PUSH and New Anti-Smoking Regulation

From the Tacoma News Tribune

**Begin Article**

"SMOKING: PUSH efforts on apartments appreciated"

"I support PUSH (People United for Smoke-free Housing) for bringing the issue of smoke-free apartments to the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Board, whose job it is to safeguard the health of our community.
The 2006 U.S. Surgeon General's report regarding secondhand smoke states:
• It causes premature death and disease in children and in adults who do not smoke (50,000 deaths annually).
• Children have an increased risk of sudden infant death syndrome, acute respiratory infections, ear problems and more severe asthma. Smoking by parents causes breathing (respiratory) symptoms and slows lung growth in their children.• It immediately affects the heart and blood circulation in a harmful way. Over a longer time it also causes heart disease and lung cancer.• The scientific evidence shows that there is no safe level of exposure to secondhand smoke.• The only way to fully protect nonsmokers from exposure to secondhand smoke indoors is to prevent all smoking in that indoor space or building. Separating smokers from nonsmokers, cleaning the air and ventilating buildings cannot keep nonsmokers from being exposed to secondhand smoke.
Research reviewed in this report indicates that smoke-free policies are the most economic and effective approach for providing protection from exposure to secondhand smoke. However separating smokers and nonsmokers in the same airspace is not effective, nor is air cleaning or a greater exchange of indoor with outdoor air.
Research indicates that the progressive restriction of smoking in the United States to protect nonsmokers has had the additional health impact of reducing active smoking.

(Henson is co-chair of the Tobacco-free Alliance of Pierce County.)

Read more: http://blog.thenewstribune.com/letters/2010/08/30/secondhand-smoke-facts-speak-for-themselves/comment-page-1/#comment-15245#ixzz0yDTRwujx""

End Article



The Surgeon General has also proclaimed that obesity is a serious threat to American's and their children. After our glorious leaders pass this law, the next initiative shoudl be to ban fried foods in all apartment buildings. The smell of frying oil carries just as far and fast as cigarette smoke, and the effects of obesity are just as significant, especially when you realize that without comprehensive health care, we will have to pay for these poor overweight victims to receive adequate medical treatment.

Get out of here. If you want someone to take care of you, move back in with your mother (assuming she doesnt smoke). The rest of us are fully capable of taking care of ourselves.

American Ismalaphobia

First - a phobia is defined as an extreme and irrational fear of simple things or societal events. So, I dont think that local opposition to a mosque would be a phobia. Maybe you could call it religious bigotry, but even thats a stretch.

Second - and maybe more importantly, local communities have the right to define what is built, and where it is built inside their community. HOA's define what is allowable inside their neighborhood. Cities decide what to allow through zoning and permits. Look at the recent uproar in Renton over the new strip club.

**No I am not comparing a mosque to a strip club. Dont follow a straw man argument**

The Imam has the right to practice his religion in America. He is guarenteed that right under the First Amendment. I and many others would die to protect that right, even though we find his religion and views abhorrent. But New York (and New York's citizens) have the right to say "we don't want it here". That is not just the Imam's city, it is everyones city. And if the Imam had any true desire to promote understanding and goodwill around his religion, he would respect those wishes, and build it somewhere else.This isn't about freedom of religion, or "islamaphobia", whatever that is. This is about a government ignoring the wishes of the citizens, and deciding on its own to define what the citizens need and want.

Read more: http://www.thenewstribune.com/personas/?insiteUserId=04e85b9285af92f88f20a7a8bc64719b-203415&plckPersonaPage=BlogViewPost&plckUserId=04e85b9285af92f88f20a7a8bc64719b-203415&plckPostId=Blog%3a04e85b9285af92f88f20a7a8bc64719b-203415Post%3a6171cb28-9a8d-4ce5-8fff-05c7c540c70d&plckController=PersonaBlog&plckScript=personaScript&plckElementId=personaDest#ixzz0xpWy9yat