New Labour isn’t the villain

<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Spiked magazine&rsquo;s recent round-up piece on the reactions to smoking bans in various cities of the world yielded some great one-liners from disgruntled citizens, like the one quoted above. But very disappointingly, Spiked missed the opportunity to put the issue into a wider political perspective for its readers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>

A Message to Smokers

<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">It&rsquo;is a matter of TRUST, is it not?… This piece by Joe Jackson is our recommended reading today, and it was written in occasion of the onset of the British smoking ban, a very sad day for </span><st1:country-region><st1:place><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">England</span></st1:place></st1:country-region><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">.</span></p>

When epidemiology becomes poetry

<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">As we know, junk science epidemiology was the excuse needed to justify hatred against the Jews in Nazi Germany. Once hatred was ignited, it went on by itself, and junk science became irrelevant. By the same token, now that hatred <span style="">&nbsp;</span>has been ignited against the smoker, the junk science becomes secondary: &ldquo;the debate is over&rdquo; &ndash; that is, hatred takes over.</span></p>

When epidemiology becomes hatred

<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Hyper-passive smoke bad for children. It&rsquo;s incredible what you can do with a criminal mind and a questionnaire. </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">We &ldquo;all&rdquo; know that &ldquo;smoking is bad for you&rdquo;. So is second hand&hellip; and third hand too!</span></p>

Georgia: smoking is the popular choice

<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Two years after the state-wide smoking ban Georgians seem to have &ldquo;accepted&rdquo; prohibition as &ldquo;normal&rdquo;, the press no longer talks about it, as no smoking is the new &ldquo;standard&rdquo; of perversion. Is it really?<o:p></o:p></span></p>

His advisers worked for PM, he must be evil

<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Fred Thompson is a presidential Republican candidate. His staffers and advisers <em style="">&ldquo;have worked on behalf of Philip Morris, one of the world’s leading tobacco conglomerates and a leading force in promoting cigarette smoking.&rdquo;</em> <span style="">&nbsp;</span><strong style="">Oh, my God, can you <em style="">believe</em> that?…</strong> </span></p>

Monarch definitely not irrelevant

<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">At 81 years of age, Queen Elizabeth no doubt remembers the horrors of the Nazi bombing attacks on her beloved homeland and most certainly lost many friends and relatives who paid the ultimate price fighting to preserve freedom and a way of life for a proud people. <o:p></o:p></span></p>

Zero exposure is absolute health

<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Another holy grail of the healthist ideology is that zero exposure is the only way to guarantee 100% health &ndash; another way to express the belief that if we eliminate ALL the causes of disease and death, death and disease will not take place.</span></p>

The march of anti-science

<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">The faith in questionnaire-based junk science continues unabashedly, as it is profitable. The </span><st1:place><st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">French</span></st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;"> </span><st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">National</span></st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;"> </span><st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Research</span></st1:placename><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;"> </span><st1:placetype><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;">Center</span></st1:placetype></st1:place><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;"> for Environment and Health states that particulate matters from traffic is the cause of low birth weight.</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 8pt; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></p>