Tobacco.org

BURKE: More designated smoking areas needed on campus 

UNCIANO: The power to tax is not the power to destroy 

• ARMSTRONG: The Tobacco Wars, Continued  

But a campaign funded by tobacco companies is spending millions on ads to mislead Californians about this life-saving initiative. Why? Prop 29 will add $1 to the cost of every pack of cigarettes sold in California, a state that currently ranks 33rd in the nation on the tobacco tax scale. So great is the power of the lobbyists and so deep are the campaign coffers that every bill or ballot initiative seeking to raise the cost of tobacco has been defeated since the last successful hike in 1988. Even though only 12 percent of Californians smoke. . . .

I also support Prop 29 because I resent the tobacco industry’s ability to influence public policy in their favor – to the detriment of Californians and their state economy – over and over again. . . .

we believe that California voters will see through the tobacco industry interference being doled out in 30-second increments on their televisions day and night between now and June 5th.

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MAYER: Need your YES vote on deceptive Proposition 29 

• Why is tobacco control still a problem in Europe? 

Tobacco control in the EU is at a crossroads. Ideally, politicians and civil servants will clearly delineate and make transparent all contacts with the tobacco industry and those in their pay, as per Article 5.3 in the FCTC. We also call on European governments and the EU to take a more robust stance and legislate more effectively to protect European citizens. The first test of the EC’s willingness to do so will be the revision of the Tobacco Products Directive. We await the outcome of that process.

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ENGEL: Where there's smoke ... 

O'REILLY: Cigarettes: I'm giving up my first love... at 30  

Looking back at all those movie and music stars, only a few have survived (I would never have put money on Keith Richards being one.) The ones still walking the earth -- their faces are maps of excess, of fragility; their bodies weathered and beaten.

So, on my 30th birthday, our 16th anniversary, rather than celebratory inhalations of smoke and the draw of heat at my fingertips, it is a funeral I give to you, my love.

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Antismoking people sometimes make interesting choices 

CODY: Secondhand Smoke Filters Through Apartment Buildings 

I happened to mention recently that smoking in France really affects apartment buildings, especially since so many are above restaurants and cafes . . .

Last year we had a beautiful home built in the 1600s in the heart of an ancient harbor town. Naturally we flung all the windows open every to watch the water, the people and to breathe in the delicious scents of bakeries, outdoor food markets, cafes.

But unfortunately, what permeated our senses the most was the cigarette smoke -- so much so that we had to keep the windows on the second floor closed for half the day, as it filtered in so badly that even our kids made comments.

While people have the right to smoke, it made me wonder about how people living in these kinds of apartments deal with this all the time.

Do they care? Do they even notice?

It turns out that they do -- a lot, especially in the United States

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Vicky Crichton: Plain packaging will help make smoking less cool 

Cancer Research UK statistics released last week showed more than 4,000 people died of lung cancer in Scotland in 2010. . . .

A report, which is being released by Cancer Research UK today, refers to documents from the tobacco industry that show that packaging has indeed been developed to appeal to new smokers, through size, colour and design. This is significant when you consider that eight out of ten smokers start before the age of 19.

Plain packaging would strip all branding from cigarette packs, leaving all tobacco packs looking the same. Unbranding cigarette packets won’t stop everyone from smoking but it will give millions of children one less reason to start.

To support our campaign to end the packet racket and sign our petition, visit www.theanswerisplain.org.

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HOWARD: Fort Worth's hiring policies shouldn't change to ban smokers  

When smoking was ‘in’  

The American Tobacco Company was the largest and most powerful tobacco company until the early 1900s. Several companies were making cigarettes by the early 1900s. In 1902 Philip Morris company came out with its Marlboro brand.

They were selling their cigarettes mainly to men. Everything changed during World War I (1914-18) and World War II (1939-45). Soldiers overseas were given free cigarettes every day. At home production increased and cigarettes were being marketed to women too. More than any other war, World War II brought more independence for women. Many of them went to work and started smoking for the first time while their husbands were away. . . .

When moving to Marshall with our young family, I would entertain my women friends at our home in the afternoons for coffee and cookies. In those days we served coffee in a cup and saucer. Most of my women friends smoked. My 4-year-old daughter would go around to each of my friends, as they drank their coffee and smoked, and tell them: "Please don't leave your cigarette stubs in the saucer, because my little sister eats them." . . .

In the early 1980s my father, who was an avid cigar and cigarette smoker as well as chewing tobacco, heeded the surgeon general's warnings about tobacco, and challenged my two brothers and my husband to quite tobacco use along with him. They all met that challenge, for which our family was really proud.

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Jim Kershner's this day in history  

From our archives, 100 years ago

J.B. Lister of Spokane wrote a letter to the editor complaining about an issue that today we would call “secondhand smoke.”

But in 1912, Lister called it the “ungentlemanly habit” of making “your fellow take your smoke.”

“At different times, I have seen men at table in a high-class grill light a cigar or cigarette and puff the smoke all across the table and make others take it in, or get up and leave,” wrote the indignant Lister. . .

Lister might have been gratified to know that the smoking-in-restaurants issue was eventually addressed. But he might have cussed when he found out it took almost a century.

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KRAMER: Up in Smoke 

Of all the vices I have overindulged in, smoking is the only one I will admit has an addictive spell over me. Only cigarettes — or the lack of them — have changed my personality and taken my body and mind out of my own control. When I was younger and tried to quit, I had horrible physical responses to the nicotine deprivation. Tunnel vision, anxiety attacks, general numbness would take over my body. My wife would often tell me to go out and start smoking again, as she couldn’t bear to watch me fall to pieces.

Since then, quitting has been a constant project with me. I quit all the time. But often, when I am overwhelmed with work, I find it almost impossible to not light up. I know, I know… It’s an excuse. But when I am filled with anxiety I simply find it so much easier to feed the beast. Trying not to smoke takes way too much effort. Of all the vices I have overindulged in, smoking is the only one I will admit has an addictive spell over me. Only cigarettes — or the lack of them — have changed my personality and taken my body and mind out of my own control. When I was younger and tried to quit, I had horrible physical responses to the nicotine deprivation. Tunnel vision, anxiety attacks, general numbness would take over my body. My wife would often tell me to go out and start smoking again, as she couldn’t bear to watch me fall to pieces. . . .

But of course my doctor was concerned about my smoking and wanted to help. He told me about an antidepressant (Bupropion) that had an interesting side effect: it seemed to make cigarettes totally unpalatable. . . .

I found an old pack of cigarettes lying around and I decided to have one to see if it would be as disgusting as the last. It was not.

The cigarette tasted just as good as all the others I’d had before taking the drugs. I laughed out loud to myself and thought, “No wonder I wanted to kill myself. I wasn’t smoking!”

I had my sense of humor back. All was right again with the world. I could live with my anxiety, as long as I had my vices to help me through.

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• HUBER: Tobacco from all nations excluded in trade pact 

At issue * April 2 commentary by Sen. Paul Hornback and Rep. Wilson Stone, "Plans to exclude tobacco from trade pact unfair to state."

The commentary that objected to the Herald-Leader's editorial board's support of the proposed carveout of tobacco from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, known as TPPA, contained misleading information that requires clarification.

Contrary to the implication in the commentary, a tobacco carveout would not apply exclusively to U.S. tobacco, let alone Kentucky tobacco.

TPPA removes tariffs and trade barriers that operate among the partnering countries. A tobacco carveout would apply equally to all tobacco within the TPPA free-trade zone. Removing tobacco from the agreement will not disadvantage U.S. or Kentucky tobacco relative to exports from other countries. It will simply leave tobacco products from all countries in the same competitive position they are in today.

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