CAUSING DIVISION BETWEEN NEIGHBOURS

ASH is at it again in ensuring huge social divisions, violence and trouble become mainstream in their desire to eradicate tobacco and criminalise its consumers.

They have come up with a plan to encourage hatred of law abiding residents who smoke. No doubt the idea is make smokers eventually homeless.

This is not about health nor is it about consideration. It is about creating a climate where law abiding smokers can be bullied by smokerphobic intolerant neighbours.

ASH can only achieve its dream of destroying the tobacco industry by attacking its customers and creating such social divisions - as if they haven't done enough damage to the social fabric of this country already.

Most smokers are so browbeaten, they will probably take the bullying and do as they are told in their own homes by neighbours who have no right to dictate how they live.

But others will no doubt give interferring neighbours a punch on the nose which is just what ASH wants and why it has decided to cause trouble in communitites that until now have happily lived side by side.

ASH is disgusting. The Govt might as well fund the BNP to make immigration policy. The outcome will be the same.

The Govt should hang it's head in shame at supporting a move aimed at dividing communities.

And if you think this won't affect you because you don't smoke, then just wait until your neighbour has the right to force their way into your home, to check your fridge, and ensure that you are eating properly and feeding your kids in line with Govt or fake charity diktat.

It's already started and at the rate these things move, give it less than five years after smoking is banned in people's own private homes and it will be a reality.

If you're sure you don't want that then do nothing to help smokers now and you will surely get it.

FINALLY - THE TRUTH EMERGES

Thanks to Anon in the comments on the previous post for drawing my attention to this Radio Five debate yesterday.

I hear Frank Davis is going to transcribe the whole thing at some point today.

In the radio interview with presenter Nicky Campbell, Witchfinder General Debs Arnott finally admits the goal is "to get rid of smoking" at 31 mins in.

She also lies when asked about ASH's funding. Yes, they do steal cash from the likes of the BHF and CRUK, that should be using their funds for medical research to find cures for these illnesses that claim many lives, because that is what people donate to them for, but because both orgs are heavily funded by Big Pharma, the deal is that they must also fund propaganda at ASH covertly or indirectly so that ASH can push people towards Big Pharma's products.

At 41 mins into the radio debate, an oncologist member of the BMA says smoking can be good for you. She claims, and I agree, that this latest lying propaganda from the BMA is counter productive. She also says HPV must be present before smoking causes lung cancer. Smoking does not cause it on its own.

I feel a bit sorry for this lady doctor because I feel sure her job in now in jeopardy. Anyone who dares go "off message" and give some actual facts on smoking and health is usually hounded out of their profession.

Meanwhile it seems that some local people are angry with Smoke Free Lincs - a public funded alleged public service that has shown itself up as a bigoted liar by backing a false and invented study made up by the BMA to push through a car ban to aid in the further denormalisation of smokers and ultimate eradication of a legal product and the criminalsation of its consumers.

I'm told people can comment on the Smoke Free Lincs site and tell them how unhappy they are that this organisation prefers to deal in lies than truth and giving a disservice to people rather than truthful, helpful, and factual health information to enable them to make the right choices.

Do feel free to add your own comments informing Smoke Free Lincs that lies are completely unacceptable and innapropriate in the smoking and health debate.

** One final point that has occurred to me is that the Radio interview also showed up state health persecutor Anne Milton as a liar. You may recall she told me that no decision had been taken on this year's funding to ASH - but this lie is exposed by Deb Arnott who told the world that the DoH funds the quango.

UPDATE : The BMA has finally retracted its claim and admits it lied but it has now made up a new figure and expects us all to believe it. The organisation's credibility has already been compromised.

The fact is, the research and study the BMA mentions was never done. It doesn't exist. It was a lie built up from a random newspaper quote left by a smokerphobic on a forum so I, for one, can't see that it makes a difference whether they say 23 times or 11 times. No study - no fact. Just another new guesstimate for effect.

DoH PLANS PUBLIC SCAM

Via Belinda at F2C Scotland it seems the anti-smoker propaganda rag the so-called "Independent" reports :



The government is to launch an official consultation on removing all promotional packaging from cigarettes by the end of the year



Heh heh heh - yeah right. We all know how "public consultation" works these days don't we.



The anti-smoker industry and it's Big Pharma backed fake "charity" front groups will muscle support from among their own ranks. They will make it appear as if the "public" has spoken while carrying out a campaign using gullible journalists, like the Indy hack, to make it seem as if Big Bad Big Tobacco, and it's disorganised hacked off consumers, have somehow bought and paid for whatever support they can muster up from those little people the DoH has already dismissed as "scum."



And indeed the DoH knows exactly what it is going to do before this laughable NuConcept of "public consultation" has even been carried out.



Sources in the Department of Health said there was unlikely to be any move soon but they were keen to look at all the benefits and potential problems with a packaging ban early so it could be implemented if it was seen to work in Australia.



Oh yes, Fascist Aussie PM Julia Gillard has done so damn well it looks as if her Smokerphobia is causing her to commit Political suicide. Something the ConDems will also realise to their cost at next election as the real, grass roots, public sees no change on lifestyle health policy between them and the awful NuLabour luvvies.



It seems pretty obvious these days that no matter what party the public votes in, the DoH still rules the nation and can even force ministers who have their doubts to get on board the Smokerphobic band waggon with their scaremongering and unproven allegations.



In the past the tobacco industry has been suspected of funding campaigns fronted by small retailers to prevent further restrictions on sales.



"That was certainly what I was told when I was Health Secretary," said the former Labour minster Andy Burnham."But I have to say I never saw any proof."



Obviously not, because the alleged "proof" is only the paranoia in the minds of the DoH and it's front group ASH that was set up by Govt under the guise of the Royal College of Physicians in 1971. This was Greedy DoH chief medical officer and smokerphobic George Godber's idea to do something about tobacco when there was absolutely not one jot of grass roots support for it by any member of the public at that time. Support has been created by the lies these people have spouted to justify their funding to force through this DoH ideology.



Forest, by comparision, often called a Tobacco Industry Front Group by the Anti-smoker industry, is very much a grass roots organisation and should be the first to be on board with any public consultation.



It was set up by an ordinary member of the public who had been attacked on a railway station because of the phobia encouraged by ASH.



Thank God it gets funding from the tobacco industry which is the least the industry can do for its grass roots consumers who deserve to be heard during this scam of "consultation" but won't be.

ASH LOVE HOCKNEY'S NEW WORK

Oooh - I do love David Hockney. The image above is his latest piece of artwork designed to show the meaning of freedom.



It is called Freedom Is Choice and of course it is whatever psychobabble the fake charity ASH and its cronies spout to create fear and loathing of smokers and redefine the meaning of this important concept. Being free to chose to consume a legal product is obviously a main plank of what freedom is about. Hockney said :



"Pettiness, meanness, dreariness. That's all I see from them. Meanness of spirit is very bad for the health no matter how long you live. Can't they look into their own hearts and understand that many people in England are fed up with unthinking, bossy-boots politicians that believe us to be infants."



He could be talking about ASH here. The very organisation that would scurrilously claim that smokers kill others without being honest about the methods by which this ludicrous and slanderous claim is reached. With ventilation now so efficient it can make the air inside cleaner than outside, and a choice of venue if only we were free to chose one, all make the claim that smoking harms others defunct.



*



ASH Scotland tweeted news of Hockney's new work, which was retweeted by Chris Snowdon. I guess they must like it. I've just been over there to have a look if they had anymore to say about it on their website and I feel quite dirty now so I'll have to rush of and have a bath after posting this in case I catch their prejudice and stupidity in some kind of fourth hand way.



They say they work to stop children and young people smoking and yet they create panic among Scottish politicians to "do something" which creates the perfect climate for a rise in child and youth smoking.



I mean this ridiculous idea to force tobacconists to register as evil drug barons to sell cigarettes will not have one iota of effect given that the growing and lucrative black market, supported and encouraged by ASH's policies, do not have to comply with the same policy.



Way to go ASH - it looks like you're obviously on the side of Big Tobacco after all.



* I don't know how to take a screen shot so I reproduced ASH Scotland's tweet the old fashioned way - printed, scanned in and uploaded.



UPDATE : My technical expert teenage son showed me how to do it. That's two new skills I've learned today. Thanks Frank Davis for the other one.

SUPPORT FAIRNESS AND CHOICE

I see that Antony Worrall Thompson's E-Petition has finally been accepted by Govt. It is now the duty of everyone in this movement to do all they can to promote it and encourage others to sign.



Forest is making cards that can be given out to people who are not online and I am more than willing to help distribute these to smokers and their non-smoker friends both inside and outside of pubs and other hospitality establishments. I think all of us who have been making a noise online should get behind this and do our bit.







Of course there are other petitions which we should also sign and ask others to support. Links can be found at the end of this post. I've also signed this one although I do think ASH's days of leeching from the public purse are almost over. The DoH has achieved it's aim of promoting anti-smokerism to the point of smokerphobia among the general public by using ASH as a front group.



State health persecutor Anne Milton has already told me twice that no decision has been taken on whether ASH will be awarded our cash in 2011/2012. Maybe she doesn't need them anymore or recognises that now Big Pharma picks up most of ASH's tab.



I agree with Dick Puddlecote that we need to share AWT's E-petition around the web. I'll be posting links on Twitter and Facebook every day and there is a direct link to the E-petition on the left hand side of this blog.



All we are really asking for here is choice and fairness for both sides of this debate. I fail to see why such simple moral qualities are so hard to get back in our society.



Getting back some sort of perspective and common sense on the smoking issue is also why I've also signed this one calling for the price of tobacco in the UK to be made the same as the EU. I think it could be better worded but for me the only way to ensure that young people do not start smoking before they are old enough to make their own, informed choices, is to end the lucrative, unregulated, black market trade. This has become strong and dangerous because of prohibition and the unrealistic high cost of legal tobacco.

THE TRUTH IS TO BE HIDDEN

My, my, my - just because a tobacco company exercises it's right to find out on what alleged scientific basis academics are trotting out constant propaganda on the dangers of smoking the anti-smoker industry starts to cry like a spoiled child and demands that it's planned eradication of tobacco and criminalisation of its consumers is kept hidden from public scrutiny.

Can this hateful, fraudulent cause really get any more corrupt? I really don't think so.

Thanks Phillip Morris for trying at least. One would hope that one day in the not too distant future, these lying academics and their paymasters either directly or indirectly from the Big Pharma and smokerphobia inspired industries like ASH will be held to account and arrested for hate crime.

UPDATE : According to The Tobacco Reporter the FoI watchdog has ordered Stirling Uni to hand over its research to PMI for analysis. Perhaps the naive Herald reporter who was fed the Uni's "evil tobacco" headline is feeling a bit silly now. He certainly should be.

Journalism has taken a thrashing of late with the unethical standards of the News of the World staff tainting all of the profession. It doesn't need to be brought down further by biased reporters happily feeding off self interest groups because they can't be bothered to look at both sides of the story.

DEALING WITH DEBS

Dave Atherton from Freedom to Choose was invited to debate the smoking issue with head ASH harridan Debs Arnott and I know who came out as the reasonable one.

Debs did her usual trick of trying to discredit the opposition and dismissed Dave as "not an expert" but then Debs herself hasn't got a degree in Epidemiology either but I wouldn't be surprised if she has one in the dark art of spin AKA professional lying.

It was quite a sad event to see her desperately pumping out old propaganda on Japanee housewives which Dave discredited in an instant because he is well informed and he does his research.

You see smokerphobes like Debs will never know the truth about smoking because my guess is that she's never done it or she's one of these former part time, temporary smokers who had a go, didn't like it, quit and then began to moralise about others who chose to continue - or she's the sort who was bullied into quitting and thinks that now gives her the right to shove other people around.

I've had my share of anti-smokers telling me they know better than I do about the effects of smoking despite my 43 years experience of active smoking from childhood, smoking when pregnant, and being a baby born from a smoker's womb. But they are still arrogant enough to think they know better.

For two days I've been given a right verbal kicking, hounded and insulted, debating with antis who just get more and more bizarre each time with new and wonderful health scare inventions.

They really do believe that tobacco is as dangerous as the fall out from Chernobyl but this fear is born from a phobia and not scientific investigation. I really think they need psychological help. I never expected that care in the community would mean the nutters making public policy even when no one has elected them to do it.

Dave says on his Facebook page that he has always been a polite smoker. I used to be that but now the law dictates where I can and can't smoke, I'm afraid the gloves are off. I am as nasty as those who are nasty to me. You can't debate with these people because their minds are poisoned.

I don't want this fight but they started it by forcing me into a position of self defence. They have caused the biggest ever social division in this country than I have ever seen in my lifetime.

They have given bigots a group of people they can legally hate. One dickhead on the Echo debate even said banning smokers from employment was a good thing. "It'll make them stop" he said even though I pointed out that it would make them starve. He thought that was hilarious and then they wonder why we get so angry.

Debs says in the CNN interview that smokers have no rights and we are second class citizens. I wonder if that is what Govt is paying her for. I've said before this Govt is corrupt. Debs has proved it. Any Govt that gets into bed with that bigoted hag is not looking at the issue in the round but being fed nonsense that it swallows either because our leaders are stupid or because they hate smokers too.

In any debate on this issue, the only fair outcome and the bottom line is choice. Choice for smokers to meet other smokers and socialise in peace without harassment and choice for non-smokers who don't like being around smokers. Most don't care and enjoy smokers' company because they have not been taught yet to hate us. Anti-smokers are a different breed who design new ways to punish us. They deserve an island to themselves away from decent people.

They drive their car, take planes, abuse our environment how they will and then moan about how ONLY tobacco is a health risk and everything they do is fine. They make judgements on people who smoke - filthy, dirty, selfish, addicts - and yet they know nothing of any of us, how much we smoke, where, when, or even why, and what we teach our children about smoking. They are convinced that as soon as a baby pops it's head out of the womb, a smoker will pop a fag in its gob and light it up.

And those heroines who take control of their own bodies and children from the fanatical clutches of the anti-smoking industry are simply and unfairly thrown to the media dogs.

Leg Iron's post also shows how it is only the anti-smokers who keep smoking in the public eye - perhaps they really want a new generation to despise because where would they be without the hate of a selective group that brings them so much comfort?

During my debates on forums yesterday and today, one anti was arrogant enough to say : "All smokers want to quit. Those who say they do not are lying."

Another said we have no rights and yet I would argue that the anti-smokers right to this mythical "clean air" ends where our right to association begins.

Then there are those we've never met who insist they are only trying to protect us from ourselves and want to help us. Why? That is not their aim. Worst still is when they try and tell us what we should or shouldn't do with our own families. To use their twee and infantile phrase I say : "butt out" of our business.

Hopefully, Dave's exposure of horrid little bigot Arnott in public is the first step back to normality, common sense and what we want - a life in peace free from harassment where we can socialise a million miles away from people like Debs who take hate as their guide, lies as their evidence, and profit as their reward.

Dave has shown the wider public that smokers - especially lifelong smokers - know better than anyone about smoking especially those who have never smoked.

Debs on the other hand came across as desperate, scared, and like a rabbit caught in headlights. One must ask if Govt backs her stance that we are second class citizens.

I'm sure whatever we say Debs will just schream and schream until she's sthick before running off to tell tales to her friends Mr Lansley and Nanny Milton to sort out the nasty smokers who won't play her game and accept their own Denormalisation.

That woman needs to get a life and stop scrounging tax payers money for her living. She's worse than a benefit fraudster because she takes far more than she deserves by lying her way to the bank.

I do so hope her days are numbered but we will have to wait and see how corrupt this NuGovt is.

I can't embed the video code but Dave's CNN interview is here Enjoy

MINISTER ADMITS DoH CORRUPTION

Well, well, well, junior state health persecutor Nanny Milton has openly admitted that the Govt's tobacco control policy is corrupt and designed by political lobbyists and Big Pharmaceutical vested interests.

In an answer to a Parliamentary question, Milton said the Govt didn't give a stuff about those who had voted Tory nor did it care about law abiding ordinary people or legal business.

Instead, it pays political lobby groups like ASH - which it hides behind "charity" status so its dodgy dealings can't be found through Freedom of Information requests - and only listens to big Corporate interests which compete directly with Big Tobacco companies who are not allowed to be heard along with their legal consumers who are being punished for not wanting to quit.

This would be the same Pharmaceutical Industry that uses Govt to push harmful drugs which kill smokers but they continue to be prescribed because the Govt says smokers don't matter and they are trying to purge us from society so death or quit makes no difference.

It seems that Nanny Milton is openly acknowledging that the publically funded Department of Vested Interests, AKA the DoH, is lobbied by organisations funded by the DoH, and is only happy to speak to those that share it's corruption in making Big Pharma richer and poor smokers criminals because they won't buy Big P's quit products.

And I thought Tories were for free market competition and not about making laws that allow one competitor to prosper at the expense of a rival.

Fair play on the only honest politician in Govt at present for asking the question of Milton. Personally I'd like to know if she is also being paid by Big Pharma to give it an unfair competitive advantage like her predecessor Pat Hewitt - the Taxi For Hire Minister who was paid £3000 per day to advance the interests of corporate Big Pharma in the making of Govt policy.

I repeat what I said above. This corrupt Conservative Govt hides ASH's main function - political lobbying - behind charity status so we can never learn how much it is paying our so called elected representatives to make the policy it wants making.

Philip Davies asked the Secretary of State for Health :

If he will make it his policy to require that organisations which engage with his Department on tobacco control issues disclose whether they are linked to or receive funding from (a) the pharmaceutical industry and (b) the public purse. [54656]

Nanny Milton - presumably in the absence of Big Bully Boss Andrew Lansley replied:

The Government are under obligation to protect tobacco control from the vested interests of the tobacco industry, under The World Health Organisation’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
Our policy on this is set out in Chapter 10 of “Healthy Lives, Healthy People: A Tobacco Control Plan for England ”. This does not extend beyond the tobacco industry and the Department, as with all other policy areas, engages with a wide range of stakeholders including the pharmaceutical industry, organisations in receipt of funding from the pharmaceutical industry and organisations in receipt of funding from the public purse.

The other question I'd really like to know is who the hell voted anyone in from the WHO into Westminster? I'm pretty sure there were no candidates from that organisation on my ballot paper last May.

So now the secret is out. Milton has admitted for all to hear that the current Govt is corrupt and it doesn't care about it's voters so smoking Tory voters - have your eyes been opened yet or will you still vote for more persecution from the thoroughly dishonest Conservative Govt that panders to Big Industry and lobbyists who are making the policy that you expected to be made by those you voted for?

If you vote Conservative again, you deserve all you get but ordinary hard working law abiding, tax paying smokers do not.

THERE IS NO SAFE LEVEL OF GOVT STUPIDITY

Alan Johnson, the creep who made smokerphobia compulsory during his time in Govt, was on BBC Question Time the other night and the very sight of him almost caused me to burst a blood vessel. He is so bad for health, they should ban him from all public places.

I could feel my fingernails gripping tighter into the arms of the settee as he opened his mouth and started talking. Those dodgy, used car salesman, slitty eyes narrowed further as he spewed forth his congratulations to the NuConservatives for implementing his policy on further denormalisation of tobacco consumers.

Yes, they'd have us stigmatised for the crime of buying a legal product we've enjoyed for decades by making it damn near impossible for us to buy it in the UK. First the tobacco display ban, next plain packaging after the charade of the fake consultation.

Meanwhile these monumental acts of stupidity, born from an ideologically obsessive healthist stance, have made smoking infinitely more dangerous, especially for the poor and the young, and deprived the UK treasury of some £4B in lost tax as this Panorama investigation shows.

Wittingly or unwittingly, these puritans are falling into the trap laid for them by smoker haters such as Action on Smoking and Health the charity founded to help smokers but has now become a greedy, far right wing lobby group that gobbles public money for its twisted cause to force smokers out of society by any means.

How much ASH costs the UK treasury from smokers who legally go abroad to avoid the fuss and tax must be equal to that of the cost of the black market.

What a great achievement but public opinion could not be twisted without the morality of Govt behind it - hence the smoking ban had to come first. Previous Govts have sensibly stayed out of the argument and let market forces decide.

It was only when Bigot Johnson's NuLabour weirdos swallowed hook, line and sinker every lie pushed down our throats during the first 10 years of their power. Arnott even took the piss out of her new paymasters. She explained how the con was pulled on a public that frankly didn't give a damn about smoking one way or the other :

It is essential that campaigners create the impression of inevitable success. Campaigning of this kind is literally a confidence trick: the appearance of confidence both creates confidence and demoralises the opposition. The week before the free vote we made sure the government got the message that we "knew" we were going to win and it would be better for them to be on the winning side.
(Deborah Arnott and Ian Willmore; July 2006)

No wonder both smoking and non smoking voters who fight against smokerphobia are flocking to the only party that speaks common sense on this issue. Even the NuGovt has to admit UKIP is best for the UK after swiping UKIP policy which it is claiming as its own.

Smokers who care about this cause have a duty to vote UKIP. The hate won't end unless Govt ends it and it seems that the NuTories are tainted with the same level of stupidity as NuLabour. You can expect years more pain under them.

PERPETUAL ANGER

Twice in two days I've launched into a random rant about the smoking issue and I've realised that I've been in perpetual rage since July 2007. It isn't getting any better despite my wish that it would.

I never felt this way before and I don't think that anger will abate until the fraudulent anti-smoking industry stops funding untruthful propaganda designed to stigmatise smokers with a daily drip feed of hate designed to socially exclude them and bully them whenever the occasion arises.

The industry, which depends on the harassment of smokers for profit and the naivety of Govt minister to push it's fraud into policy, is calling the Tobacco Display Ban an urgent matter of child protection.

As usual it is out of touch with reality but it is more about the Denormalisation aspect of promoting - again by daily drip feed - "smokers as child abusers" rather than any real and meaningful effort to protect children from taking up smoking.

They say :

The tobacco industry depends for its future on recruiting and addicting new consumers, many of whom begin smoking as children. Such legal challenges are undoubtedly costly to government in terms of both legal fees and time spent defending these public health measures through the courts. However the costs to our society run deeper still, and will be measured in lives lost as this lethal and addictive product continues to recruit new users.

Note how they deliberately use the word "addictive" and their emotive use of children as human shields. But they are talking about a time more familiar to my childhood over 40 years ago. Perhaps they haven't noticed how much has changed or they are so dependant on their jobs that they have to keep on coming up with new scare tactics to frighten the public. Perhaps they are just being deliberately fraudulent with a view to influencing policy against smokers because they hate them. It's hard not to think this given what they have done and it's hard to think they care about children. I am the childhood smoker they want to eventually criminalise as an adult because I wasn't of the generation that heard their message.

ASH's insane idea to ban sales of tobacco - which is what will happen as a result of their madness because of the costly charge of shop refits - will force open the black market and lead kids of any age to get tobacco far more easily, and drugs if the baccy man has those in his stash too.

As a child smoker who took up the habit aged 8 years old, I know that what they are proposing will only make the situation worse. So much has changed since I used to go to the shop with my dinner money and I know for a fact that responsible shop owners haven't sold to under 16s (which used to be the law) in 30 years.

Yes, some get caught out but usually because the anti-smoking industry has set a trap by deliberately sending in older looking youths to further their argument for a ban. They are creating a problem that isn't there because it helps to take forward their ideology of tobacco eradication and stigmatisation of legal businesses and adults associated with tobacco consumption and sales.

If they get their way, tobacco use will go undeground like drug use and, well, we all know that kids today don't use drugs because they are not on sale down the local shop or supermarket.

I mean, I must be be on something myself when I sit through court cases such as that of a 17 year old girl with a £200 a day heroin habit.

What makes me so angry these days is the pure unintellectual rubbish that those who you would expect to know better take on board without even consulting with anyone else who might have useful and specialist information to add.

They will not work with us for the greater good of everyone because we are "the enemy" - not Big Tobacco but the little man or woman. And it's the poor they get at most because as the weakest members of our society they can. While the rich can smoke, drink and eat themselves to excess, the poor are denied simple pleasures because of, well, being poor.

That inequality angers me and I rage because decades ago we decided as a society that stigmatisation, bullying and harrassment was wrong and equality was right. We even had laws to protect people from being sacked from jobs, or discriminated in the workplace because of their lifestyles and yet no law exists to protect smokers from being sacked for being smokers or being refused jobs because of being a smoker.

A friend told me about photoassist.com, a photo agency, which she says prefers non-smoker employees but expects smokers to sign a pledge to say they won't smoke at work. That is the law so it's insulting and I'm sure they don't ask those who like alcohol, or the occasional glass of wine to sign any pledge not to drink at work or eat unhealthy food. Perhaps that's coming. The barriers to fairness have been smashed down.

Why this kind of harassment is being legalised by Govts on the fraud of the Unelected smoke free industry made up of ASH, their partners, and their pharmaceutical bedfellows is beyond me. I've never understood it and that angers me too. I find these days that it takes just a mention of the smoking issue to make me fly into rage.

The first rant this week was at the check out at Iceland when the cashier told me how her husband was photographed by the local press in a sort of "show and shame" piece about the problem of smokers outside of hospitals.

We were chatting about the local Netto up the road being taken over by Asda and supermarket shopping generally as my junk food/ microwave specials were passed through the barcode reader. She said she liked Morrison's and smoking came up when I told her we boycotted that store because they sacked two employees at Christmas for smoking in the car park.

She's a non-smoker supporter of choice. She doesn't like smoking next to her but she has no problem at all with separate areas in public places or separate public places. What got me angry was how embarrassed she was at her husband's actions. I said she was supposed to feel like that because of the whole "Denormalisation" and pro-stigmatisation programme. I said she should have been proud of him.

I also went off on one yesterday during a debate about the BBC's alleged "impartiality." I said the smoking issue was a prime example of how the BBC doesn't present both sides and indulges in press release propaganda on this issue.

The BBC's coverage of Communist USA's New York outdoor smoking ban, for example, has not one word from the other side of the debate nor does the BBC care how people - especially the elderly - will be affected by this.

If the BBC cared to ask they would soon learn that this issue has nothing to do with smoking.

During my ranting debate with a colleague, it was said that the broadcaster, nor any other "responsible" media, would want to do anything that could be accused of promoting smoking because whatever we think about choice, smoking is "bad for you."

They don't even ask if we promote smoking - they assume we do and don't care that they are slandering us. They don't ever report, for example, that we just want to be left alone and want the harassment to end but we don't go around telling people to take up smoking.

In the same way the Broadcaster harasses young and vulnerable families with children who can't afford a TV licence, they also use the power of their partciular media and influence to stigmatise smokers. The BBC is on board with the plan. Perhaps it doesn't realise how much it has been used.

The BBC has never, for example, even bothered to debate the alleged stance that "smoking kills and is bad for you."

I believe that for some people it is "bad" but not all and that is the risk we take. If the effects of smoking on smokers is different, and if genetics has at least something to do with the illnesses we get, that might explain why some die after a few years of smoking while others smoke from childhood to 100 years old and stay in relative good health their whole lives.

The antis say these people are in the minority - well they are anyway - but actually when it comes to smokers, those who die young are unfortunately in the minority.

As a child smoker with no legislation at the time to protect me - except for my mother's back hand if she caught me at it - and as an adult who has always smoked and fears that quitting could seriously damage my health, I still wait for serious and truthful research to be done on why some die young and others smoke unaffected. Inconvenient maybe but true none the less.

Tobacco used in moderation can be good for you actually. Before the propaganda, health promotion, EU directives, changes in legislation, public health programmes, nannying and now nudging, doctors would tell patients to smoke moderately for their health in some circumstances. A non-smoking young colleague was told recently that smoking can ease endometriosis, ironically because she doesn't smoke nor wants to take it up.

A real medical nurse friend of mine with 30 years experience also said two or three cigarettes a day sorts out irritable bowel syndrome. Tobacco is a herb, despite being maligned as a "drug" to hype up the "addiction" angle. When I read the ingredients on a packet of Boots own brand herbal seasick pills the other day, I noted tabacum was one of the ingredients. So it's OK to use the natural product when packaged and pushed by Big Pharma but somehow wrong to buy it from Big "evil" Tobacco.

The word is getting out via blogs, and the recent good news in Holland which has negotiated some fairness back on to the agenda is testament to that, but it seems the corrupted UK State institutions are trying to stop us from talking because they don't like what we say.

It seems other people across the world are raging as much as me but for different reasons. If the oppressive states of Britain and the USA are anything to go by then the likes of Egypt would be well advised to avoid democracy which in this NuWorld is simply about elective dictatorship and doing as you are told by the state.

All freedom has gone. The anti-smoker industry murdered it and until they back off, I fear my rage will continue and my compulsion for this tiresome battle will never end.

ASH BAN FUNDS TERRORISM

So ASH are stamping their feet and demanding a tobacco display ban.

Perhaps they should be warned that THIS could be the result.

Does the NuGovt really want to take the risk of falling for ASH's folly in the face of such warnings - especially given that they lied to push through this particular bad economic idea?

Now supporting it in the face of these warnings would be an act of monumental stupidity, would it not?

ASH SPOOF BLOG PINS DOWN LIES

News that ASH Scotland's main harridan Shiela Duffy now has her own blog has been met with astonishment that she closed the comments which is just not part of blogging etiquette.

With this in mind, someone has set up a spoof copy to enable people to take her to task for her lies and misinformation.

A lot of the comments HERE are angry ones and not related particularly to the debate of how ASH conned the public with false information on the tobacco display ban but fair enough.

We have taken insult after insult from this organisation so I, for one, have no problem in seeing them get back some of the anger they have created in their long history of lying.

At least Ms Duffy can't get away with just telling us what to do and how to think based on her blog. We will have our say!

FACT AND LOONS

I was going to write about the psychopathic (I,m told I have to make my opinion based on fact clear for those who are too stupid to distinguish between the two) ranters in the comments section of the Daily Mail but Dick Puddlecote describes it far better than I could.

While these idiots (opinion)who are so health obsessed (opinion) that they believe the crap on 3rd hand smoke (opinion) astounds me. (Fact.)

Meanwhile one of the orchestrators (fact) of the scam (fact) that is third hand smoke Shiela Duffy at ASH has started her own blog which doesn't welcome debate. (fact)

My guess (obviously opinion) is that she's scared (opinion) of debate in case the arguments used to encourage the above loons (opinion) soon begin to fall apart (Fact.)

I hope I've made myself clear.

NOT IN MY NAME

I am constantly fed up with the anti-smoking company ASH crowing that it speaks for smokers. It does not. It hates us.

It has literally turned my stomach to see their galling press releases that say such things "Smokers want more restrictions." No they don't and ASH does not speak for me or any other smoker.

This is the latest piece of propaganda that they have put out. Simon at Taking Liberties might think it's hilarious. Some might say desperate. ASH thinks it can trot out that somehow Big Tobacco is orchestrating the assault on the scam Freedom site when in fact the only orchestrating done on this issue is by ASH - the scam charity - instead.

And ASH's claim to speak for smokers is an insult, it's laughable. Politicians who believe this crap are even more stupid than I thought.

Let me make one thing clear - and I know it's how a lot of smokers feel - I hate Big Tobacco almost as much as ASH. If I could find a way of growing my own so I didn't have to put any money in BT's pocket then I would.

BT has done nothing for the smoker in standing against the smoking ban. They make more money from smoking bans because they are good for getting people smoking. In every country where bans have been imposed, smoking rates have gone up so why on earth should BT back our stance?

Back off ASH. You don't speak for me and you don't ask for more restrictions in my name.

NICK HOGAN - TARGET REACHED !!!

I am really busy this weekend finalising my short story, Great Granny's House, for my MA monthly assignment. and so I won't spend much time here boring Baz, in particular, with my thoughts on what we smokers and freedom loving non-smokers have acheived. Read Anna Racoon, Old Holborn and Simon Clark's blogs for the full update on how we reached the target to free pub landlord Nick Hogan within four days.

No one can say that this was not a great effort. I believe, and so do many others, that this has proved there is more public support for choice than oppression. ASH, which couldn't function without Pharmaceutical industry and Govt support, only raised £4000 in a year from public donations. Nick Hogan's fund trawled that in from willing donators within a few hours. The grand total in a week was more than £9,000 and money is still pouring in.

Bloody well done, everyone! Read all about it, and the rest, from the links below.

http://www.annaraccoon.com/politics/update-on-nick-hogan/

http://takingliberties.squarespace.com/taking-liberties/2010/3/5/nick-hogan-target-reached.html

http://bastardoldholborn.blogspot.com/2010/03/target-reached.html