Strong charge in that headline, no? Boy. I better get busy justifying it. Or not. See, the Post-Gazette has set the bar so low in making such charges that I feel comfortable just saying it. Like the editorial board does.
The latest unjustified diatribe comes--surprise!--in yet another editorial supporting a smoking ban:
The legislators need to stop kissing the feet of these businessmen and tobacco lobbyists and focus on two points made by the surgeon general.
Kissing the feet? Look. There are hundreds of legislators who currently oppose the ban. And this editorial indicates the each and every one of them is worshiping at the altar of special interests and Big Money. According to this rubbish, not a single one of these elected officials is opposed to the ban on the grounds of property rights, concerns about individual autonomy or any other reason. Nope. They are all greedy, dishonest hacks. Or stupid.
Well that's crap. Especially since the paper can be accused of the same sin. Seriously. I hereby challenge the editorial board: Did a single member actually read the recent Surgeon General's report on which the editorial was based? Not the executive summary. I am talking about the report. You know the one. It's about secondhand smoke. According to the Post-Gazette, this report proves a whole bunch of stuff once and for all. Things like (according to the Post-Gazette): "Even brief exposures can place nonsmokers at risk."
Because one supporter of smoking bans did read it. And he thinks that claim is a big load of crap. Keep in mind that this is not some dude with a journalism degree masquerading as a public health official. He is a medical doctor who has worked to restrict tobacco for the past 20 years. A guy who holds a serious position at Boston University:
In fact, such a conclusion flies in the face of common medical sense. How could it possibly be that a brief exposure to secondhand smoke can cause heart disease? It takes many years for heart disease to develop. It takes years of exposure to tobacco smoke even for a smoker to develop heart disease. I estimate that it takes at least 25 years of exposure (based on the fact that very few smokers are diagnosed with heart disease before age 40).
So how could it possibly be that for an active smoker, heart disease takes 25 years of exposure to tobacco smoke to develop, but for a passive smoker, it only takes a single, transient, brief exposure?
It is also quite misleading to tell the public that a brief exposure to secondhand smoke increases the risk of lung cancer. There is certainly no evidence for this and the Surgeon General's report itself draws no such conclusion. In fact, the report makes it clear that most of the studies linking secondhand smoke and lung cancer studied nonsmokers with many years of intense exposure.
Re-read the beginning of that last paragraph: "It is quite misleading to tell the public that a brief exposure to second-hand smoke increases the risk of lung cancer."
Now go back to the Post-Gazette editorial:
Even brief exposures can place nonsmokers at risk.
Weird.
But how could a report from the Surgeon General's office be wrong? Don't get me started. But in this case there is an interesting development. According to the anti-smoking activist I linked to above, the report DOESN'T say that. Only the executive summary. Turns out that the official has spun the report to his own liking. Hello? Is second-hand smoke the new WMD? According to the anti-smoking doctor:
The rest of the story is that the Surgeon General's press release distorts the science presented in the report and ends up presenting misleading and inaccurate information to the public.
The press release claims that a significant finding of the Surgeon General's report is that: "Even brief exposure to secondhand smoke has immediate adverse effects on the cardiovascular system and increases risk for heart disease and lung cancer."
To re-phrase this for clarity, the Surgeon General is publicly claiming that brief exposure to secondhand smoke increases risk for heart disease and lung cancer.
But there is absolutely no evidence to support this claim. Certainly, no evidence is presented in the Surgeon General's report to support this claim. And certainly, the Surgeon General's report draws no such conclusion.
The Post-Gazette's editorial has a helpful link to the report. Perhaps the people who wrote the editorial might want to click on it and read it with a critical eye before accusing hundreds of elected officials--and everyone else opposed to the ban--of being corrupt or stupid.
If lawmakers opposed to the ban are kissing the feet of tobacco lobbyists, what body part do the editors of the Post-Gazette have their lips attached to? Because I think someone is blowing smoke out of it.
Maybe that sounds harsh. But people who live in smoke-free glass houses shouldn't prattle on about people "kissing feet."
That is dishonest, misleading nonsense and the paper ought to be ashamed.
(Thanks to Hit and Run for the link to Dr. Michael Siegel's site.)
Smoking bans are happening all over the country for obvious, rational reasons. This constant bashing of the PG is just silly. Once this generation of smokers has passed, people will look back at the ridiculous environment that we once lived in. In the meantime, the rest of us already see how ridiculous it is.
Posted by: JoeP | June 30, 2006 at 06:11 AM
Joe,
I agree with you. A generation from now people will look back and be aghast at the number of people who smoke. We are already doing that with regard to the number of people who USED to smoke.
But how that translates into a justification for using the government's monopoly on violence to force people to comply is beyond me.
And how that translates into a justification for slandering everyone who opposes a ban as a tool of Big Tobacco is beyond me.
Fine. You don't like smoking. Don't smoke. And don't patronize businesses that allow smoking. Hey. I don't smoke, either. Great. 20 years from now we can meet up in just about any bar in the country to enjoy a smoke-free beer.
Why does that have to be tomorrow? Doesn't that set a bad precedent? And doesn't it set a bad precedent for political discourse when the Surgeon General can misuse his own agency's report? And doesn't it set a bad precedent for journalistic discourse when any dissent is seen a malfeasance? And doesn't it set a bad precedent for imaginative civil discourse when the ONLY option ban supporters will get behind is an ABSOLUTE ban? Would it really be impossible to consider setting aside 10 percent of bars as smoker friendly? One percent? One tenth of one-percent? Well, of course that's impossible now, because the rhetoric the banners have employed makes that kind of compromise impossible.
People shouldn't smoke. But they do. Leave them alone and eat somewhere else. There are 170 places in Pittsburgh already. How many do you need? I suggest you open one on your own. If I have to leave the Post-Gazette alone, perhaps you ought to back off local restaurant owners.
Dr. Siegel has enough integrity to call his own side on this kind of dishonesty. Others, sadly, do not.
Talk about ridiculous.
By the way, you didn't respond to the the post. Are you OK with the "kissing the feet" rhetoric"? Are you OK with the Surgeon General spinning his own report?
Are you OK with these things because you agree with the ends involved?
I have said time and again that this is not the most important issue facing America. But the fact that people look the other way when the discourse proceeds in this fashion might be. The fact that people are so satisfied with their own lifestyles that they feel free to force them on others REALLY might be.
Posted by: Sam M | June 30, 2006 at 06:36 AM
I haven't followed this closely because I just accept that smoking will be banned in similar ways as other states. It is something that will happen, and frankly it is better overall for all of us, when it does. The sooner we remove the band aide, the sooner we can get past the sting of it, the pain of it, and move on.
Posted by: JoeP | June 30, 2006 at 07:51 AM
Joe,
Again, I agree with your basic premise. I just don't see how "inevitability" justifies exaggeration and character assasination in support of any policy.
Look. There is no peer reviewed report showing that brief exposure to SHS causes lung cancer or heart disease or in any other way amounts to "flirting with death."
And there is no evidence that everyone who opposes a ban is in the pocket of Big Tobacco. If there is, and the Post-Gazette is aware of it, it has a civic and professional obligation to say so. The fact that it has not done so, I think, speaks volumes.
Yet the Post-Gazette says these things in its editorial section. I see that as a serious problem.
Yes. Smoking is bad. And eventually fewer and fewer people will smoke. And businesses will respond. I just find it INCREDIBLY disheartening that anti-tobacco activists distort the science and the politics of it all.
As a former journalist myself, I find it even more disheartening that rather than calling those people to task for their exaggeration, the paper is joining in on the spin. A paper's job is to question authority. Even, one hopes, when authorities agree with the editorial board. Is that too much to ask?
There are serious issues to be addressed here. In addition to the science about SHS there are issues like property rights and autonomy and class conflict. All of these are just below the surface. And an otherwise excellent newspaper is ignoring all that to drop stinkers like "flirting with death" and "kissing the feet."
That is a terible, terrible shame. And a lost opportunity. All because of a smug sense of disregard for the cigarette puffing underclass. And it's even more of a shame that it's happening in Pittsburgh.
Posted by: Sam M | June 30, 2006 at 08:01 AM
Keep on bashing the PG, Sam. They think this is an easy issue becasue 79% of the people do not smoke. Some of us that do not smoke, like Patrick Henry, wish to defend your right to smoke.
The SG even said (by exclusion) that there is no increased deaths by cancer from SHS during the Lehrer interview: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/jan-june06/smoke_06-27.html
JIM LEHRER: How in the world are you going to stop that?
DR. RICHARD CARMONA: Well, education, we hope. We hope this information will get out and empower people to start thinking. I mean, a lot of people think, "Well, it's secondhand smoke. It's really not that worrisome. The kids will do fine."
The fact is: They won't. We have evidence now that every day a child is exposed to secondhand smoke, they have higher incidents of asthma. Eventually, they'll develop cardiovascular disease and cancers over time.
JIM LEHRER: And that has actually been traced and proven?
DR. RICHARD CARMONA: Yes, the secondhand smoke relationship has been proven in certain areas. There are some areas that are still gray. We're not actually absolutely sure, you know, on aneurysm, vascular disease, but certainly for heart attacks and coronary disease, no question, unequivocally related to the disease, secondhand smoke.
Some things not "linked", i.e. after you "delineate the connection between certain risk factors and secondhand smoke". Ya, lots of luck. But when push comes to shove, even the SG has to admit not every smoking disease can be linked to increase of that disease in non-smokers via SHS.
Well, at least it is a start.
Posted by: Amos the Poker Cat | June 30, 2006 at 05:06 PM
Years ago, George Will noted that if we wanted to live risk-free, we'd have to outlaw left turns. To use a less extreme example, most state governments, when the received permission from the federal government, decided to raise speed limits on many roads above 55 mph. We decided as a society to trade safety for convenience.
There is only so much you can do to make life safe before you've a) taken the joy out of living and b) created something approaching tyranny.
Now, I will allow that while government has no obligation to protect you from your own dumb choices, it does have responsibility from protecting you from the bad choices of others. But only to a point. A few years ago the federal government blackmailed states into lowering the legal alcohol limit for driving from .1 to .08. There were some protests, but given the toll drunk drivers seem to exact, and given how reprehensible the behavior is, it was hard to muster much sympathy for the counter argument.
But what if activists decide it must be pushed to .07, or .06? Forget about ordering that glass of wine with dinner. I never would have thought we'd see a day when people would sue fast-food restaurants for selling unhealthy food, but here we are.
The point is that the slippery slope is real, and it has to be considered. I have mixed feelings about the proposed smoking ban, but I am definitely opposed to distorting scientific studies, and I don't like the idea that the ultimate goal of society is to keep everyone as safe as possible at all times. It's a fool's errand, and I suspect that in the end, few people would be happy with the results.
Posted by: Jonathan Potts | July 01, 2006 at 06:37 AM
Years ago, George Will noted that if we wanted to live risk-free, we'd have to outlaw left turns. To use a less extreme example, most state governments, when the received permission from the federal government, decided to raise speed limits on many roads above 55 mph. We decided as a society to trade safety for convenience.
There is only so much you can do to make life safe before you've a) taken the joy out of living and b) created something approaching tyranny.
Now, I will allow that while government has no obligation to protect you from your own dumb choices, it does have responsibility from protecting you from the bad choices of others. But only to a point. A few years ago the federal government blackmailed states into lowering the legal alcohol limit for driving from .1 to .08. There were some protests, but given the toll drunk drivers seem to exact, and given how reprehensible the behavior is, it was hard to muster much sympathy for the counter argument.
But what if activists decide it must be pushed to .07, or .06? Forget about ordering that glass of wine with dinner. I never would have thought we'd see a day when people would sue fast-food restaurants for selling unhealthy food, but here we are.
The point is that the slippery slope is real, and it has to be considered. I have mixed feelings about the proposed smoking ban, but I am definitely opposed to distorting scientific studies, and I don't like the idea that the ultimate goal of society is to keep everyone as safe as possible at all times. It's a fool's errand, and I suspect that in the end, few people would be happy with the results.
Posted by: Jonathan Potts | July 01, 2006 at 06:37 AM
Jonathan,
Excellent points all around. This IS a tough issue, I think. And I would be a lot more accomodating of the Post-Gazette's position if it arrived at it in the fashion you describe. I would still disagree with it 100 percent. But I could respect it a lot more than what they are doing now, which amounts to cutting off debate by casting anyone who disagrees as some kind of corrupt degenerate hell-bent on killing babies and sucking op to Big Tobacco. That's crap.
I guess my response to the reasonable case for the ban would be: Your drunk driving example is good. But not perfect. A road is a public place. A bar is a public accomodation. I think we can make a distinction between the two. We don't allow people to cook or strip or raise goldfish or dryclean clothes in public parks. But we do allow them to do those things in certain places, where those risks and externalities can be contained to a reasonable degree. That way, only people who want to engage with those risks and externalities have to go to those places. And only people willing to work near those risks have to work near them.
And get this: I don't understand why people are so much more upset about banning smoking on the street, on sidewalks and in other truly "public" places. I think that takes concerns about the risks of second-hand smoke to new extremes. But so be it. It's a public sidewalk. So if people in some uppity California enclave don't want people smoking at the bus stop, fine. I disagree and would oppose it were I on city council. But that seems far more defensible than banning smoking in a bar run by a person who owns the bar and (ostensibly) makes his own decisions about what services to offer and which customers to serve.
It is not the Surgeon General's bar. It is not city council's bar. And it certainly is not the Post-Gazette's bar. Nobody has to drink or eat or work there.
So I invite the Post-Gazette and other ban supporters to do something even more radical than they are proposing: Go for a ban on smoking outdoors.
There. Your precious lungs will have even MORE places to breathe free. Just let the smokers smoke in their own homes, in their own yards, in their own cars and in bars where the owner welcomes such activity.
That seems like quite a deal. You can have the libraries and streets and stadiums and schools and hospitals and parks, etc.
Is it really so much to ask that people can have a cigarette with their Wild Turkey if they so choose?
(Again, for the record, I would oppose a ban on smoking in all public places. But I do think it makes more sense than a ban in private establishments.)
At any rate, thanks for the reasoned response.
Posted by: Sam M | July 01, 2006 at 07:32 AM
While I don't have a link handy, and probably not going to take the time today to find one, I believe that there have been a number of studies debating that there would be any substantial reduction in accidents with a 0.08 BAL instead of 0.10 BAL. Nevermind, that it ignored that some states, like CO, already had a lower DWI, driving while impaired, level of 0.05, in addition to a DUI level of 0.10.
NH was that last state to buckle under for highway funds to the 0.08 level. Michigan put a sunset clause in their law that will revert the BAC level back to 0.10 in 2013.
If you have ever heard an interview with a true believer from MADD, you might find that they come off sounding alot like the SG did on Lehrer. Spouting lots of absolutes, and definatives, that do not stand up to rigorous debate.
Personally, I am not the hopeful for individual liberty in the future, especially with the generation after GenX being the Melleniumal Generation, 1980ish to 2000ish, or what I like to call the "Helmet Generation". HG has basicly been programmed since day one being locked into safety seats, and learned not to question authority, or convential "wisdom".
Of course, the generation after them, 2000ish to 2020ish, will further have any remaining starch completely washed from them. They will be the new bland "man in the grey flannel suit" silent generation.
Posted by: Amos the Poker Cat | July 01, 2006 at 12:02 PM
Let's not forget that the federal government used the same trick back in the 1980s to get every state to raise its drinking age to 21.
Posted by: Jonathan Potts | July 01, 2006 at 04:35 PM
Jonathan and Amos,
Right with you.
The thing about MADD is that its leaders are basically immune to criticism. Whenever someone does it, they come across as being callous and mean to a woman who has lost a child. Not a winning approach.
Unfortunatley, I think, the push for tighter drunk-driving laws very often seems like a thinly veiled push for some sort of neo-temperance movement. Might be worth noting that the OLD temperance movement was ushered (rammed?) through by extremely active womens' and religious groups. It's always about saving the children.
I wonder if someone could get elected to a national office by running on a "Screw The Children" platform. Might be something akin to Hunter S. Thompson's Freak Power Ticket.
Or you could just view this comment as one of hundreds of reasons I will never be elected to anything.
Posted by: Sam M | July 02, 2006 at 06:18 AM
actually, that "screw the children" slogan is the official tag line of the Thailand Bureau of Tourism. seriously, if you do run on the screw the children platform i think you should campaign around the country with your twin riding on your lap while drive at 85 mph and chug six packs nonstop. after all, they're not my kids.
Posted by: sean mcdaniel | July 09, 2006 at 09:02 AM
Sean,
I would be glad to run on that platform, but a true statesman has already beat me to the punch.
President Britney Spears.
Perhaps I can be her surgeon general.
Issue Number One: Mandatory Wild Turkey at all state functions. Might be interesting to see how the Israelis and Palestinians get along after a few belts. Couldn't hurt.
Posted by: Sam M | July 09, 2006 at 04:35 PM