[Vision2020] More Banning?

[Kenneth Marcy]

On Thursday 18 June 2009 12:02:56 Chasuk wrote:
> However, I am against outright smoking bans.  Yes, I should be able to
> enjoy my evening without the stink of cigarettes, but the smoker
> should be able to commit slow suicide if he or she chooses.

I agree that an total smoking ban is, as a practical matter, unenforceable 
among the current population of smokers and with the availability of many 
tobacco products. When, if at all, and where tobacco use is allowed in public 
places can and should be regulated, however. If a smoker or a drinker insists 
on periodically polluting himself or herself, to the detriment of others, 
particularly or generally, then that person may legitimately be required to 
identify his or her purchase or cigarettes or booze. This is already done.

The advantages of social agencies keeping track of who uses how much of what 
may outweigh the privacy forsaken by the substance consumer. Higher insurance 
rates for regular consumers of substances that cause the most preventable 
cancers and a major cause of vehicular deaths and accidents are appropriate. 
Legally eligible persons could be issued a controlled substances ID card, and 
be required to present it to purchase substances, and transaction information 
could be electronically passed to agency databases just as seamlessly as 
debit card information goes to a financial institution.

If larger jurisdictions weren't so (perhaps hypocritically) prone to stick 
their regulatory proboscises into small, local concerns while ignoring larger 
issues for which they are responsible, the suggested monitoring likely could 
be accomplished on a local level.


Ken