can't remember why? I blame the demon drink myself, well, we have to have an enemy!