February 15, 2008
Smoking in Virginia is Here to Stay
It's official: the Virginia House of Delegates killed the latest package of smoking ban proposals in a subcommittee Thursday. The set of proposed bans would have barred smoking in restaurants, offices and other public places. The bills' defeat means a state-wide ban won't come before the Virginia legislature again this year.
The House had previously spiked their own versions of the smoking ban proposals. Yesterday's subcommittee action put an end to the bills that had been passed in the Senate.
The move is a sound defeat for Gov. Tim Kaine (D), who has been pushing for a state-wide smoking ban in several forms since he took office. Unlike some other states, such as Maryland, Virginia does not grant the power to counties or cities to enact bans on their own. With this latest move, the Virginia House of Delegates has ensured that smoking will continue to be legal in bars and restaurants in nearby Northern Virginia for the foreseeable future.
Photo by yonas1
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Thanks a lot, Virginia. You've just ensured that I'll continue going to DC to do my partying. Nothing worse than coming home after a night out, reeking of smoke... urcch.
I'm sure if the bars and clubs in VA really felt that allowing smoking was keeping them from getting more business than it was bringing in they would prohibit it themselves.
@saturngirl,
Please take public transportation if you're commuting to do your partying.
Yeah, can DC please take back Arlington?
And now it seems totally appropriate that the South Park episode I watched on the flight back to California last night poked fun at Rob Reiner's crusade against Big Tobacco.
Not that I disagree with the idea of banning smoking in bars. I love not having that morning after smell anymore. But it was still a damn funny episode.
this is not surprising.
reason 4815162342 why virginia sucks.
The crazy thing about that whole "freedom" thing is that people are free to do things you don't like.
The crazy thing about that whole "freedom" thing is that people are free to do things you don't like.
like being gay...
Until Phillip Morris moves out of Richmond it is unlikely any such ban will be in place unless it goes federal. goat_boy can bite me.
@ces12,
Sort of. More like being gay and wanting to get married.
Looks like the smell of taxation WITH representation is cigarette smoke.
In other news, proposed legislation to ban barbecue in North Carolina went down in hickory-smoked, vinegar-slaw-covered defeat in Raleigh today. A spokesperson for Citizens for a BBQ Smoker-Free Society stated, "This is a sad day for people whose lives have been ruined by sweet, tender hunks of pork shoulder and ribs, slow cooked to mouth-watering tenderness. We are now moving forward with legislation to declare pork rib bones a 'delivery device' for barbecue, and subject to ATF narcotic controls."
the funny thing is that, like a lot of other southern states, virginia likes to talk about it's tradition of "state's rights" vis a vis the federal government, but when this is logically brought down to the next level (county's rights vs. the state), they don't allow that amount of devolution.
what i'm trying to say is....damn hypocrites.
I usually look forward to laughing at Moneyrotica's comments, but making light of the serious health problems and death that second-hand smoke causes is just not funny. Cigarettes are incomparable to BBQ ribs, and any other consumable product. They are in a category by themselves.
I hope employees in Virginia will one day have the same rights as their colleagues in DC and MD to breathe smoke-free air.
My chances of dying from second hand smoke can't compare to the odds of me being killed by a drunk driver. But where's the outrage in that? Liquor and cigarettes are legal. I can choose to stay out of a smoke-filled bar, but there's no choice whatsoever when I get behind the wheel of a car. Drunk drivers are out there and not as easily recognizable as a puffing smoker.
Counties have no rights in Virginia - they are extensions of the Commonwealth and as such are subject to whatever whims the Commonwealth's officials choose to enforce upon them. Kind of like DC and the Federal Congress.
@IMGoph,
I don't recall DC's smoking ban being the de facto state due to the individual wards banning smoking.
@IMGoph,
I don't recall DC's smoking ban being the de facto state due to the individual wards banning smoking.
Jen209 = Po-faced.
I'll see your po-faced and raise you wanker.
I have as healthy a sense of humor as anyone, it just bugs me to see the harm caused by tobacco so trivialized. To me, it's a big deal.
Cunty-bollocks
Wizzyliz - funny you should mention chances of dying from second hand smoke can't compare to the odds of me being killed by a drunk driver...
Adams, S. and Cotti, C., "Drunk driving after the passage of smoking bans in bars," Journal of Public Economics (forthcoming).
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/02/10/uncommon_knowledge/
Wizzyliz - funny you should mention chances of dying from second hand smoke can't compare to the odds of me being killed by a drunk driver.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2008/02/10/uncommon_knowledge/
(yeah, i can't href)
i think the internal server errors got me,
the end of that link is:
/uncommon_knowledge/
Duffer.
of St George?
Duffer: someone who is useless, junk, trash.
I didn't know the term was associated with a British version of J Crew...cheeky.
Smeggy knob-cheese...
true, ccunning, but the district wasn't part of the confederacy....and now i'm babbling
I really don't see how people are so shocked by this. It is extremely disappointing of course, but this is the home of Big Tobacco! Boy I can't wait until Democrats control the General Assembly!
Wizzyliz: "there's no choice whatsoever when I get behind the wheel of a car."
Really? It seems to me as though there's as much choice in driving as in entering a bar. Personally, it's a choice I choose not to make. (Although I would never give up bars).
Since you're babbling I'm not going to say anything about the implication that it's OK for "Northern" states to overlook "counties rights" and not "Southern" states.
BTW - The North won, so there are only supposed to be "United States", not "Northern" and "Southern".
@mgt,
Drinking and driving is stupid and illegal. Smoking is just stupid.
Also, bars are privately owned, the roads are not.
True, MGT. I have a choice of bars that are smoke-free. However, there are no highways or roads that I am aware of that are drunk driver-free.
Yes, Wizzyliz, that I will agree with. But I would try here: http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/controversies/1140551076.html
... making light of the serious health problems and death that second-hand smoke causes is just not funny.
Sure it is. Anything can be funny. The little bubbles of humor in the otherwise fetid cesspool of life is what keeps some of us from having a Falling Down moment every time the Orange Line breaks down.
Has any Virginian ever died from tobacco smoke exposure in a bar or restaurant?
i think people make a big deal of the situation than it really is. in cali and in ny it's pretty much normal to have to go outside to smoke (or go to a designated smoking area). everyone seems to have moved on from the initial shock of the ban. but hey, at the end of it all it's better to ban it. you can still smoke outside, and that shouldn't have to be an issue.
I agree with goat boy. Virginia sucks ass for a trillion reasons.
As opposed to DC, which merely sucks ass for not quite a billion reasons. I'm looking at you, $15 hamburger at Marvin.
Smoked and cured meats are loaded with sweet, delicious carcinogens, more than you're likely to ever get second-hand in any bar off Wilson Blvd. Liquor rots your liver and unsafe buttsecks can kill you. Nicotine, caffeine, chainsaws, chrome-plated buttplugs shaped like characters from Dickens' Old Curiosity Shop. They're all still legal (for now), although I'm sure there's someone, somewhere twitching in their sleep thinking of ways to finally make us all safe from them.
Freedom is meaningless unless it includes the freedom to go to hell in your own particular fashion.
Amen, Monkeyrotica and way to go, Virginia! Don't believe the BS that everyone in NY loves and accepts the ban. I don't spend my hard-earned drinking money anywhere I can't smoke and I refuse to stand outside like a leper. It's a big deal because the 20-30% of the population who smoke also have rights, those include the right to assembly association and public life.
The Niconazis will keep trying to push a ban through. I suggest you start now to defeat any legislator who supported the ban this time around. That includes your governor.
Someone proposed Maryland for our family vacation this year. I'll be voting no fro one reason; they now have a smoking ban. But Virginia will reamain on my list of acceptable destinations.
Amen, Monkeyrotica and way to go, Virginia! Don't believe the BS that everyone in NY loves and accepts the ban. I don't spend my hard-earned drinking money anywhere I can't smoke and I refuse to stand outside like a leper. It's a big deal because the 20-30% of the population who smoke also have rights, those include the right to assembly association and public life.
The Niconazis will keep trying to push a ban through. I suggest you start now to defeat any legislator who supported the ban this time around. That includes your governor.
Someone proposed Maryland for our family vacation this year. I'll be voting no fro one reason; they now have a smoking ban. But Virginia will reamain on my list of acceptable destinations.
Amen, Monkeyrotica and way to go, Virginia! Don't believe the BS that everyone in NY loves and accepts the ban. I don't spend my hard-earned drinking money anywhere I can't smoke and I refuse to stand outside like a leper. It's a big deal because the 20-30% of the population who smoke also have rights, those include the right to assembly association and public life.
The Niconazis will keep trying to push a ban through. I suggest you start now to defeat any legislator who supported the ban this time around. That includes your governor.
Someone proposed Maryland for our family vacation this year. I'll be voting no fro one reason; they now have a smoking ban. But Virginia will reamain on my list of acceptable destinations.
monkeyrotica and chriss need to get a book on philosophy of law before they type arbitrary nonsense.
Freedom is being free to do anything you want unless it others around you (limiting freedom of others). Consuming liquor or caffeine does not effect anyone except yourself. Using butt-plugs does not either. But smoking in a public place does harm others around you through second-hand smoke. Now, you can argue that the non-smokers are free to leave and go someplace else, but that's the same dumb argument that can be used to say "if you are against drunk drivers, pick safer roads instead of restricting freedoms".
Having bars choose their own smoking policies is as absurd as having only some roads require seat-belts or sober drivers.
Not at all. borio (are you by any chance Gene Borio, NY's Antismoking A$$hole Par Excellance?--what an "honor"!) If a majority support a smoke-free environment bars will reflect that. Unfortunately for you that's not the case. Unfortuantely for the rest of us, you've got tons of Bloomberg and RWJ money behind you. That's the only way your intolerant laws get passed.