Smoking bans in general are wrong at multiple levels. I get furious when I hear about them and wring my hands about the wholesale health-and-wellness police state that big brother is clobbering us over the head with. From what I hear, there are places in the US where even outdoor smoking is being banned. It's enough to make me weep for my country, not just as a smoker, but as someone who values freedom.

I always used to think that the nanny-staters would pistol-whip the smokers into submission and then move onto food and beverages, slapping the double cheeseburgers out of the mouths of fast-food patrons and sin taxing alcohol and coffee right into the black market. It was at this point I thought the people would say enough is enough and revolt...when it was more than just us smokers getting slapped around. Now I doubt the tide will ever change. The more hyperbolic rhetoric the public has thrust upon them about the need for Oreo prohibitions and "double latte sin taxes", the more they accept the idea that "something HAS TO BE DONE!!!!!" Public opinion polls are already showing a major shift in favor of "Twinkie taxes" and other anti-obesity measures. I suspect that with a couple more years of breathless warnings about obesity epidemics, obese people will be joining us smokers as the pariahs of society.

Sorry for the rant, but this kind of news really makes my blood boil..lol.