Just tobacco right?

It ends there right?

It won't morph into restrictions on alcohol (of course not), or unpatented non-petrochemical (natural) drugs or treatments?

How about overeating? Or not exercising....?

Upon the premise of 'taking care of us' THEY decide right? I am not impressed by the logic. smokers pay a very high tax on their choice of consumption already, but certainly, it would be 'better' to prohibit the choice, right?

Legislation like this will mark the end of personal sovereignty in future history.

It's a shame really.



[edit on 26-6-2009 by Maxmars]

Dr. Jeffrey E. Harris MD. Phd Said in his presentation to the U.S. House of Representatives..

From my review of past and ongoing research, I estimate that cigarette smoking accounts for 8 percent of all health- care spending in the United States

-E-

I think that makes sense. Smoking is a careless risk towards your health. They limit drinking and driving because it causes injuries, underage drinking because of health problems, they tax soda in some places, and they make other things that are bad for your health like some drugs illegal.

But that's just me. I don't like smoke. I don't know why it's legal to smoke. It shouldn't be, along with tanning, and swimming in pools of radiation. Things that cause cancer in large amounts just shouldn't exist.

Actually, the cost of Healthcare that Tobacco cause to American Tax Payers is a total ruse. I'm not saying that Tobacco doesn't generate a financial burden, but it is chump change compared to what is really going on.

What the fact of the matter is, in regards to this legislation that Obama signed into law, that this is Economic Protectionism hidden under the guise of Health interests.

What this law effectively does is allows the FDA to discriminate Tobacco products not on the merits of their health risk, but on the merits of their point of origin, without violating Trade Treaties.

The fastest growing section of the Tobacco Sales in the United States is Kreteks (Clove Cigarettes). In the past decade Kreteks have gone from .9% to 9% of all Tobacco Sales in the US. Current trends show that this growth-rate is only going to accelerate. Kreteks have been shown by the CDC to have no greater health risk than any other Tobacco product (and actually a 15 year long study by the CDC on Indonesians who smoked in excess of 1 pack of Kreteks a day showed no instances of elevated health risk over not smoking!) As all Kreteks are imported from Indonesia and there are currently no US Manufacturers that produce Kreteks, this is a significant financial threat to the US Tobacco Industry. And this is just the largest segment that poses a threat. All of the Tobacco products that are flavored come from North Africa, the Near East, Russia or SE Asia, not from the US. These are the products that have been explicitly banned under this new legislation. Without invoking a Trade Embargo against these Countries, which would cause an International Incident and cause a Trade Embargo of US Tobacco Exports in retaliation, this law was contrived to have the same results without affecting our ability to Export Tobacco products.

Thus, only US Tobacco products can now be bought and sold in the US...although US Tobacco products can still be Exported to other nations.

Also, States annually receive a portion of profits from the US Tobacco Industry as terms of a Class Action Lawsuit. Foreign Tobacco Companies that have their products imported into the US do not have to pay the States a part of their profits. Thus, it is in the cash-strapped States better interests to eliminate all foreign competition as that will make their profit-sharing in the US Tobacco Industry's sales go up!

Remember the old Axiom of "If you want to find the real reason behind something, just follow the money!"

I can honestly say, good job Obama (although he smokes as well). And start taxing even harder on the cancer sticks. In some states its illegal to smoke in a car with children,smoke in restaurants/schools. When are people going to realize that smoking is no longer the "fad".

500k+ die a year from smoking related problems. A minority of those people never touched a cig in their life,but received second hand smoke.
I just watched my grandmother choke on her own Bile and die from a miserable 20+ years of fighting cancer that was related to her smoking habit.

Why dont smokers just go grab a loaded gun,take off the safety, and just end their existance. Smokers are "sheeple", because even though the warning signs are there, even on the side of the damn boxes, some people continue to smoke them and give money to the USA's filthy gov.

Now everyone has their reasons on why the smoke, but WHAT IF, just WHAT IF, you wake up one day to find out that your child has lung cancer and that it was tobacco related. If you think about it, the smoking laws have not been around that long. There is probably plenty of people out there that have not smoked anything in their lives walking around with cancer because of second hand and they just dont know it yet.




Sorry I just have to rant when people start talking about cigs, because ive lost so many close to me because of them.

Originally posted by ravenshadow13
But that's just me. I don't like smoke. I don't know why it's legal to smoke. It shouldn't be, along with tanning, and swimming in pools of radiation. Things that cause cancer in large amounts just shouldn't exist.

Like self-righteous, authoritarians who can't see past the ends of their own noses? When is it your turn? Get in line with an attitude like that. People wanting their chance to lay down decrees for everyone else are the real cancer.

What do you like? I'll lead a campaign to ban it just because.

When I think of every thing our ancestors have been through to conserve our freedom and civil liberties.........

I find it both shocking and appalling at how quickly some people are willing to hand them over.

[edit on 26-6-2009 by ladyinwaiting]

Originally posted by MysterEI think your reasoning is good, other then the fact that the govt. isn't in the business of selling tobacco. Now, state govt's do benefit as you stated by the additional tax, but I don't think this legislation was specifically aimed at that. The timing is too coincidental with the health care legislation on the table. You said "follow the money", and as I said earlier, the govt. ins't directly in the tobacco business, but they soon will be in the health care business.

On the contrary. Tobacco is the 2nd largest revenue source for the US Treasury, exceeded only by Excise Taxes on Gasoline. The Federal government receives revenue from Tobacco not only from Federal Taxes on Sales, but also Federal Excise Taxes on Imports, Federal Taxes on US Tobacco Industry Revenue, and Federal Taxes on US Tobacco Industry Employee Wages.

The CDC calculates the estimate cost of smoking in the US to come out to $96 Billion/yr in Health Care (which is not yet a liability to the Federal Government, but will be if we adopt Socialized Healthcare) and $97 billion/yr in lost productivity (read potential lost Taxes on Wages due to decreased life-span). Only 22 billion packs of cigarettes are sold domestically in the US, so this comes out to be $3.45/pack in potential Health Care cost and $3.73/pack in potential lost productivity, which we tax $2.92/pack directly, coming out to a seeming loss of a potential $4.16/pack to the Federal Government (again, this is a hypothetical loss assuming fully Socialized Healthcare). Yet when you include all the other Taxable Revenue sources attributed to the growing, manufacturing, and distribution of that pack of cigarettes, the US Treasury still receives a Net Gain of $0.32 per pack of cigarettes sold in the United States (or $7.04 billion dollars annually) under this estimate. This also does not include the consideration of Tax Revenue from raw Tobacco or Exports.

On top of this, the US Tobacco companies pay the States $24.6 billion/yr in Settlements (having paid $203.5 billion in the past 10 year since the DMA).

Still, this is chump change.

Now, let's get to the big bucks of where the US profits from this new Tobacco Law...

We export 191 Metric Tons of raw Tobacco a year. We import 241 Metric Tons of raw Tobacco a year, giving us a Net Import of 50 Metric Tons.

We export 170 billion pounds of cigarettes a year but import 200 billion pounds of cigarettes a year, giving us a Net Import of 30 billion lbs.

By effectively banning Imports (by using the FDA instead of Trade Embargo) we have turned this into a Net Import of -191 Metric Tons of raw Tobacco and -170 billion pounds of cigarettes a year, all of which means higher Capital Gains for the entire Tobacco Industry in the United States. This means the Tobacco Industry in the United States will now have to produce 432 Metric Tons of raw Tobacco a year, and and ramp up to producing 370 billion pounds of cigarettes a year to make up for this difference in Net Import. This effectively more than doubling the US Treasury's Revenue, making Tobacco now the number one revenue source for the US Treasury. It also means that a huge amount of US jobs are created to help assist in this more than 100%+ increase in US Tobacco production.

Name me any other industry that can turn a 100%+ increase in Revenue and Taxes!

The US Car Industry and Wall Street combined don't equal the amount of Revenue that the US Tobacco Industry represents to the US Treasury!

You can consider this Legislation to be the US Tobacco Industry's Bail Out, the only difference is that it is making both the US Tobacco Industry and the US Treasury fat off the deal, at the expense of foreign Tobacco Industries and US Consumers.

Of course, this will only last until the WTO rules on this, as Indonesian Kretek Manufacturers have already asked for Economic & Trade Sanctions against the U.S. Still, the US Treasury and US Tobacco will profit greatly off of this scheme for a couple of years until then, and hopefully by then the US Economy will have recovered enough to handle things going back to the way they were prior to this law.

[edit on 26-6-2009 by fraterormus]

Originally posted by EnlightenUp
Like self-righteous, authoritarians who can't see past the ends of their own noses? When is it your turn? Get in line with an attitude like that. People wanting their chance to lay down decrees for everyone else are the real cancer.

What do you like? I'll lead a campaign to ban it just because.

Well said!

I think that a large problem is date rape. I think all women should be required to wear burkas and have a male relative escort them at all times.

Another problem is religion - we all heard about those wackos that attack abortion clinics - ban them!

An what about the number one killer of all: obesity? Obviously, if we were only allowed to eat moderate amounts of tofu and broccoli then we wouldn't have this problem!

The list goes on and on...

To paraphrase Hans Gruber: "Sooner or later, I will get to something you do care about"

If we continue to ban everything that is unhealthy, unsafe or has a potential for abuse then we will all end up in climate controlled, rubber rooms with nutrition dispensers and treadmills. That doesn't sound like being a free human being to me - it sounds like being a hamster.

Alot of you the posts here make excellent points, but I believe the timing of the passage of the tobacco legislation gives away the govt's intentions. Health care is President Obama's main goal, and will be his legacy. The current cost of health care is not sustainable by the govt. Hence, reduce one of the leading factors of expensive care. If the bill was about taxes, or import/export, it would have been done a long time ago. I have no doubt that all the great reasons here play a role, but what I am saying is that the timing of this legislation coinsides perfectly with socialized heatlh care.

President Obama will get his health care, and IT WILL COST SOME OF US CERTIAN FREEDOMS.

Forbes top 9 most expensive desieses
1. Heart Conditions - 68 Billion
2. Trauma - 56 Billion
3. Cancer - 48 Billion
4. Mental Illness - 48 Billion
5. Respiratory Ailments - 45 Billion
6. Hypertension - 32.5 Billion
7. Arthritis And Joint Disorders - 32 Billion
8. Diabetes - 28 Billion
9. Back Problems - 23 Billion

From my OP

Smoking causes complex diseases like, stomach ulcers, heart attack, cancer (in particular lung cancer) as well as chronic obstruction in airway

As you can see smoking causes some of the most expensive health care issues, and President Obama is very aware of that.

-E-


[edit on 26-6-2009 by MysterE]

Originally posted by MysterE
The real reason President Obama let FDA regulate tobacco products is simple. Smokers cost too much!

I don't think Obama and the government are worried about spending at this point. We're so in the hole, I'm sure adding a trillion to the national debt will be like throwing a penny in a fountain.

I don't question that the data is right, just how it is being interpreted.

It seems to me that the most expensive medical conditions used to be psychiatric and long term care that required long term inpatient hospitalization.

Has that CHANGED? I seriously doubt it.

My mother died at 62 as a result, no doubt, of long term smoking. She had a nasty habit but it was HER habit and she didn't want to give it up. Death came rather quickly once lung cancer was found.

My grandmother lived into her 90s and was on social security from the time she was 62. She lived in state funded housing and was frequently sick - with at least 10 major hospitalizations and surgeries throughout the years - culminating in a stroke that put her in the nursing home for 2 years before her death.

You know, if I had to bet on it, my grandmother who walked every day and tried to do whatever the doctors TOLD her to do - I bet...if you looked at what she cost the govt, it was many, many more times that of my mom.