It's new and improved and they call it the New Improved Constitution Lite - The Tobacco Institute's Cigarette Constitution

Today I get to write from the heart. The Iowa legislature finally passed a ban on smoking in public businesses with the exception of Veteran’s Homes and casinos. The Veteran’s Homes I can understand from a political standpoint, but the casinos being exempted has me baffled. Perhaps it’s because casinos are really a black hole of reason. Casinos seem to be an oasis where people can exercise most every vice except public sex. Gamble, smoke, drink, swear, hang out and do public sanctioned old-school mob related activity – all sanctioned by the State of Iowa. But really today we’re here to talk about smoking cancer sticks so let’s not digress.

In the Des Moines Register’s Metro & Iowa section today there is Jeff Wagner standing before two flags, Iowa’s and the former Soviet Union. He’s jokingly, but really not, arguing that the big bad government telling us, well not us them, what to do like stop slowing killing the rest of us is against his customers’ (un) civil liberties. Many of his customers agree. Well I should say if his customers could find their way through the smoke filled bar and out the front door they might even protest. I’ve driven by the Blues On Grand, BOG as it’s fondly known, and if the front door to Grand Avenue is open, which it usually is, the building looks like it’s on fire.

“Mr. Wagner, do you have six fingers?”

“There’s a lot of people out there who are anxious, and now they’re just going through a flood. It’s bad timing for the state,” Freohlich said. “The economy is bad, gas is up, food is up and all I can say is our legislators bought into a bunch of propaganda like other states did.”

Propaganda? What propaganda? Are you serious? You sound like the Tobacco Institute testifying before congress that there is no proof smoking cause’s lung cancer. And the bar owners talking all about the price of gas, food and the economy is about as disingenuous as smoking cigarettes will make the price of gas go down. How much does BOG charge for a mixed drink? How much does that drink cost to actually make and deliver to your table? I’d be surprised if that drink costs fifty cents to make and wait to a table. And what does it cost the customer? $4.50 to $6.00? What other businesses have that kind of markup? Not many.

Some bar owners are threatening to sue the State of Iowa – go ahead, but when you show up for court leave your cigarettes behind. You won’t be smoking in court. What I say about this threat is, “Bring it on!” What a lame threat that is. Fred Remington is a good friend and former high school classmate who owns and operates three bars on the Hawaiian Islands. Hawaii banned smoking in restaurants and bars. Fred protested saying all the same things. He organized the bar owners and shouted about “Constitutional rights being violated”, then sued the State of Hawaii. Yawn……. His organizations arguing the constitution as a basis for someone smoking in a restaurant makes the owners sound like a bunch of tobacco plantation owners arguing for a constitutional right to maintain crop subsidies. Why don’t they just say it like it is? Why not argue that people have a right to be addicted to a habit that slowly kills them and those they smoke around.

Last night I, along with about 50 people were waiting for a table in the bar at The Waterfront restaurant in West Des Moines. One couple was ruining the air the other 48 were breathing along with the clothing they wore; not to mention the food they were eating and the drinks they drank. They could have cared less about the other 48 customers. There they sat at the bar in the corner with an ashtray in front of each, cigarettes smoldering without regard to anyone else’s “constitutional rights”. The Hawaii Bar “Moaners” Association already argued the Constitution from some unknown planet. And Judge McKenna did what any judge would have to do, he dismissed the law suit.

Fred, my good friend, as Inigo Montoya said to Vizzini in The Princess Bride, “I do not think that word means what you think it means.”

April 14, 2007

Aloha Members !
As you all must know by now, this past week was very difficult.

First, on Tuesday, the 10th, Senator Sam Slom's floor amendment to HB1018 was voted against. This would have allowed for a new liquor classification to exempt them from the smoking ban. This was really our last shot at the legislature this year. I believe that the regular session ends in the first week of May.

Secondly, the very next day, on Wednesday the 11th, our law suit against the State of Hawaii was dismissed by Judge McKenna. But the good news is, she dismissed it without prejudice. What this means, is that we can still challenge the law based, on the constitutionality of it, if and when someone or some establishment, gets cited and or fined. The court did not want to rule on a hypothetical situation.

According to our Attorney, Paul Yamamura, we could re-file the complaint alleging actual money damages as a result of the smoking law, but we would each have to show actual monetary losses that we incurred and not just percentages of business downturn. At this point, we are trying to regroup and figure out a different strategy. We may have lost this battle, but WE WILL WIN this war.

I would like to thank Sam Kekaula and his contingent from Kailua-Kona, I think they had about 12 members in all, for coming to the hearing on Tuesday. I'm sorry that I can't remember all of your names, but thank you for your sacrifice of time and expense of travel, to help support our organization.

As always, we are open for any suggestions and or recommendations and input that will help build and strengthen this organization. Till next week, Aloha !!!

Fred Remington
President
Hawaii Bar Owners Association
307 Lewers St. Suite #200
Honolulu, HI 96815
926-4711 office
924-5420 fax
479-0782 cell

You might want to consider going back to selling wine because the whine you’re trying to sell isn’t of the quality we are used to buying. Filing this lawsuit was the same as trying to climb the Cliff of Insanity.

“Fred, do you have six fingers?”

And what about those other people affected by second hand smoke? You know the ones whose lungs you’re polluting, clean clothes you’re ruining and meals you’re degrading as they enter those establishments to which I’ll compare to the “Pit of Despair”. Have you thought about their constitutional rights? You know the same ones, who as customers you promise a nice dining experience, then take their money and allow the smoking customers to invade the space they paid for. Or don’t they have the same constitutional rights? (Like I said, “I don’t think that word means what you think it means.”) And don’t tell me about smoking sections in restaurants. Smoking sections in a room would be similar to peeing sections in swimming pools. Under your constitution do people have a right to pee in a public swimming pool? I’m back to The Princess Bride. Like I said, “I don’t think that word means what you think it means.”

Health issues aside let’s just talk about my right to enjoy for what I’ve paid. Wearing clothes just back from the dry cleaners ($$$) my date and I sit down in a public restaurant; spend $25.00 on drinks and a $100.00 on a nice meal. As we bite into this tasty morsel the chef has labored to create, the guy who arrived thirty minutes before us lights up a cigarette and ruins the meal for both of us. After we “enjoy” his cigarette smoke we have to go home to shower and change our clothes because neither of us smoke and can’t stand the smell of cigarette smoke on our clothes and skin. If I have this same “constitutional right” then why can’t I during the smokers’ meal walk over to their table and throw cigarette butts on their entree? Don’t I too have a constitutional right to ruin their meal? And how about if bring along some really cheap cologne and perfume to throw all over their clothes? You get my point, they aren’t just rude and insensitive, they are downright obnoxious about what they do. Perhaps if smokers had been more considerate there would be no need to ban it. But they weren’t, aren’t and never will be. They are self absorbed addicts with no hint of common sense. (Like I said, “I don’t think that word means what you think it means.”)

What about the health effects? Are their any? Is there a constitutional right to slowly kill yourself and to take with you victims using second hand smoke? Back-in-the-day, as my son’s so fondly refer to the past, when my father started smoking it was the manly thing to do. For dad he started when he was 13 and working at the soda depot delivering to stores. By the time dad reached age 35 when the doctor diagnosed lung cancer, until age 37, from my point of view it didn’t seem all that manly. My dad was laid up in bed at home for a long long long time. He spent the last six months of his life in a hospital probably hooked up to machines and puking his guts out from the chemo therapy and radiation treatment. I’ll have to guess because no one would let my sister and us four boys in to see him those last six months. Of course at age 12, everything seems like a long time when you’re waiting for someone to die. One bright sunny day dad called me into his bed room, saying he had something to show me. While lifting up his t-shirt to show me the brass staples that held the 24 inch surgical incision closed, he said “I’m showing you this because I want you to know what smoking will do to you. I want you never to smoke.” Of course when he died I was 13 and at 13, your father is nearly the dumbest person on the planet. So I did try smoking for about a year and a half and then figured out maybe on this point I should concede his argument. My initial argument was, as Vizzini is quoted as saying,

“Inconceivable!”

To what constitution do you smoker’s right people refer? Does it apply to everyone or just bar people? What about the waitresses, waiters, bouncers and bar tenders who don’t smoke and have to work in the smoke filled environment? Don’t they too have this same “constitutional right?” Where exactly is this constitution kept because I’d like to read it?

Today you bar owners who protest get to play the six-fingered man. It’s a line from The Princess Bride. Allow me to conclude this point of view by borrowing a line from the movie.

My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die.

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