916WI: If I had meant legally indefensible, that is what I would have written. I hope you're not trying to make a case that the standard for determining the morality of something should be its legality!?! The precedence of tyranny is no justification for more tyranny. The liquor license rationalization is non-sequitur to the issue of morality because the Wisconsin smoking ban applies to private clubs with exclusive, restricted memberships --places where the non-smoking citizen has no legal standing to demand his alleged "right" to breath the air, smoke-free or not, over the objections of every legitimate member. Yet, this law provides for exactly just such coercion. Morally indefensible.

Which brings me to krsmith... I am getting the impression you have gotten stuck on dismissing my position as merely MY opinion. True, other supporters of liberty have, for some reason, been notably silent here lately (thekid3477 notwithstanding... thanks). Regardless, if our Founding Fathers were alive today, do you think they would be arguing your side of this issue or mine? On this same subject, voicing my opinion is not something I am "entitled" to do. Entitlements are gained by petitioning government to force others into fulfilling our own personal wants and desires. In contrast, voicing our opinion is an inalienable human right recognized and guaranteed by our Constitution. The former can't be freely exercised without sticking a gun to the head of another; the latter is freely exercised only in the absence of any sort of coercion. Entitlements and rights are polar opposites... though one might never learn this by listening to a typical 21st Century American.

While we should always strive to adhere to principles (e.g. reference to the Constitution), the nature of reality never allows us to truly get there -a state of pure principle on any issue.

People shouldn't smoke, period. But while prohibiting smoking in bars etc. is practical and doable, a universal ban on smoking is not practical and doable. However, the smoking ban will not only prevent smoking in bars, it will contribute to fewer people taking up or continuing the habit.

This view strives for pure principle while it is tempered with reality.

916WI-Even if we sold our liquor license and completely stopped operating it as a bar, that building still sits on property that is zoned strictly for commercial business. It doesn't just magically become "private" like a residential piece of property and FOTH's knowledge (of the differences) between these two is just not there. And unless an impartial, licensed attorney can define and interpret what "morally defensible" means in the context of this discussion, FOTH'S use of that term represents nothing more than an "opinion". . . .which he is of course "entitled" to.

zestyone- were you once Qaz668? The User Policy Agreement states: Users agree NOT to:
* use our Web site to advertise, solicit, or promote without our express written approval.

Now I can go get azz faced at the bar and not wake up smelling like an ash tray :) I bet I'll feel better too :o)))

Fool--your "ban on private property is morally indefensible" holds absolutely no water at all. We've already been through this. These people are operating businesses that are licensed and regulated by the state. These business owners have hundreds of regulations that must be adhered to. They can use their "private property" any way they wish--smoke away in it to their heart's content with out repercussion(aside from developing lung cancer)--as long as they turn in their liquor license and stop selling alcohol......

True nailqueen, but not only is the government slowly (because of so many fighting against it) adressing that through emmissions standards, but the concentration of it in the air is relatively small, too small to really effect me in my lifetime. If you walk into a cigarette smoke filled room and analyzed the air, I'm betting that the other pollutants you are referring to would be almost, if not completely immeasurable compared to the 1,000+ chemicals coming out of each cigarette! We enjoy rather clean air in this area compared to others already and this is one more step to make it even better!

Hey Jenny57... If you're worried about breathing polluted air you better hold your breath. This might come as a surpise to you, the air is not ONLY polluted by cigarette smoke but other things pollute the air YOU breath.

A smoking ban on all public property is morally defensible, even if only tiny minority of people supported it. A ban on private property is morally indefensible, even if an overwhelming majority of people supported it.

Okie-We did not compile statistical data to prove or disprove anything. But what I can tell you is that 85% of our customers are smokers and based on first hand knowledge and experience in the bar business, the smoking law was NOT the end of the world for smokers, non-smokers or bar owners and it won't be for Janesville either.

Coercion has no place in a civil, moral and free society. The absence of coercion is liberty. This is the defining element of social interaction that distinguishes charity from theft; free markets from totalitarian governments; employment from slavery and love-making from rape. Coercive force is not a subjective quality to be determined by those who support its conditional use. That is because they will eagerly support its use to attain their own desired goals but then vigorously oppose it when they are the one being coerced. In order to rationalize this dichotomy, they will find it necessary to stand mute or look away when they see someone else being coerced.

okiefed - Previously I could NOT make the choice to walk into a bar if I did NOT want to breathe in carcinogen-laced air or I had asthma. That choice was being made FOR me by the smokers! So...let's see here, the smokers can go wherever they want, because the air quality is of no concern to them, but people that don't want their polluted air or people with respiratory problems are limited. I guess the polluters win then! Gee that's nice.
Definitley not my definition of freedom for the people NOT spewing their smoke into the air! You can always go outside for a "smoke", that's not unreasonable, but asking me to go ouside for a "breathe" is!

YEAH! I can go bowling now with my kids!!

This was a very wise decision and needed government intervention to do the only right thing. Smoking unlike other bad habits (drinking, overeating, etc) pollutes the air that we ALL require to live. I cannot chose whether to breathe the air or not. I have just as much right to socialize in and enjoy any public place (including bars) as anyone else and breathe air that is unpolluted by cigar and cigarette smoke. Denying me the ability to smoke-free air in public places is a violation of MY rights! Wake up and "smell the smoke"...public sentiment was going this way anyway. It all comes down to one thing - YOU do NOT have to smoke to live, but we all must breathe air to. So go ahead and drink all you want...it doesn't make me drunk, eat all you want, it doesn't make me overweight, just dont force me to breathe your polluted air!

Yep, you would think e-cigs would be fine if this was actually about second hand smoke, but now some of this same activists want to ban e-cigs.
"Last month Oregon went into history as the first American state to outlaw electronic cigarettes, with New Jersey and Connecticut are in the process of taking up similar measures."
It never ends.

Prohibition of a legal product is a blow to the heart of Democracy

http://thetruthisalie.com

http://fightingback.homestead.com

Why dont people switch to those new Crown7 electric cigarettes?!?! These things only emit water vapor and I have seen so many people smoking these in bars and restaurants.

Okie-our bar is in a bigger city than janesville, it is an old downtown neighborhood pub, on Main Street, in a brick building well over 100 years old. No fancy restorations, just an old ass building. We serve food one night a week because we actually MAKE the food,homemade spaghetti, lasagne, meatball sandwiches, steak sandwiches, chicken marsala and pizza and that's it. Not typical "bar" food. No french fries, hamburgers, or jalapeno poppers. My partner has owned it for 32 years and our clientele is, factory workers, truck drivers, farmers, veterans, doctors, lawyers, strippers, bikers, gays, 21 year old head bangers, lesbians, drug addicts, rugby enthusiasts, prostitutes, and EVERYTHING in between. And most of these people are either from the neighborhood or have relatives that live in the neighborhood.

All beer, no martinis, no fluffy mixed drinks,(we don't own a blender)no strip mall, no franchise chain, no deep fried food, no new building. And oh yeah, 85 percent smokers that just plain like thier cigarettes, thier beer and once a week, a home made meal!

So believe me, I've heard every argument, from every angle, from a full spectrum of professional and non professional intellectual levels about the smoking law. And guess what. . .every ex-angry smoker and "activist" is still here drinking at our bar and happily smoking on our outdoor smoking deck!

Okie--California banned cigarette smoking from it's bars well over a decade ago. Bars there are still flourishing with prices in CA terms being very reasonable--and there is absolutely no talk of zero tolerance(believe me--I know:)) So, using that as an example as to whether or not your "stage 2" is ever going to come into effect, I really think you're just blowing hot air. You're just going to have to come to terms that this is really just about 80% of the population wanting nothing to do with your second hand smoke--Easy peasy--Accept it and move on.......

There is an example at every workplace, and in every environment. Hope your not using plastic, not only is it made from oil but once its bendable it has lead in it. We all love lead right?

Straw man is subterfuge, smokers don't care they just want their place to smoke. We care less that everyone is destroying the world with their pollution. Smokers don't care either, sorry you can see our smoke.

Our bill of rights, the first amendment, gives us the right to freedom of association. The fourteenth amendment says the states can not remove our first amendment rights.

If you like it or not there are people that want to smoke and people who do not. But minority rights and majority rule is protected under the constitution.

The smoking ban is unconstitutional, and not a single non smoking objector has bothered to find the legal print supporting their argument that a total smoking ban is legal. When I did find it and link all the relevant information it was summarily dismissed by the majority, feigning ignorance or disinterest of the law.

Even a few, I am not going to read something that might allow me to understand the country I live in, arguments.

You still support the right to imbibe alcohol and crash into something or someone. That seems a larger public health concern than something they claim will kill you in 10-20 or 50 years.

Second hand smoke gave me cancer... congratulations you have identified one of a billion things spewing pollutants into the air you breathe. Cigarette smoke you can see so it must be the culprit. Your brand spanking new car has nearly as many carcinogens in it as a cigarette. Which do you think the nonsmoker smells more of tobacco burning or new car.

I know I could smoke all day even 2 packs a day at one point, but you give me a couple hours just off a highway breathing and I have a headache from the sulfur among of things spewing from cars, trucks, semi's, and every 3rd vehicle that spews that lovely blue haze from being beaten on that is currently burning oil.

Lets by all means argue the amounts of chemicals spewed forth from smoking vs traffic vs industry. Then lets tally up which side of the equation they fall on. Animal testing shows a link between cancer and hydrocarbons. To be more accurate, complex hydrocarbons. well skip the carbon dioxide being a hydrocarbon argument, or that carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide from your car can kill you from asphyxiation.

But I mean the real hydrocarbons. Like that wd40 you smell everyday at work the permeating smell of spent car oil brake fluid and so on. We all know what oil smells like. Hey cooking exposes you to oil too. What about that lysol or pick your air freshener you liberally spray or the candles you burn.

I hear formaldehyde is good for you too. That is every paper bag and cardboard box you handle you smell it and some amount is absorbed right into your skin. Even the paper you child writes on. Not to mention its in your new carpet.

Maybe we are talking about lung cancer. I know most people have newer homes or they remodel. Gypsum is what they make drywall out of its a very fine dust, asthma what? Hope you had it all cut outside, you can find it in a house years later. Its not like walking around will kick up a cloud, but maybe you can't see it so its harmless. At least you can see tobacco smoke.

The few bars in our city that went out of business (post smoking law) were in trouble well BEFORE the law went into effect. And trust me, it was the perfect excuse for "troubled" bar owners to say the "BAN was why they went out of business." When it all came out in the wash, the smoking law had little if nothing to do with any of it.

gazettefan-I can't honestly say that we did not have a "strategic business agenda" as you might have suggested in your last sentence. To some degree, we were afraid of that law just like everyone else. However, we DID know that by "accommodating" everyone, both smokers and non-smokers, this law certainly should NOT put us out of business as many angry smokers and "rights activists" would have the public believe. Ultimately this is not a smoking "BAN." If it were truly a "BAN", no one would be smoking at all, period. This law accommodates EVERYONE the most logical way it can. And like it or not, it works!

It's possible a few Bars will not be able to weather the storm and will have to close their doors. Oh well we have about 50 to many bars anyway.

FOTH-It's not our inability to see things, it's our collective unwillingness to view them through YOUR set of glasses.

krsmith...., thanks for verifying my 11:18a post.

And beeferer, 916WI, Pandalover, Zoom, you are all correct! As I said in my other posts from the previous article that came out on this topic: As an experienced bar owner and one who has survived the smoking ban (in a different state), I guarantee you that people don't stop coming to bars just because they have to smoke outside! They boycott and protest for awhile, but eventually they do come back. Our bar is thriving proof that all the arguments against this smoking law do not and will not stand the test of time.

Citing legal precedence for past violations of coercive government violations of individual property rights is not a valid argument in a debate on morality. Asking government to violate the rights of another American on your behalf is morally no different than holding the gun yourself. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muHg86Mys... This absolutely IS a property rights issue. What saddens me most is how any American could be so unable to see this.

I don't have a problem with the smoking ban, if everyone wants a smoke free state so be it, just let me know where the smokers only state is and I will gladly move there.

What has to factored in is that if owners felt free to say exactly what they think, they'd say they approve of the smoking ban. (Except maybe some of the ones who smoke.)

Why wouldn't they want to work in and manage a place that is smoke free?

It's strategic for them to be silent about the ban or to complain about it. They have more to gain than if they openingly supported it. Why alienate their current customers? The ban has been a long time in the works and now it's here. The smokers will still drink there and many more non smokers will now drink there.

The owners want the ban: it's good for business.

"Simply put, state government has granted one group the power to take something they have not earned."

If that statement is true, then tell me exactly when did smoker's "earn" the "right" to smoke in bars? Just because there have been no laws against smoking in bars up to this point, doesn't mean it doesn't jeopardize public health. And like it or not, bars are not "personal private property." It's not like owning your own home. And that's the biggest mistake inexperienced bar owners make. Bars are highly regulated businesses and have been for many, many years.

I am completely for this ban. I have allergies I cannot tolerate the smell of smoke, especially while I am trying eat. But when you're in a restaurant or bar, you cannot escape it. I am really happy with the state's decision to pass this law.

And to all of the smokers who are crying about their rights being infringed upon, you need to realize that YOU ARE IN THE MINORITY! I am one of the majority who will start to patronize bars & restaurants again because I will no longer choke from the toxicity in the air. So there goes the "it will kill business" theory!

Exactly 916WI. Smoking inside an enclosed space isn't integral to any business, save something like a cigar bar, which has a carve out in the legislation.

NCC1701 simply hasn't done his/her homework. There are 27 other states with smoking bans, and no evidence that the bans hurt business. There are more than enough non-smokers that will make up for the few smokers whose can't curtail their habit for a short time.

FOTH, this law is no different than any number of laws a BUSINESS must abide by, including health codes, building codes, etc. As soon as PREPERTY becomes a BUSINESS with EMPLOYEES, there is a host of additional laws that must be followed. You're arguing an abstract that hasn't existed for over a hundred years.

I am really enjoying these posts. For the record there is no "right" to 1) clean air, 2) to breath, 3) to smoke, 4) to completely control your property, 5) to not smell...it could go on. At least attempt to have a educated debate and not throw around the argument that "x infringes on my right to _____". This is a reasonable law that has successfully been implemented in many other states. There is no right for a business owner to decide exactly how to run their business (health codes, food inspections, zoning regulations, bar closing times...) and there is no right for someone to have clean air to breathe when they enter a bar. This is a law that has been democratically agreed to and imposed upon the people for the betterment of our state. Lets start fighting about something else.

fool--I really don't consider this a property rights issue. If the smoking ban is such an issue, a bar owner can simply turn in his liquor license, pull out the ashtrays and smoke away. The state is responsible for licensing and regulating these businesses. Bar owners signed on when they got their licenses knowing without any doubt that the state was the ultimate authority and any laws enacted would be adhered to. There are hundreds of regulations on the books which expressly tell bar managers what they can and can't do with their businesses. The bar owners I talked to were totally fine with this--it's just a small segment of selfish smokers who have an issue and are blowing things way out of proportion.

NCC1701- I'm afraid I have to disagree with your opinion (which you have every right to express) that this will hurt small businesses. It is a level playing field. If all bars have a no smoking policy then why would people quit going to any one particular bar in favor of another? The policy exists across the board. And I believe it is fallacious to think people will just quit going to bars because they can no longer smoke in them.

perfectly stated fool...

"Isn't smoking an infringement on my right to breathe clean air indoors? Whose rights are being infringed upon the most? Depends upon which side of the fence you live on, doesn't it?"

No, it doesn't, BeenThereDoneThat. You certainly would have such natural right if you owned said indoor property or were the invited guest of its like-minded owner. But, to claim more "right" to set the terms of private property usage than the property's owner is a false premise of contemporary American entitlement mentality. No one has any "right" to demand another person provide them places of business suited to their own wants or needs. Piling on another law that violates the natural rights of individual property owners does not validate or justify the underlying false premise of such artificial "rights". This new law grants you and others claim to something that you have no natural right to claim. Simply put, state government has granted one group the power to take something they have not earned. While I am glad that everyone will be breathing cleaner indoor air, I will never forget that it was achieved by sticking a gun to the head of its rightful owner.

If Mr. Cook is drinking Old Style out of a can then his demand for freshness and good taste left the station a long time ago. Heck, carbon monoxide and arsenic are a step up from Old Style out of a can. Cans and bottles are made for transporting beer, NOT drinking out of. We need a law against drinking ANY beer out of the can, how pedestrian, how banal, how crude.

The vast majority of citizens do not smoke and, through this legislation, they have spoken. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Get over it.

tarbender -- isn't smoking an infringement on my right to breathe clean air indoors? Whose rights are being infringed upon the most? Depends upon which side of the fence you live on, doesn't it?

its still an infringement on rights. it should be up to the establishment some had already chosen to be smoke free!!!

I noticed at pool leagues last night that the smokers were edgy, ornery, and short tempered. I just had to laugh at some of them! I don't carry cloths around with me, so I have never had a problem with them smelling smokey. I did notice that my clothes didn't smell as smokey as usual though.

we would never eat at bars, dispite the great food, just becuase of the smoke... we started going to a local bar a while ago after we noticed few if anyone was smoking there anyway. SO that bar has increased business because of 'no smoking'. we would not go to resturants that did not do a good job of isolating smokers.. we dont like the smoke, we dont like our cloths smelling like smoke, we dont like it sam i am...