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In 2012 eCigarettes Are Under Attack, and I am a reformed political junkie that can no longer ignore the politics of all this. Watching the 2008 campaign gave me a horrid look at how the whole democracy “sausage” is made. Let me tell you, it’s sickening. As far as our freedom to vape, I’ve had enough.
Have you ever met a politician who’s #1 concern wasn’t his or hers reelection? One who hadn’t sold out the second D.C. was his or her new workplace? They all suck. They are all liars. And they are the epitome of the perfect “necessary evil”.
For all the trillions of dollars that are spent every year on pet projects and other wasteful and stupid ideas these assclowns make up to give them some excuses to run for reelection, the country continues on its long, slow, decline. Only now, the slow decline is picking up pace.
Due mainly because our government has decided that “Team Democrat” and “Team Republican” are all that matters. Well, that and how many people where the colors of their team. Makes me sick to my stomach to think human beings can be so easily manipulated. That definitely includes me, no one was worse than me in my “Team” t-shirt, looking for new ways to destroy the other side.
So, I don’t talk politics anymore. I don’t pay much attention to the political news. I know what’s going on in the world, and I know all the horrible details of our current election, but it takes only seconds for the nausea to set in. Especially when it comes to our huge loss of freedoms that seem to be accelerating every day.
I won’t bore you to death by counting off the freedoms we’ve given up over the past 12 years, or how fast our losses of freedom have been these past 4 years… You don’t need me to tell you things suck. But there is one thing that is happening to each of us that I can no longer keep quiet about.
Personal Freedom is Under Attack
When every person in this country that talks about the loss of freedoms currently plaguing our country there is another person that argues against it. We are a split society, right down the middle, the teams are evenly divided and it’s exactly how the politicians like it.
The freedoms that half the country is mourning are our “personal freedoms”. You know, the freedom to have health insurance, or not. The freedom to smoke in our own home, or not. Everyday, whether its new dog laws or new health laws, or new diet laws, whatever, its become crystal clear that the people in power believe, believe to the core of their very souls, that it is THEY who know what we should be doing with our lives, not us.
Government, both federal and state, want to control what we eat, what we drive, what we wear, and what we do with our extra money (pay more in taxes for one thing), and even which hobbies we partake in. To them we are idiot simpletons who cannot care for ourselves. And if we do not do something about it we’re lost to the void.
Personal freedoms are under attack by democrats and republicans alike. Liberal or conservative, they know better than we do. It must stop.
Under Attack by Banning eCigarettes
Towns, cities, states, even countries, have decided that eCigarettes, an activity no more harmful than drinking coffee, should be banned. Now, the evidence for banning eCigs is nowhere to be found, but that doesn’t matter. “It looks too much like smoking”, they say.
I had heard rumblings about banning eCigarettes in towns and cities over the past year and each time I heard something I just shook my head and wondered where it will all end. But this time, something snapped in me and I knew that I couldn’t just shut up and look the other way.
What I thought would be a limited act of sheer “dumbness”, by some tiny town counsel or selectman, is instead a snowball rolling down hill. Soon, buying or selling of eCigs will be against the law everywhere. It’s going to be the next cause célèbre.
Unless We Stop it in its Tracks…
Read of the excerpts from an article that was published 2 days ago in Massachusetts, in the Patriot Ledger, a newspaper that serves the town of Cohasset.
“It’s a new-make tobacco product,” Cohasset health inspector Tara Tradd said of e-cigarettes.
Nineteen cities and towns in the state, including Boston, have adopted the ban by inserting e-cigarettes into their respective anti-smoking laws.
Many critics of e-cigarettes also claim the devices can lead non-smokers, including children, to smoke traditional cigarettes.
Under Attack Everywhere
But all is NOT lost in Cohasset. You see, these new laws were suggested by the town’s Board of Health and so far the town’s selectman and advisory board are unanimously opposed to these restrictions or bans.
It’s not Cohasset we’re worried about, it’s the disturbing news that 19 towns in Massachusetts have already passed similar bans based on NO science and NO evidence, but rather based on the fact that the town’s power base think they know better than its citizens.
And because the eCigarette looks like a cigarette and contains nicotine, they simply put the electronic cigarette under the same classification of tobacco cigarettes.
Yet, those same towns, all 19 of them, allow the sale of alcohol. They sell coffee laced with caffeine, and they even allow children to buy coffee from Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts.
However, because eCigarettes look like smoking, and because Big Tobacco isn’t involved (meaning no deep pockets for lawyers) making such bans are relatively easy for those towns run by progressives who believe people are children and cannot care for themselves.
Look, the problem here is we are under attack on our “personal freedoms”. Town, city, state or even the Feds should have NO say in what we do with our bodies. If any activity we choose to partake in causes NO harm to anyone else then politicians should keep their collective noses out of it. We “should” be free to live however we want, as long as we’re adults and as long as we don’t hurt anyone else.
Why are we sitting down and letting this happen?
I’m not saying that minors should have access to alcohol, cigarettes, or anything else. It’s not about minors; it’s about freedom of choice for adults. And we had better step up, and step up soon.
In the coming weeks I will be attempting to jab a cattle prod into the sides of eCigarette users and eCigarette makers so that we get the chance to fight back before it’s too late. Do they even know we are under attack? eCigarette companies need to band together, form a real lobby, and get those lobbyists to Washington and begin fighting for the cause.
As far as I know, the current organization(s) out there have been completely ineffectual at protecting the right of eCigarette companies or their customers. It’s time for a real lobbyist.
I FIRMLY believe that eCigarettes are 100 times safer than tobacco cigarettes. If any ingredient had sounded an alarm to any doctor or any scientist it would have happened by now. Doctors are not worried about eCigarettes, on the whole anyway. My own doctor doesn’t see anything to worry about.
The invention of eCigarettes should be celebrated, not shunned. The electronic cigarette is saving millions of lives, not destroying them.
People are choosing to stop smoking and begin vaping, and that’s a damned good thing. Companies that make quality eCigarettes should be extremely proud of what they are doing, the lives they are saving, the contributions that they are making to the bottom line of the economy and the health of our fellow citizens. eCigarettes are a “good” thing, not a bad thing.
eCigarette companies should not have to stand up against the politicians, but they will have to, if they want to survive.
WE, you and I, need to get the message out that vaping is NOT smoking. We need to tell people around us that smoke juice contains a handful of harmless ingredients (except nicotine, which is as harmful as caffeine), not 4000 carcinogens.
We need to help educate those over-reactive do-gooders and show them that they need to turn their attention elsewhere, maybe join PETA, whatever, but there is nothing to see here, move along…
eCigarettes are just the latest enemy of those that think they know what’s best. Despite being early in the overall history of the eCigarette, we need to act now so that the battle is not joined later when there is so much more to lose.
Self-Regulation
This is not to say that the eCigarette leaders do not have a job to do. The bigger, quality companies, need to self-regulate and “mutually-regulate” so that the quality of the product remains high, that cheap, risk-taking sharks are not allowed in the pool, and that the safety of their customers remain their first and last concern.
The big guys have a major role to play in making sure the anti-eCig powers have little to no excuses to cause trouble.The electronic cigarette marketplace should welcome new players, new information, new science, but first and foremost, they must make sure that only the highest quality standards are met and kept. The freedom to choose depends on it.
John Manzione
More Columns by John:
E-Cigarette Crossroads – Opinion by John Manzione
What’s John Vaping? 3 Great eLiquid Flavors!
