You take a product that damages America. Smokers cost more in health care, they addict American children, and they damage our health and comfort. You compare that product to FOODS you don’t like to smell.

Your right to swing your fist stops short of my nose. Why not carcinogens? I have no objection to banning it but frankly, smokers owe the people’s life you have degraded far more than you’ve paid.

If your brain was not fogged by your addiction, you’d realize that you are being given a choice. Rise above your addiction and ban it from your own life.

I don’t smoke, but if you want, I have friends in Iowa — and one just across the river from Burlington, over here in IL — who would pick up a carton or three for me if I asked…. Just say the word.

And, oh yeah: can we ban Brussels Sprouts while we’re at it? Those things smell *nasty* even when they’re just growing in the fields.

The government needs less, not more money. I enjoy reading how people on here are all for these types of draconian measures becasue it no longer impacts them. Just wait until they start yanking up the taxes on potato chips and cheeseburgers. We’ll see how the minds change.

What excessive and discriminatory taxation WILL do is endanger your re-election! The government is sticking its nose into our lives far too often and too deeply. I believe that less government is required, not more! I don’t need a nanny. I’m 65 years old and will actively campaign for the removal of office of all you nosey parkers!

When I was a smoker, years ago my country club began to restrict smoking. It didn’t take long for the board to discover that unlike government, they don’t have exclusive power. 30% of a membership that smokes is quite a large loss of dues. They made accommodations and all were happy. Like the tax on cigarets, it is amazing how quickly non-smokers faced with massive loss of revenue will accommodate when a burden would fall upon them. That is what Rick is talking about, liberal self interest should not give conservatives cover. We should stand against this bogus tax burden and force liberals to ban tobacco or offer my policy for eradication.

Could I have permission to reprint this with attribution on cigardiary.com?

Consumption taxes have long been used to simultaneously generate revenue for the government and to discourage use of particular substances. I invoke the Founders to demonstrate that this is as appropriate a use of the government’s taxation power as an import duty. I cited before to Hamilton, but consider also that George Washington (successfully) led troops into battle to preserve the government’s right to tax whiskey. Come to think of it, the government STILL taxes whiskey more than it does other kinds of things we might consume.

Since I like to have a drink now and then, I too am a “victim” of this “tax-but-not-ban” policy, even though I’m not a smoker. But you won’t hear me complaining that I pay more taxes on my booze than I do on my bananas. There are two reasons for this.

First, even if, in theory, we were to accept that the government properly has no power to tax something consumable but does have the power to ban it instead, that doesn’t mean that it’s a good policy to ban a consumable substance. We already tried that once. Prohibition demonstrated why (and I believe the War on Drugs again demonstrates why) banning a substance is bad social policy.

Second, I don’t accept your argument that the government lacks power to tax a particular substance, or the corollary argument that even if it can, it shouldn’t. Taxes on discretionary, consumable items are an effective blend of fiscal and social policy and they are well within the legitimate power of the government. I may not particularly like it, especially when I’m the one targeted to pay the tax, but then again I don’t like paying income taxes either but I still do that.

Be realistic — a ban wouldn’t stop you from smoking. But it would drive you to buy your cigarettes from a street dealer, just as if you were a crackhead, and with all the same risks the crackhead faces.

Your complaint should not be that there are special taxes on cigarettes. It’s better addressed to the amount of the tax. Sirius’ argument — if taxes on cigarettes become insanely high then a black market will form just as if there were prohibition — is a much stronger one than the argument than “ban it, don’t tax it.” But a ban would guarantee that such a black market would form.