Richard North has it about right, I think:
Peter Hitchens thus has it, writing under the headline, “We’re being dragged into a new Cold War by a puffed-up bullfrog”. Stupidity and ignorance rule the world, he says, but the trouble is that the stupid and the ignorant think that they are clever and well-informed. He rails against the likes of Hillary Clinton who, like Deshchytsia, has directly compared Putin to Hitler.
But, in particular, he berates our prime minister for “puffing himself up like a bullfrog, and busily creating a new Cold War that will benefit nobody except spies and weapons-makers, for a cause he doesn’t understand and can’t explain”.
The whole pack of them are stoking the fires, seemingly yearning for death, destruction and war. And, remarkably, against that, it seems that the public are taking the contrary view, not in any way buying the bellicosity of their masters. As diplomacy dies on the streets of Kiev, never more have the likes of William Hague seemed so out of touch with ordinary people.
Well, they’re certainly ‘out of touch’ with me. In fact, it’s rather an understatement. It’s more that I think that UK politicians are all, with one or two exceptions, poisonous little reptiles. It’s the way I’ve felt about them since 1 July 2007. And it’s the way I feel about most of the EU political class as well, for the same reason. Because the likes of Rompuy and Ashton and Barroso are utterly nauseating too. None of these people – not one of them – represents me in any way, shape, or form. And so I’m glad to see them all getting a bit of a bloody nose in Ukraine.
And yet, just 10 years ago, I would probably have felt exactly the opposite. But back then I was a valued citizen. And now I’m part of a despised and excluded and demonised underclass. And I see everything through the prism of that experience.
Which is why I can’t bring myself to actually support Putin: because he’s yet another antismoker, and bringing in a full Russian smoking ban in June. He might be riding high in Russian opinion polls right now after his Crimean counter-coup, but I suspect that a few nights of standing outside Siberian bars in snow at 40 below will sour things a bit for the 60%+ adult male Russian smokers.
In fact, I wonder why he intends to go ahead with the ban at all, now that he’s burnt his bridges with the West. After all, these smoking bans are really all about becoming more “westernised.” And what’s the point of that now? I read recently somewhere that old Soviet cigarette brands are being relaunched:
The cigarette brands with the Soviet past from another company, Nevo-Tabak, also managed to improve their sales. The sales of such brands as Arktika, Troika and Leningad improved considerably during the recent six months.
“BAT Russia is not a pioneer when it comes to the launch of iconic Soviet cigarettes. This has been happening on the market of alcohol beverages too. One may recollect the fight of the Moscow Distillery Cristall for such well-known Soviet brands as Pshenichnaya and Stolichnaya. Dairy companies design Soviet-style packaging to win customers’ attention to their products….”
I reckon that about the best thing Putin could do would be to annul the Russian smoking ban, and start lighting up old Soviet cigarettes, and blowing smoke in the faces of horrified visiting Western bigwigs. And also start flooding the EU with the very same cigarettes.
They’d become the ultimate must-have smokers’ resistance cigarette, giving an in-your-face middle finger to our nanny bully state puritans. What could be better than having a pack of Herzegovina Flor sitting next to your pint on a garden table?
They’re what Stalin used to smoke.
Frank Davis 
Its definitely a different world today than 20 years ago……………as they play power suck politics the rest of the world sinks into economic oblivion. Btw get your money out of the banks before the bail-in plans get used.
“After all, these smoking bans are really all about becoming more “westernised.” ”
I think, its about being BEST. There are winners and losers. ;)
Nah. Putin is a Spartan. His body is a temple. I bet he gave up drinking as well as smoking. It’s the new machismo.
And, Carol, if you’re still around:
Enstom, for one example, fought back with science and got drubbed, discredited and canned. The Galileo of his time, give or take a jail sentence. And many ordinary people fought back, presenting reams of counter-science, which the pols dismissed out of hand and which courts wouldn’t accept under “rational basis scrutiny.” Consider Audrey Silk’s lawsuit against New York City in 2003–loaded with scientific arguments, And she and her group keep on fighting. That aside, I agree with Nisakiman: most everyday smokers haven’t got the time or capacity to do infinite research or the wherewithal to do anything about their persecution except sign petitions which the pols don’t read, and take defensive action like stop going to bars or growing their own tobacco or buying black market.
And we can vote UKIP and Republican (except for RINO’s, in which case default to the Libertarian’s). Four million smoking voters for Nigel & Company and around 20 million for the right Repub (like Rand Paul) would work wonders for our headaches. We would literally own those parties on a quid pro quo basis.
Why is this so impossible? Blacks, Latinos and unions have got bloc voting down to a science.
Enstrom “The Galileo of his time?” Give me a break. His garbage is our enemies’ garbage! Their fraud is his faith! And vice versa.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17920112
Neither Enstrom nor NYCClash have ever attacked the anti-smokers’ scientific frauds. Nor do they have slightest intention to do so, ever. They’re perfect examples of fake opponents because they pose no real threat to the anti-smokers. They WANT smokers to think that that dreck is all that smokers can come up with. Those people are patsies. The only reason the anti-smokers acknowledge their existence is because they’re lame and tame.
My goodness, you’re at it again, Carol! You really aren’t very good at diplomacy, are you? Tell me, is there anyone who lives up to your expectation of a champion of smoker’s rights? It seems to me that the only person you consider worthy of that appellation is yourself!
Just as soon as you attack their scientific fraud you’ll be worthy, and not one minute before.
Carol, it appears that the only person you listen to is yourself. You certainly haven’t been reading the posts on this and other blogs, which consistently and in great detail, and with a plethora of links back to original research attack the ‘scientific’ frauds being perpetrated. If you think that vitriol and spleen will get you anywhere, I’m afraid you’re very much mistaken. My assessment of your obviously well researched site here would, I think be echoed to a greater or lesser degree by most people who are actively working (and working tirelessly, I might add) to expose the scientific fraud that is so prevalent in Tobacco control, and who you dismiss so haughtily as ‘whiners’ and fifth columnists.
Because we don’t choose to adopt the approach of arming ourselves with verbal AK47s and going in with an ‘all guns blazing, fuck the collateral damage and take no prisoners’ attitude does not mean that, by default, we are lily-livered cowards. It means we have assessed the reality of the situation, and have realised that the bombastic approach favoured by you is never going to get us anywhere. Quite the opposite, it will merely alienate those people who we need to convince.
For all it’s merits in terms of research and pertinent links, I’m afraid your site is going to influence nobody. You don’t seem to have a clue about what makes people tick.
“You certainly haven’t been reading the posts on this and other blogs, which consistently and in great detail, and with a plethora of links back to original research attack the ‘scientific’ frauds being perpetrated.”
Name an actual fraud which they have exposed. And that’s outrageous to accuse ME of being “bombastic,” what you must really mean is that it’s over your head. I make the strongest points in the fewest words, unlike certain others. And I know perfectly well what makes you tick – rhetoric over substance – while you ignore the fact that your rhetoric hasn’t influenced anyone outside of your mutual admiration club for decades.
I rest my case.
LOL, Carol. I feel like inviting you to “step outside and repeat that.” especially your slurs on Audrey if they weren’t (lame and tame?) so obviously laughable. As for Enstrom, he took them apart on their own terms. And the Clash lawsuit spent a few hundred pages attacking TC science–the science the city used to justify the ban– and offering published counter-evidence, all with footnotes and Exhibits. The judge acknowledged that while Clash’s scientific arguments might, in fact, be true, they were nonetheless irrelevant And you, with your germ-theory-of-everything (which also might have merit, at least up to a point), would come up against the exact same brick walls if you ever decided to put your money (legal challenges are expensive) where your mouth is. You’re an admirable researcher but all you’ve got is a website and a water pistol with which you snipe. Audrey, ex-cop, can pack real heat.
+1 Walt!
(I was going to let her go on for a while longer)
I’ll be happy to repeat all that outside, and add some more on top of it. Thanks to your ilk, the anti-smokers get away with the same fraud, over and over again. The NYCCLASH 2003 lawsuit is just the same old “freedom versus public health” schtick. That’s YOUR brick wall, not mine, and this is entirely because you refuse to question anti-smoker scientific fraud. The so-called science? Alvan Feinstein never questions their fraud. John C. Luik doesn’t, either. The same for all the rest. Since when are do you “fight” someone by unquestioningly swallowing all their false premises? Answer: You don’t. All you do is help the anti-smokers pretend their critics don’t have a case. All you do is drown out the people who do have a case. All you do is waste peoples’ time and money on worthless efforts. And then you sit and sneer at the person who COULD do the job right! As if it’s THEIR fault that you do everything wrong, and never support them! And don’t give me that crap about packing real heat, as if that’s something exclusive to cops (not in the US it isn’t).
Responding to Carol @ 5:07 AM, which post will either appear below or above this one, I’m not sure, but..
Okay, Carol, now that we’re outside: What’s my “ilk”? And how do you think you know what it is? Seems like, with your water pistol, you shoot first and don’t even bother to ask questions later. If you read the brief of the Clash lawsuit, you’d know it wasn’t “just freedom vs public health.” As I said, it was loaded with–literally 100s of pages and Exhibits– “exposing the fraud” of TC science. The painful lesson from the Clash lawsuit was that neither the pols nor the courts give a damn whether TC science is a fraud. And, moving on, I begin to doubt you’ve read much of Feinstein or Luik either. Either that, or you read them with the same kind of angry cherry-picker that the aunts must use, and in that sense, you’ve absorbed the anti-rational style and personality of your (and our) enemies. Please tell me, too (since you know me so well, right down to my ilk) exactly what false premises i’ve swallowed. Seriously. Name them.
Now I suppose you believe that you, of course, are the person who COULD do it right, so please tell us how you’d do it. Exactly. Specifically. In the real world. You can’t just get away with stalking out of the poker game, declaring “I won,” without showing us your hand. If you’re right, we’re reasonable people who share a common goal and put the goal above everything, so most of us would listen with an open mind despite your off-putting and counterproductive combativeness.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, Audrey won the lawsuit against the NY State park ban and has just launched another suit against New York City whose brief is brilliant and flawless and I’d bet will prevail. Of all the people on our side of the battlefield, Audrey seems to have “figured it out.” And as for “heat,” honey, LOL, look up the word “metaphor.” And don’t bristle for too long about that “honey.” I am not now, nor was I before, “sneering” at you. You’re a remarkable researcher but you need to find a better way to catch flies: Honey.
Waltc: You’re completely deluded about the supposed quality of what is passed off as science in that lawsuit. Judge Osteen didn’t address the science, never mind “discredit… the scientific foundation and methodology” of the EPA study. An accusation of “cherry picking” doesn’t address the issue of fraud that needed to be raised, namely that all of the studies, including those the plaintiffs presented, are defective and for the same reason: because they ignore the role of infection. The rest is procedural. But you think that decision is great merely because its rhetoric makes you feel good. Likewise for the CRS report. And citing the toxicology studies merely enshrines them in their wrongful role as the only considerations that matter. On top of that, there’s not the slightest squeak about the real corruption of the EPA, due to collusion between anti-smoking activists and politicians. I wouldn’t bother to use a single one of those studies, nor a single cherry-picked quote from them, because not a single one of them nor the whole lot of them put together addresses the real issue of scientific fraud. Namely, that the anti-smokers deliberately use defective studies to falsely blame smoking for diseases that are really caused by infection, and the mechanism by which this works for them. That this is systematic, and perpetrated in regard to every disease they blame on smoking in the first place, and secondhand smoke secondarily; and furthermore, that it has been conducted for the last three decades by the same politically connected clique of insiders, whose ringleader is now the head of the scientific committee of the FDA committee on tobacco. This is as I’ve been publicly expressing for decades, so your disingenuous pretense that I need to explain it to you as if you’ve never heard of it before is evidence of nothing but your own refusal to listen.
“Please tell me, too (since you know me so well, right down to my ilk) exactly what false premises i’ve swallowed. Seriously. Name them.” You mean, tell you AGAIN, for the umpteenth time: You believe that studies based on lifesyle questionnaires which ignore the role of infection are legitimate science. They are not. Whether they’re anti-smoker studies or not.
You’ve already proven abundantly that you don’t listen, period; and that your mind is closed to anything but junk science. Your faith in that rubbish is what you put above the goal of justice for smokers. And your patronizing crap about using honey is just further proof of your closed-mindedness and arrogance, that I’m expected to butter you up and flatter you and pander to your delusions of adequacy, as if you don’t even realize that the rest of the planet considers you to be on a par with creationists, flat-earthers, and other mental incompetents. Which is just about right, and I’m sick and tired of your incompetence losing my freedom.
Spartans drank their wine alright. And used fires and burned incense like everyone. If tobacco was around, they’d be smoking that as well. And their women wore short dresses showing their thighs, and could have a baby from any Spartan they chose, if he agreed. Which is pretty advanced, and probably had the Spartans enjoying themselves a lot, with each others’ wives.
Greeks (and Romans) weren’t life-denying puritan whiners, they enjoyed their lives.
This post sent me scurrying first over to my website for a look-see and eventually back to my hard drive to search for an old deleted file (circa 2008).
I once concocted a graphic (using MS Paint) with Putin smoking a cigarette collaged in with two different popular Russian brands – Belomar-Kanal and Prima to accompany an article I’d thrown together. There was a caption of sorts that read “Can you spare a Belomar, comrade?” and ‘Command Economy Cigarettes’.
This article, written at the height of the economic meltdown, consisted of my typical sophomoric pablum; defending capitalism against planned economies and joking about Russian cigarettes of which I know diddly squat about. I’d just finished reading an article about how the Russian and French economies with a heavy portion of socialism in the mix had fared relatively well. Bullcrap said I.
I guess it’s one of the articles I jettisoned from the site on grounds of temporal obsolesence because it’s not out there on the net anymore, but it still exists on my computer. I must say the graphic is pretty spot on. The packets of Belomar’s and Prima’s juxtapositioned with a beady eyed Vladimir exhaling a big gray cloud works good. All on a background of commie pinko lavendar.
I think one of the attractions of my website is that of glaring at an auto smashup. How does a grown man manage to continue to write like a teenager?
I should probably worry about some do-gooder going after me for writing about smoking whilst being underage. In most states you’ve got to be 18 years of age to use tobacco.
Anyway, here’s a couple of links mentioning Belomar-Kanals and Prima’s. My top notch research for that article led me to believe they were the top two commie Rusky brands.
Russian Travel Forums – Cigarettes
Whoopsie daisy — here’s the second link.
Russia’s High-Tar Tasters Live and Breathe Cigarettes
I agree completely, Frank. What should the West do about Russia? Nothing, of course. And I love the idea of our market flooded with cheap Russian fags.
Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence: Third Edition
nap.edu
This sorta says it all
These limits generally are based on assessments of health risk and calculations of concentrations that are associated with what the regulators believe to be negligibly small risks. The calculations are made after first identifying the total dose of a chemical that is safe (poses a negligible risk) and then determining the concentration of that chemical in the medium of concern that should not be exceeded if exposed individuals (typically those at the high end of media contact) are not to incur a dose greater than the safe one.
So OSHA standards are what is the guideline for what is acceptable ”SAFE LEVELS”
OSHA SAFE LEVELS
All this is in a small sealed room 9×20 and must occur in ONE HOUR.
For Benzo[a]pyrene, 222,000 cigarettes.
“For Acetone, 118,000 cigarettes.
“Toluene would require 50,000 packs of simultaneously smoldering cigarettes.
Acetaldehyde or Hydrazine, more than 14,000 smokers would need to light up.
“For Hydroquinone, “only” 1250 cigarettes.
For arsenic 2 million 500,000 smokers at one time.
The same number of cigarettes required for the other so called chemicals in shs/ets will have the same outcomes.
So, OSHA finally makes a statement on shs/ets :
Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)…It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded.” -Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Sec’y, OSHA.
Why are their any smoking bans at all they have absolutely no validity to the courts or to science!
Don’t fret over list of cancer ‘risks’
http://www.dispatch.com/…/…r-list-ofcancer-risks.html Link is long dead I wonder why!
“We are being bombarded” with messages about the dangers posed by common things in our lives, yet most exposures “are not at a level that are going to cause cancer,” said Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, the American Cancer Society’s deputy chief medical officer.
Linda Birnbaum agrees. She is a toxicologist who heads the government agency that just declared styrene, an ingredient in fiberglass boats and Styrofoam, a likely cancer risk.
“Let me put your mind at ease right away about Styrofoam,” she said. Levels of styrene that leach from food containers “are hundreds if not thousands of times lower than have occurred in the occupational setting,” where the chemical in vapor form poses a possible risk to workers.
Carcinogens are things that can cause cancer, but that label doesn’t mean that they will or that they pose a risk to anyone exposed to them in any amount at any time.
Now,Im glad to see the ACS admitting to the dose response relationship finally!
So now we understand why the following is factual:
are hundreds if not thousands of times lower than have occurred in the occupational setting,” where the chemical in vapor form poses a possible risk to workers.
Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology, Vol. 14, No. 1. (August 1991), pp. 88-105.
ETS between 10,000- and 100,000-fold less than estimated average MSS-RSP doses for active smokers
http://www.citeulike.org/user/vmarthia/article/7458828
OSHA the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)…It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded
JUST AMAZING ISNT IT
Oh how the Love grows and grows with these Nazis
harleyrider1778 > thinkclearly66 • 10 minutes ago
PROOF PROOF PROOF……….Oh that’s right there is none!
Not 1 Death or Sickness Etiologically Assigned to Tobacco. All the diseases attributed to smoking are also present in non smokers. It means, in other words, that they are multifactorial, that is, the result of the interaction of tens, hundreds, sometimes thousands of factors, either known or suspected contributors – of which smoking can be one.
thinkclearly66 > • 3 minutes ago
again, I hope you die a horrible and painful death from lung cancer from cigarettes just like my mother did. THAT will be your proof. The rest of the world already knows.
harleyrider1778 > thinkclearly66 • 2 minutes ago
Actually they know nothing like Sgt Shultz…………..all they know is what the Furher has told them………
harleyrider1778 > • 2 minutes ago
The Führer thanks you from the grave:
Hitler was a Leftist
Hitler’s Anti-Tobacco Campaign
One particularly vile individual, Karl Astel — upstanding president of Jena University, poisonous anti-Semite, euthanasia fanatic, SS officer, war criminal and tobacco-free Germany enthusiast — liked to walk up to smokers and tear cigarettes from their unsuspecting mouths. (He committed suicide when the war ended, more through disappointment than fear of hanging.) It comes as little surprise to discover that the phrase “passive smoking” (Passivrauchen) was coined not by contemporary American admen, but by Fritz Lickint, the author of the magisterial 1100-page Tabak und Organismus (“Tobacco and the Organism”), which was produced in collaboration with the German AntiTobacco League.
http://www.propublica.org/article/smoking-mad-tobacco-users-caught-up-in-insurers-obamacare-glitch
5 Propaganda Techniques
Propaganda techniques are commonly encountered in commercial advertising but these techniques, or variations of them, are used by political campaigns and nearly every other organization that needs to persuade the public. The five techniques are known as bandwagon, testimonial, transfer, repetition and emotional words.
Bandwagon
The bandwagon technique seeks to convince people that “everyone” is doing something, or likes something and you should too. This method plays on an individual’s need for social acceptance. One example of this is seen in political rallies with large cheering crowds, waving flags and cheering or booing in unison. In advertising it is common. Examples include a 1959 Elvis Presley album titled “50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can’t Be Wrong: Elvis’ Golden Records, Vol. 2” and any TV programs that claims to be “the show America is talking about.”
Testimonial
Testimonials use people to persuade other people of the value or importance of something. This is most frequently done with celebrity endorsements but it is also done with experts or average people. In politics, this can be as simple as having the president or another popular political leader endorse an idea or point of view. In advertising, examples include Jenny Craig having celebrities talk about their diet plans in commercials and any advertisement that uses a doctor or someone dressed as a doctor to say something is healthy.
Transfer
The transfer technique involves using symbolism to give virtues to a product or idea. This is sometimes done with celebrities, such as putting athletes on a Wheaties box or putting Michael Jordan’s name on sneakers. Sometimes placing, for example, an American flag next to a product can convince people that it is somehow patriotic. Products also might be placed in a hospital setting to give the impression that a product is healthy or somehow endorsed by medical workers. This type of propaganda is most frequently found in print advertising
Repetition
Repetition is the most frequently used propaganda and advertising technique. Repetition works under the assumption that the more often people hear something the more likely they are to believe it, even on a subconscious level. In politics this is known as “staying on message.” A politician, during a campaign, speaks to different groups of people every day, but always includes the same handful of points that they wish to make. In advertising, it works basically the same way. An advertiser will attempt to convey the same handful of points about a product in all of their advertising including television, radio, print and digital.
Emotional Words
The emotional words technique uses strong language to attempt to persuade people. This can mean an impassioned speech but relates more often to key words that trigger emotion in people. For example, putting the word “free” in an ad causes it to be looked at more closely even if the product is not free. Putting the word “important” or “urgent” at the top of a page will make people more likely to look at it. In politics this technique is used almost constantly. Referring to an idea as “left wing” or “right wing,” “liberal” or “conservative” automatically triggers certain responses to the idea. Calling a foreign government a “regime” automatically implies certain attributes about that government.
Read more: http://www.ehow.com/info_8464540_5-propaganda-techniques.html#ixzz2wz8vxqyE
Smoking Statistics and Epidemiology
October 31, 2010 TheZAP
Regarding smoking, the most reliable statistics are actually supplied by the Tobacco Companies. The prevalence of smoking in any country is determined by the sales of the products. If the combined sales of tobacco are up from last year to this, then more people are smoking (and the reverse applies also). However, in this little blighted land, the Government was bullied into making tobacco here the most expensive in Europe, so we now import it cheaply and legally ourselves, or we buy the cheap smuggled variety here. So, what is the prevalence of smokers in Ireland? In 2008, the Office of Tobacco Control reported optimistically that 23.5% of the population smoked. In 2010, Eurostat reported that it had risen to 31%. Neither figure includes imports from either source. Customs & Excise conservatively suggest that 10% tobacco consumed here is illegal. There is no register of smokers in Ireland and neither is there a register of drinkers so the best that can be said is, that we consume loads of each.
So, we don’t actually know how many people actually smoke here. And, what about the numbers of people who die from smoking? You’ll have heard people wisely announce that, “the cigarettes killed him”. However, technically, this is false. No Doctor wishing to continue to ply his trade would ever put smoking as the cause of death of any certificate. You see, the Doc knows it’s far more complicated than that. If a smoker dies from a heart attack for example, the Doc knows he cannot isolate smoking from the many many other things that cause heart attacks. This is the difference between multi-factorial conditions (ie. having many possible causes) and Monofactorial (having a single cause). Hell, even old age brings on heart attacks and, believe it or not, the biggest killer in Ireland, according to the CSO, is old age.
So, while there is a database somewhere with a record of all death certs. you won’t find smoking listed among the causes. Now, 29,000 people approx. die from all causes in this Country every year and some sweet charities maintain that 6,000 of those are smokers. Is this based on 6,000 death certs? Like hell it is. It’s a guesstimate and a bad one at that. If 31% of the population smoke, then to reflect this in the deaths, there should be 8,990 smokers dying in any year. If ASH, the IHF and ICS are correct, then smokers are healthier than non-smokers and that can’t be right, can it?
So, we don’t actually know for sure how many people actually smoke here and how many really die here. Of course, if you wait long enough, all the filthy smelly bastards will die of something. But, the problem is, you are constantly being fed with statistics on smoking, so you must ask yourself, where are they getting these percentages and would a fool believe them.
Enter “Epidemiology”, the Science of bullshit. The gullible public when imagining a ‘scientific research project’, visualise diligent clean professionals dressed in white coats, milling around a lab. of some kind, staring intently into a glass beaker full of coloured liquid. In Epidemiology, nothing could be further from the truth. All you need is a telephone and a phonebook to get started. You could ring as little as thirty people, ask them as little as ten loaded questions and you would have all the data you needed to prepare a scientific paper on environment tobacco smoke. That’s not only true, it has been done. The questions you ask are critical, depending on your desired outcome of course. If you want to earn a shed load of dough for your few hours work, then you’d need to be discovering that ETS is deadly. So, you might ask your case subjects things like, “Isn’t it great that you don’t have to put up with filthy smokers blowing their noxious fumes in your face every time you go out”, (make sure the subject is a non-smoker). You’ll get 100% for that question and your finding will be that “people feel far healthier since the introduction of the ban”. The screaming headline in the paper will say, “Scientist finds that Irish people are 134% healthier since the introduction of the ban”. If you are not getting the ‘right result’, change the questions and go back and ask them again. As long as you are getting the right result, you can hop on the gravy train and watch the grants flow in.
Epidemiology is a sort-of-Science and it’s based on statistics. If you ask one hundred people a question and 89 of them say yes, then you can report this as 89% of people agree with whatever horseshit you asked them. That is where the percentages on smoking come from. It’s all epidemiology, no expensive labs with actual scientists are needed. But, Epidemiology is designed for use in Monofactorial circumstances. That is, the study of disease that has one single cause. Any of the diseases associated with smoking have multiple cause, and that includes lung cancer. It gets worse. The first tenant of Epidemiology says that it cannot prove causation. Put in English, an epidemiological study of smoking can never prove that smoking causes cancer. Equally, it can not prove that it doesn’t. Are you confused yet. ?
What is a fact though, is that the ban in this country was decided upon after nine foreign epidemiological studies were examined, three of them cherry-picked as favourable, and then a slew of bullshit statistics on ETS bombarded us. Then, within days, the authors of the lie happily announced that, “The debate is over, ETS kills”. Now, there has never been a single instance of ETS appearing on a death cert. anywhere in the whole world, and yet our cherry picked panel of ASH-ites and their fellow travellers, confidently named it as a killer.
So, our smoking ban is a deceitful and contrived piece of legislation dressed up as a health initiative and many have been fooled by it. Mind you, look at the country today and you could name a whole lot of similar things we have been fooled by.
TheZAP.
http://smokingoutthetruth.com/2010/10/31/smoking-statistics-and-epidemiology/
Campaign to cut children’s smoke exposure
new campaign aims to spare 50,000 children from exposure to harmful second-hand smoke.
The Scottish government initiative urges parents to take their smoking “right outside” homes and cars.
They say current measures being taken by parents who smoke, such as opening windows, are not enough to protect children from harmful chemicals.
Public Health Minister Michael Matheson said all children should get the chance to grow up in a smoke-free environment.
The Scottish government said the campaign helps people understand how smoking pollutes the air and outlines simple steps to make their homes and cars smoke-free.
Research shows 85% of second-hand smoke is invisible and odourless, so many are unaware that smoking indoors – even at an open window or standing at the back door – is not enough to protect children, as harmful chemicals linger and drift around the home.
Health risks
The campaign aims to reduce the proportion of children exposed to second-hand smoke from 12% to 6% by 2020, which equates to 50,000 children.
It is estimated that second-hand smoke causes more than 20,000 cases of lower respiratory infection and at least 20,000 new cases of wheezing and asthma in UK children every year.
Pupils from Royal Mile Primary School helped launch the campaign
It is also thought to be responsible for one in five cot deaths.
In England, the House of Lords has backed a Labour plan to ban smoking in cars carrying children.
Mr Matheson said the campaign was about educating parents on the effects of smoke rather than curtailing their choice to smoke.
He added: “We want to give every child in Scotland the chance to grow-up in a smoke-free environment.
“The reality is that many think they’re already doing enough, without realising that the harmful chemicals from second-hand smoke linger, even when there is no smell and it can’t be seen.
“Because children’s immune systems aren’t fully developed and they breathe quicker than adults, the simple fact is that smoking in the home or car puts children of all ages at risk.”
Air pollution
Dr Sean Semple, of the University of Aberdeen, whose research contributed to the campaign, said: “In the past five years our research group has measured pollution levels in over 100 homes across Scotland.
“Smoking homes have very high concentrations of fine particles that tend to be much higher than the worst pollution on even the busiest roads in Scotland.
“Second-hand smoke also lingers for a long time.
“In more than a fifth of cases it took more than five hours for the second-hand smoke to clear, and during this time the harmful chemicals will move around the house.”
James Cant, Head of British Lung Foundation Scotland, said: “Every parent wants to do the right thing to protect their kids.
“This campaign will give them the tools and information to do just that.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-26732748
The Scottish government initiative urges parents to take their smoking “right outside” homes and cars.
Right on CUE from the anti-smoking playbook TRIGGERS FOR OUTRAGE
As we can all see the END GAME is to first ban car smoking and then follow it up with a ban in the homes,likely using the children for this purpose yet again. Then if they can get their final smoking rates at a certain level tobacco control plans on pushing the government for OUT RIGHT PROHIBITION ON TOBACCO PRODUCTS!
Second Hand/ Third Hand Smoke: Trigger For Outrage –Catalyst For Change?
•Smoke Free Public Places
•Smoke Free Work Places
•Smoke Free Parks/Open Spaces
•Smoke Free Private Transport
•Smoke Free Homes
Positioning Tobacco Endgame In The Post-2015 Development Agenda
UNSustainable Development Goals Or Expanded Millennium Development Goals
Can tobacco control endgame analysis learn anything from …
tobaccocontrolbmj
The thirdhand and second hand smoke MYTHS were created to create public fear and outrage. They are basically telling us that in the above! TRIGGER FOR OUTRAGE!
Smoking causes magic
This is amazing:
SALT LAKE CITY — Betty Lawson sat in her wheelchair, hooked up to oxygen Thursday, and said she wishes she’d never picked up that first cigarette when she was 19.
“It’s a creeping, insidious thing that has you before you know it, and you can’t turn loose,” the Midvale woman said.
Lawson, now 86, quit smoking 20 years later, but she has suffered from a multitude of smoking-related health problems. Her doctors say she would probably live to be 104, if it weren’t for her lungs.
She started smoking at 19 and gave up at 39. She’s had so many smoking related issues since her 20 years of smoking in her youth, that so far she has only made it to 86 and may not live to see 104.
Fuck me!
http://allgoneballs.blogspot.com/2014/03/smoking-causes-magic.html
“Fuck me!”
No way youngster, you are much to ugly and grumpy. :)
She’s had so many smoking related issues since her 20 years of smoking in her youth, that so far she has only made it to 86 and may not live to see 104.
Blimey! 86 and bitching that she might not make it to 104? Tell me it’s a spoof, Harley, please!
Meanwhile, cytomegalovirus has now been implicated in COPD. Finally, after decades of worthless garbage studies based on lifestyle questionnaires, there’s some real science.
http://www.smokershistory.com/COPD.html
And for all those decades, the CMV might have been treatable with valganciclovir. That means the anti-smokers have been standing there, watching people suffer and die needlessly, just like the nazoid doctors who did the Tuskegee experiment, all so they can blame smoking and tyrannize smokers.
It is also thought to be responsible for one in five cot deaths.
So what!!!!
A smoking mother’s chance of having a cot/sids death baby is the same as a non-smoking mother.
In America there are about 2,100 cot deaths/SIDS deaths per year.
1 in 5 would be 420.
There are 4 million births per year and the CDC says that about 20% of those mothers smoke.
That would be 800,000 pregnant smokers and 420 cot/sids deaths.
A smoking mother has a 1 in 1,905 chance of having cot/sids baby.
A smoking mother has a 1,904 out of 1,905 chance of NOT having her baby be a cot/sids death.
That is a 99.95% chance of NOT having her baby be a cot/sids death.
Or you could consider this:
1 in 5 cot deaths is 20%
20% of mothers smoke and their babies account for 20% of cot/sids deaths.
80% of mothers do not smoke and their babies account for 80% of the cot/sids deaths.
That would be 3,200,000 pregnant non-smokers and 1,680 cot/sids deaths.
A non-smoking mother has a 1 in 1,905 chance of having cot/sids baby.
A smoking mother’s chance of having a cot/sids death baby is the same as a non-smoking mother.
It is also thought to be responsible for one in five cot deaths.
That’s typical tobacco control! Ignoring protests and continuing the same lie over and over:
We, at the SIDS Alliance applaud your efforts to bring to the attention of the American public the hazards associated with smoking and smoke exposure; we must, however, object to your organization’s use of misleading data and terminology when linking Sudden Infant Death Syndrome to your cause.
Statistically, passive smoke exposure is a recognized, significant factor for SIDS. To date, no direct causal relationship has been established. In fact, the vast majority of infants born to smoking parents do not die of SIDS. And, since many SIDS deaths occur in a smoke-free environment, we must refrain from making smoke exposure appear to be linked to all SIDS deaths.
The sensational heading for one of your recent Internet reports [07/30] “Smoking Parents Are Killing Their Infants” has gone too far. The fact is, researchers still do not know what causes SIDS. Avoiding known risk factors for SIDS may reduce its incidence for some babies, but offers no guarantee for every baby. Risk factors alone do not cause SIDS. […]
http://tctactics.org/index.php/Sound_Bites
None of these people – not one of them – represents me in any way, shape, or form.
UK or EU politicians represent tobacco control, not the people – put all these politicians into one huge bag, get a barge pole and hit it. You will hurt the guilty one.
And so I’m glad to see them all getting a bit of a bloody nose in Ukraine.
In a way, yes. “Schadenfreude ist die schoenste Freude”.
I reckon that about the best thing Putin could do would be to annul the Russian smoking ban, and start lighting up old Soviet cigarettes, and blowing smoke in the faces of horrified visiting Western bigwigs.
Putin’s secret weapon: smokers. It’s so much cheaper than tanks & bombs!!! The passive smoke will instantly kill all present, the moveable borderline has been contaminated with this even more dangerous third-hand smoke, so any EU soldiers with fall victim as soon as they touch the makeshift, heavily with third-hand smoke contaminated, borderline and die. Then there are those soldiers who see this makeshift barricade border that is contaminated with third hand smoke. They drop dead on just looking.
I do wonder what will happen when Putin cottons on that his country has already been invaded; worse even, the enemy played the same mind games with him as it did with the rest of the world’s politicians. (Well, almost all. I believe, tobacco control has not yet had a chance to visit Kim Jong-un.)
What should the EU do about Russia? The first thing would be to grow politicians that have a backbone instead of a wishbone and have no problem with banning tobacco control et al.
Since we do not have the above, we best start learning Russian. Just in case.
An executive banker was trying to give up cigars when he committed suicide in January, though he obviously had quite a lot of other things on his mind too:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-03-25/deutsche-bank-er-explains-why-he-committed-suicide
Thanks, Roobeedoo!
Unfortunately the possible explanation delivered for these executives cannot explain the number of youngsters choosing fail-safe methods to end their lives.
Jemma’s back for more….
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/jemma-wayne/on-being-called-a-nazi_b_5020758.html?&just_reloaded=1
Hmmm, at least she is bothered about losing prospective customers to her forthcoming book.
One particularly delightful post titled its rant ‘Another Little Nazi’, before noting that since I am Jewish I should know better.
Indeed, the little girl should have known better. She is promoting word-by-word of what my family who lived through these times, Hitler installed.
Lack of historical knowledge = another minus to her publication.
Thing is, I think I do. Know better that is. Having mulled the original article carefully, there’re a couple of phrases I could – and should – have phrased more sensitively. That smoking and not smokers are stupid for example (except for when it comes to smoking, when I maintain they are!).
Here a little try to look better… Completely destroyed in the next sentence:
And that the act of smoking around others (rather than smokers themselves) should be shamed.
Nevertheless, the little girl carries on:
But this was about the worst of it. A mere opinion. About smoking. Hardly on par with the murder of six million Jews.
Right. How many millions of people all over the world would this little girl condemn to misery – and death? (Please refer to the ever growing smokers’ graveyard). Because of her call that “smokers should be shamed” how many OLD people (you know, little girl, the age you were told you’d reach if you fight smoking and smokers) die of loneliness? Their Bingo halls were shut when they did not want to STAND in the rain and wind… But then, you don’t care. You wanna be a serious writer? Well………………
Freedom is of course the absolute cornerstone of our society, of our history, of our liberal culture. It is what makes Britain great and, for the most part, tolerant. It is what allows me to express one opinion, and you to express another, and neither of us go to jail for it. But freedom to should not always trump freedom from.
Freedom and social responsibility have become extinct. Freedom from……. sorry, you as a jew better start thinking about this! Very, very quickly.
All in all, I’m afraid my CHOICE not buy any of what’s-it’s-name-wanna-be publications has just been confirmed.
Jemma is a Nazi because she believes in the totalitarian ideology that the people are the property of the state. Plus, she believes in the Nazis’ pseudo-science of lifestyle questionnaires that ignore the role of infection. The Nazis could hide behind the excuse of ignorance because people didn’t know any better back then, but her ilk CANNOT. And she pretends that her critics are trivializing Nazism by likening her to them, when she’s the one who’s trivializing it by pretending that the only thing wrong with Nazism is that they killed the Jews. (Never mind the other people.) As if she’s saying that it would have been a wonderful system if only the Jews hadn’t been excluded from their party. As if nobody else, such as smokers, has any reason to hate the Nazis. As if nobody else has any right to criticize the Nazis because the Jews own the rights to them. The bottom line is that what the Establishment has been shoving down our throats is the essence of Nazism, while they make a big show out of abhorring the superficial trappings of it.
You should try the REAL Hercegovina Flor. Hand cut hair thin tobacco strings. No additives !