The following is a guest column from Frank Kilgore, no relation to Jerry and Terry, on banning smoking in Virginia. Frank is an attorney based in St. Paul, a native of Southwest Virginia, and the co-author of Far Southwest Virginia: A Postcard Journey.
WHEN DID THE "RIGHT TO SMOKE" GET INTO THE U.S. CONSTITUTION?Smoking in public is not an inalienable right guaranteed by the state and federal constitutions, despite what some self-righteous and blatantly selfish smokers assert. Nowhere in those ancient documents is it found the following clause: "It shall be the right of all persons in these United States to, through the various orifices of their heads, render the common air full of cancer-causing and noxious fumes that are deliberately spread in public places". Find that clause or one like it in our nation's governing document or its amendments and win a free carton of Marlboros.
Smokers who justify their own weak constitution by insisting upon "smokers' rights" are of the same "center of the universe" ilk that believe they are at liberty to drive the public roads intoxicated, park in the handicap zone when not handicapped, clog the passing lane for hours or, the worst of the worse, refuse to flush a public toilet, apparently out of a great feeling of pride for finally having produced something of great value that the whole world should share. The smoker' rights members of this elite group started their stinky habit based upon a gullible tendency to believe at an early age that using tobacco would make them "tough" a "rebel" or acceptable to the "in crowd".
The same parents who hide their children in a stuffy, smoke-filled house out of fear that the West Nile disease will find and hurt them, against astronomical odds, think nothing of taking the same children for long rides in an enclosed vehicle, puffing away on cigarettes to the point that the net carbon dioxide content would bring about aggravated assault charges in a logical world.The addictive power of nicotine is so strong that some deathly ill patients on oxygen puff away every chance they get, occasionally blowing themselves and the structure in which they reside out into the streets. We all know these people; many of them are our friends and our loved ones, wasting away before our very eyes. Truth is, many of them are honest about their self-inflicted predicament and objectively support a smoking ban in public places. Maybe, deep down, they enjoy the one-hour respite their lungs, hair and clothes receive during a smoke-free meal.
It is the militant minority of smokers who coined the phrase "smokers rights" that stamp their feet and cry foul when the state steps in to belatedly protect the public's health and welfare. Let us not listen to them; they have already demonstrated very poor reasoning and skewed logic by smoking in the first place. If this minority of knot heads bent on self-destruction continues to impact public health policy then we will bankrupt our public health care systems. We cannot even calculate what they cost us now in lost production and Medicare/Medicaid expenditures. If for no other reason than the public purse, we cannot abide their logic another day.
The whole ruse of individual liberties for smokers and owners of public businesses is nothing but a cover up for the billions being made by big tobacco companies whose executives have many times raised their hands to God and testified that smoking harms no one, all the while sitting on hundreds of their own studies proving just the opposite.
Long story short, smoking should at the very least not be allowed in any enclosed place open to the public that allows children as guests, customers or employees. If we cannot do that much for our own children and grand babies, then we stand for nothing.
Sadly, my native Virginia is lagging behind Tennessee and West Virginia in adopting reasonable laws to protect hearts and lungs, young and old, in public places. It is embarrassing and it is shameful. It is time for Virginia and the other states still blinded by the smoke to do the right thing.
There are just a few Wegmans stores in Virginia, but this family-run chain of 71 stores has decided to stop selling tobacco products:
http://www.mcall.com/news/loca...
The upscale supermarket chain, which operates 71 stores in five states *** said Friday it will stop selling cigarettes and other tobacco products in February.***
''We have come to this decision after thinking about the role smoking plays in people's health,'' the company's top executives, Danny Wegman and his daughter, Colleen, said in a letter to employees. ''We certainly respect a person's right to smoke, but we believe there are few of us who would introduce our children to smoking.''
The family-owned business said it has stopped ordering tobacco supplies and will sell its remaining inventory until Feb. 10.
Kudos to Wegmans.
Virginia should hang it's head in shame as the French embarrass us by taking more progressive steps toward dealing with smoking.
But the good news is that we can make up for it this year. Great work by Governor Kaine for continuing to pursue this smoking ban.
In other words, don't even try to have a reasonable discussion about health, welfare, and showing adult discrimination in applying the right to bear arms or to smoke or otherwise engage in self-destructive behavior. Such a discussion might be regarded as an attack on their prideful masculinity and result in a duel over honor.
Probably the same folks who refuse to wear helmets on their motorcycles... part of the same syndrome. Is it all about personal risk-taking?