Since the study of American smoking bans by Jerome Adda and Francesca Cornaglia found that such bans do not reduce the overall secondhand smoke exposure of nonsmokers in communities where they are enacted, why would we expect heart attack rates to change?
http://www.ifs.org.uk/
publicatio...ication_id=3523
Wow! First and foremost, kudos to Micahel and Dave!
I'll take a closer look at a more sane hour tomorrow. For now, it looks really nice. 
And it's really nice of you, Doc, to take a serious look at what they've done. 
Well done Doc. Possibly we could discuss why this study was suppressed by the medical journals thus denying publicity.
OT but a good article from the times.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/
tol...icle2062061.ece
except
"abuse of the rights of the citizenry as things that some people simply disapprove of are made illegal, and the near-sexual frisson of pleasure gained by those who pass such laws."
GreatScot
Congratulations Dave and Michael! Thank you Dr. Siegel!
Very impressive nonsense written by smokers. Junk at it's best.
Very impressive critique Ben.
Your well thought out substantive response has converted me.
GreatScot
Ben---'Junk at it's best.'
Perhaps you could post your best non-smokers junk to tell us your side, no?
Of course until then, I, like GreatScot will remain a loyal convert to you.
.
This is a very funny read from Eric Blair at FORCES:
http://www.forces.org/articles/f...files/
blair.htm
Enjoy.
SUPERB article by Eric,sums up the more salient points.I wonder if Eric would be able to do a resume on Dr Siegel's infamous smoke and glass mirror's bar study ?
A small minor inconvenience to the Tobacco Control rantis,what happens when smokers cannot smoke anywhere other than at home.Legislation necessitates further legislation when these knee jerk nannies do not see further than the end of their proboscis ,usually brown in pursuit of fame and anti tobacco financing http://www.spiked-online.com/ind.../earticle/3593/
Perhaps Dr Siegel would like to disabuse the writer of the "facts" he quotes in the article concerning the lack of evidence regarding SHS.Presumably in the same manner that he sought to disabuse many of us who still question how and why he managed to achieve the data that he did in his study,referred to above.The mannerism which was similarly identical to Stanton Glantz's response to Dr Siegel .It seems to me that studies concerning heart disease,lung cancer or short term SHS exposure are merrily discussed,but "longer" term exposure will not be debated,since the mystical figure of 220 still remains a mystery.Unless they procreated exceedingly quickly giving rise to the reference to 16 million.On second thoughts,surely no-one could have that sort of stamina ?
Michael stated in an earlier post no one in the med community is saying eating a single Big Mac leads to increased risk of heart attack. Guess what; they are now. In a previous government budget something called the Pan American strategy, which was promoted by anti Food fanatics CSPI was approved by all parties in Canada.
The plan calls for a 300% tax rebate to advertisers of healthy foods along with a cigarette type abusive taxation of unhealthy foods with no definition of what constitutes healthy foods.
CSPI's definition includes anything non bland and non vegan. Sugar and salt are known to be deadly toxins at any measured level.
CSPI presented to a royal commission grossly exaggerated figures stating 40,000 deaths occur in Canada due to what is known as the fat pandemic. The numbers were from a CDC report which after some urging freom their own researchers was recanted. The CDC admitted the figures were 26 times higher than what was actually found.
The problem remains how do we sell this nonsense to the public? The subtlety of ad agencies has perfected a way through anti smoker technology.
Float a balloon and only publish the views of supporters. Embellish the cheers with sound bites from an organized support group chiding in, to excite the taking from others what the government has no legitimate right to take. Sin taxes as punishment for non criminal acts. How easy it is to encourage government seizures of funds from others in selling the promoted hatred of those to be punished.
Today Toronto viewers were treated to the first trial balloon, a research report calling for a substantial fat tax to battle this deadly pandemic. They did state at the end of the infomercial melded into the news, researchers admit, many feel an application of such a tax would limit personal freedom and affect the poor to an unfair degree.
So it seems the conservation epidemic has rubbed off on Lobby groups who will not allow a single death to go under utilized. Smoking related mortalities will be used once more, recycled to sell the next big thing.
Expect the research to be released soon describing the same blood flow restrictions leading to heart attack [as provided in smoking research] to be re-used to make us all loose weight and provide new funding sources for child health scare or any other worthy cause they dream up.
Recycling is great isn't it?
I have read this study by Dave and Michael several times and I too think it is time for well deserved exposure. Thanks Doctor Siegel for taking the time to remark about it. It is a well researched piece of work and a must read for everyone.
Ben,
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Even non-smokers and obviously antismokers can identify the beauty or else you wouldn't be so nervous about it. When smokers calls your studys junk, we can justify it. Can you justify your comment of nonsense and junk? These guys used footwork and actual admissions for their studies. You guys use a generated computer software program that shows alot of mays, maybe's and could's to support your claims.
Si,
IMHO the increase in home smoking is not an unintended consequence but a cynical, deliberate manipulation that will ultimately be used for the next logical step.
Exhibit A
Caroline Flint stated that 95% of ETS exposure happened at home, presumably this included our bartender friends. She stated there was no evidence that home exposure would increase. Tony Bliar stated there is no intention of extending the ban into peoples homes.
Exibit B
Scotland pre-ban tested 5000 children from smoking homes. Post ban re-test and surprise surprise preliminary findings are children are more exposed. I would not be surprised to find England have paved the way for similar, ie already set the benchmark.
Exibit C
ASH UK have declared now that the ban is in place they can move forward to truly make Britain "smokefree"
Exhibit D
The WHO FCTC new amendments.
Need I go on? We are being done up like kippers and this why I believe anymore compromise is foolhardy.
GreatScot
Oh yeah, great job with the forces article Eric. Got my first laugh of the day with that one.
Kevin, your post is the one I made a brief comment about yesterday. Yours goes more into detail than what my local news covered. Thanks for it as it was a very good read.
Si,
Brown indeed!!! And they complain about tobacco smoke smelling?
L L!!!!
Having authored papers in refereed journals and having served as a referee for several journals (in engineering, solid mechanics not medical), here is a list of reasons I believe Mike and Dave will not be published in a journal.
1. Lack of affiliation. You should be affiliated with a university, government, or well known research organization. Being an author of a book and a retired chemist just will not cut it. Your stated affiliations make you seem bias.
2. Lack of credentials. You should be well known in the field you wish to publish. You should attend conferences and get published there first and get your name and face out there. It is easier to get published if just one coauthor is well known. This is why graduate students publish with their thesis advisors as coauthor or the advisor is cited as main author when he really only reviewed or directed the work. This gets the student published and known based on advisors reputation. You may well have novel sound research, but it may not get published if you are not well known in the field already. For example if Gantz or Siegel were added as coauthor the paper might fly. In the journals I am familiar with the academic degree obtained (PhD) of status (Professor) are not mentioned, thus one be must be recognized by initials and last name alone (MJ McFadden).
3. The referees usually are selected from prior published authors of the journal whose topic or subject matter is related to yours. Often this will be authors of the references you cite if they are previously published in the same journal you are submitting too. Yes that may mean your paper could be suppressed if you disagree with the referees cited work. This is also why two referees are normally used to prevent this from happening. You may be selected as a referee in the future if you manage to get published. Some journals from the same publisher or journal that publish similar subject matter will share there referee lists. This is how one becomes a referee.
4. It is normal that who refereed your paper is not provided. The authors only receive the comments provided by the referee. The editors may also receive comments which the authors will never see. This is to prevent retaliation by authors against the referees in the future.
I wish Mike and Dave luck. But I think you will have a hard time finding a good journal to publish in. I have not seen the papers but did follow Dr. Siegel’s links. So I cannot comment on that.
" Very impressive nonsense written by smokers. Junk at it's best."
Yea I know what you mean;
Like that theory of relativity nonsense written by a smoker, junk at it's best.
Or the babbling of another smoker who once said;
"We have nothing to fear but fear itself."
Pure bunk.
A right headed non smoker is critiqued at the link below. More of us should be more familiar with the current foundation of health care reform and it's humble beginnings.
http://constitutionalistnc.tripo...eftist/
id1.html
Thanks Kevin.
Perfectly correct GreatScot,but since the consequence was clearly foreseeable,and no-one can argue that it was not an odds on cert,it clearly shows that the original legislation now necessitates further legislation for them to get into your home.The whole concept that the ban was for the health of the nation (excuse me whilst i have a technicolour yawn and spit out those damned carrots) will prove to be nothing more than a cynical march towards prohibition in the home.To try to prove otherwise will either make them out to be all as thick as Liam Donaldson,which wouldn't be too difficult,or a bunch of manipulative,power crazy loonies who do not care for the welfare of children since they have cynically abused them as part of the longer term agenda.I think sufficient outrage could be instigated .I totally agree though ,quarter should no longer be given.
What Good Is Science?
First, and foremost, I express my sincere thanks to Dr. Siegel for posting our findings and linking to our description of our saga in trying to get our manuscript published.
And, of course, I recognise Dan's points. Yes, if McFadden and I were well established tobacco researchers, our manuscript might have been treated differently. But our lack of recognition was not given as a reason by any of the 3 journals for rejection. As a chemist, I never had any problems getting my work published in chemistry journals.
In fact, none of the 3 journals cited any scientifically compelling reasons to reject our manuscript. Let me qualify that.... They did cite some weaknesses in our manuscript which also should have also applied to Helena, Pueblo, Peidmont, and Bowling Green causing those to be rejected, if ours was going to be, as well. Let me cite some examples:
One journal said we should have used age-adjusted data. But none of the cities studies which were published cited age-adjusted data.
One said we should have also included deaths due to AMI, but again, none of the published studies on this subject included deaths data.
One said we should have provided some proof that secondhand smoke exposure actually declined in those states with bans, But again, none of the published studies addressed that either.
And these are only some of the examples.
Now, I am the first to admit that our study is not perfect. However, there is no such thing as a perfect scientific study in any field. Every study ever published anywhere has limitations, but the reason why studies in any field are published, is to make other researchers aware of data which may enhance overall knowlege on a given subject. Then researchers debate and consider the new data, and how it fits in with older data, and new ideas emerge which ultimately lead to better scientific theories. This is called a "learning process" , which is how science is supposed to advance. Journals, and yes, meetings are the forums which are supposed to enable that.
Or , at least it's supposed to be that way. And in many branches of science it still is that way.
What good is science? the only reason for it's existance is to make predictions, which enable mankind to know what to expect will happen to a dependent variable when an independent variable changes.
Helena, Pueblo, Piedmont, and Bowling Green all say that we should expect states with bans to manifest dramatic declines in heart attacks. We found that that does not happen. ERGO something is wrong with the conclusions of the published studies.
That is more important than our name recognition, and should have been the number one reason for acceptance of our manuscript.
Again, Dan's points are well taken, but should scientific journals judge the merit of a manuscript on the basis of the name recognition of the authors? or should they judge it on the merits on the content? eg: the usefullness of the manuscript to other researchers to help uncover scientific truth?
The latter would be the ideal answer and the fact that these journals did not judge our paper on it's scientific merits is disturbing. We also believe that if our manuscript had found 10-20% sudden drops in heart attacks compared to states without, bans, it would have been published regardless.
It becomes very plain, that a real double standard exists regarding publication in journals at least in regards to secondhand smoke papers.
Why? clearly because the intent of publishing such papers is no longer to promote better scientific understanding of the subject, rather it is to provide ammunition to promote smoking bans.
Dr. James Enstrom, at his website, http://www.scientificintegrityin...yinstitute.org/
has disclosed that he also experienced initial rejection from one of the same journals which rejected us. This was his 35,000 Californians study using CPS-1 data which reported no relationship between secondhand smoke exposure and lung cancer or heart disease, in nonsmokers.
However, Enstrom was ultimately successful in appealing that rejection, doing many rewrites, and getting published possibly in part due to the name recognition factor.
McFadden and I are going to continue trying to get our manuscript published.
Before closing I ask does anyone know of any other instances of valid studies which do not support politically correct secondhand smoke conculsions being refused for publication? And if so, please post in this thread.
I suspect there are many. Givens calculated that sufficient secondhand smoke studies to totally offset the "official claims", have never been published.
http://projecteuclid.org/Dienst/...d.ss/
1030037958
dave K
Perhaps Dave,if your combined studies had proven the necessary between SHS and death ,they would have been snapped up.After all that is what is occurring in the "mainstream".
Surgeon gen. nominee defends himself
Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr. said he is committed to science and would resign if politics interfere. He also denied any gay bias.
RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, Times Staff Writer
July 13, 2007
WASHINGTON — President Bush's candidate for surgeon general, facing an uphill struggle to win confirmation, told the Senate on Thursday that he's committed to science and would resign if pressured to slant his recommendations for ideological reasons.
"I would use the science to attempt to educate the policymakers," said Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr., a prominent Kentucky physician, medical educator and former government official.
Excerpt:
"Holsinger struck some independent notes Thursday before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. He said he supported an advertising ban on prescription drugs. He underscored his advocacy for higher tobacco taxes. And he said that using condoms was important for preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, and suggested condoms were appropriate for teens.
Rod note: My heart is warmed by the fact the nominee for US Surgeon General wants me to continue smoking. Perhaps the additional taxes will pay for condoms with messages printed on them "Smoking causes impotence!"
Maybe billboards: "Don't smoke! Don't engage in premarital sex! Practice bansturbation, instead!"
Oh, and, something new! - "he's committed to science and would resign if pressured to slant his recommendations for ideological reasons."
I am truly confused. On the one hand, he waves the "pure science and ethics" flag. Then he loudly proclaims he is a big supporter of taxing smokers to pay for children's health! He wants to keep smokers smoking, presumably only at home around children (because of the bans), so they can be taxed to provide health care for children who, Big Tobacco Control claims, are most at risk because of SHS.
How do these doctors, scientists and researchers get their credentials? Are they all suffering from the Glantz Effect? Do they all have Anti Smoking Dysfunction Syndrome?
Another question: Why didn't Repace and those other experts that measure SHS die of massive heart attacks and/or suffer massive strokes from their heroic deeds? When they finally die, will their deaths be classified as "premature" due to the effects of SHS?
Dave,
based on what you say, publication bias coupled with agenda driven research bias and the lack of independent research will make it impossible for future meta-analysis to give anything other than strengthening anti-smoking results. Does honesty and the truth matter so little?
When I first read Dan's post I was thinking about some kind of scientific snobbery. You know what I mean, known name, long list of letters after = credibility and publish
Author
Poff. Stanley Duntz PHD. TOSS. BAM.POT. KNOB.
Published
Author
Joe Bloggs (Honest dude)
Get Lost
But it looks as if it is more sinister than that. I hope that any other researcher that has found their work unpublishable contact you ASAP.
Disclaimer
Stanley Duntz is a fictitious character, plagiarised from MJ McFadden and any resemblance to real people past or present is purely in the imagination of the reader.
GreatScot
Dave K. says. "Again, Dan's points are well taken, but should scientific journals judge the merit of a manuscript on the basis of the name recognition of the authors? or should they judge it on the merits on the content? eg: the usefullness of the manuscript to other researchers to help uncover scientific truth?"
Yes papers of merit can still be published, at least in my field; it is just easier to get published if you are prominent. I have rejected papers by some very prominent people whose papers were clearly substandard and wondered whether they thought they could get away with publishing any trash because of their stature. It is publish or parish and sometimes it does not matter what.
I have already stated my opinion on the SHS science. I consider it junk science along with most new medical findings I read about in the news. Normally I would think that the findings should be verified independently before making the news. Findings and experiments need to be repeatable before they should be given any merit. That takes time. In medicine it seems every time a paper is published it is followed by a news conference. Huh?
Thus as you point out Helena, Pueblo, Piedmont, and Bowling Green should never have be published. If you missed my link “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False”
http://
medicine.plosjournals.org...al.pmed.0020124
I believe even Michael Siegel’s work will not stand the test of time. Unfortunately, I also believe by the time it is all seen for what it is (junk) the goals behind the studies (smoking bans) will long have been accomplished. Thus they will probably achieve what they were intended for (smoking bans and quite possibly prohibition). I still find it hard to fathom that anyone believes this junk.
Is it because they WANT TO believe it Dan ?
A Disturbing List
Scripps-Howard News Service 12.26.01
Balint Vazsonyi
Lead in:
Last week I suggested the presence of socialist-communist attitudes and practices in our daily lives. Such a statement ought to be supported by examples. The reason native-born Americans would not recognize them, while people of my ilk do, is that growing up in Hungary we had no choice in the matter. At school, we were required year after year to be trained in Marxism-Leninism. It was considered everyone's major, taking precedence over one's real major - in my case, piano.
Americans, people of exceptional goodwill, have been persuaded that Marxist-Leninist ideas and practices are congruous with basic American principles and do, in fact, fulfill the Founders' intentions. Even a cursory comparison of the reality of socialist-communist societies with that of America ought to convince anyone that such notions are preposterous. And now the examples.
Excerpt after the examples:
"... so much of what is said and done with good intentions comes, in fact, from a most detestable source. Everything in socialist-communist thought and practice - legal, moral, economic - is the opposite of the principles upon which America was founded and with which Americans have succeeded."
URL: http://tinyurl.com/2bsfyy
OT Last thread on National Health care
http://www.onthefencefilms.com/
Perhaps as a companion piece to SICKO.
.
Dave -- Well gee.. publication in public health is a good ol' boy network? What a surprise.
But there are lots of minor journals that you may have a shot with. Be careful about the ones that have longggg reply times. They can hang you up for a long time -- and then reject you. Stuff gets stale meanwhile.
If publication is the important issue -- rather than where, one way people get in the back door is to publish outside of public health. If one can reframe one's article so that it has, for example, a public administration slant (i.e., a field other than "health")-- one can go for a public admin journal (the idea is that things may be less contentious in another field -- and different editors and reviewers).
And Dan is apparently channeling my thoughts, so not much else to say.
Many thanks to both Dr. Siegel for blogging this and for some of the insightful comments above. Ben's comment is particularly nicely placed as it illustrates so well the sort of criticism that meets work like ours.
As to other journals and the difficulty of getting published without a solid background of history and credentials: Dave and I are aware of that, and appreciate the truth behind it. The balancing factor in this case however was the responsibility that should have been felt by the three journals we did submit to. That sense of responsibility to aid in the appropriate correction to previous misinformation should have overridden such concerns.
Michael J. McFadden
Author of Dissecting Antismokers' Brains
http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com
In essence, in the absence of any recognized research which falls within the margin of error the bulk of associated research has to be assumed to be in error and resultant of bias or closer to a fashion statement than actual fact.
This likelihood increases in continuing to support many smaller studies with low statistical weight in place of fewer larger studies with opposing results exaggerated with the obvious rejection of opposing results in meta-analysis.
The meta-analysis design can only be considered to legitimize that which is already known to be a flawed conclusion by summing and averaging extremely low yet duplicated statistical insignificance in effect creating significance by popular demand through designer vision.
Even today many still reject the demonstrated nature of stomach ulcers despite the embarrassments to the medical community when one researcher who was rejected by his peers gave himself an ulcer and curred it in front of TV cameras.
One would think in order to create a more credible atmosphere in self preservation of the field, ethical changes would have been made then.
The one mindedness of so called professionals who mimic fashion slaves has only gotten worse.
I do think the leaders in the antismoking field do believe that a lot of the studies related to secondhand smoke are trash.
However, Like Dan, I also believe that by the time all this is finally brought out that the adjenda will have been achieved.
Personally, I believe that those who rejected our manuscript know full well that it was worthy of publication. However, I believe that they feel the success of the overall mission, to banish smoking from society, is more important than their values. Dr. Siegel does not feel that way, and he gets attacked all the time.
To greatscott, I say, yes, meta-analysis over time will strengthen the false claims about secondhand smok; This is most recently evident in the 2006 Surgeon geneal's report which did not include the results of the Enstrom/Kabat study.
They have enough city-wide bans to cherry pick only those which found drastic drops in heart attacks, but not enough states with bans to chery-pick ones which happened to have enough of a decline to publish.
So they have cooked up some lame excuses that the effect will not be observed at the state level. yet when they go to state legislaturers to speak in favor of bans, they cite the 4 cities studies and imply that the states will have lower heart attack rates if a ban passes.
They merely say, that even though the states will have lower heart attack rates, that they will not be detected .
Go figure....
The saga of the sudden drastic drops in heart attacks in the 4 cities, and our study rebuking that, only serves to show that it's really all about cherry-picking. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, how are we to know that other kinds of studies used to promote bans are also not cherry-picked?
Dave K
To clarify, the Enstrom/Kabat study of 35,000 californians was not rejected outright, but was finally accepted after a major overhaul. it was the meta-analysis of all US cohort studies on heart disease which found an overall nonsignificant 5% increased risk, that was rejected outright by one of the same journals which rejected our study. dave K
I submit that if a journal publishes evidence of an effect in one direction, it has a moral duty to publish equally good evidence that refutes the original (not relying on particular authorship, but on the strength of the work). If the original evidence is important to the community then the refutation is equally important.
Agreed, meta-analysis is a joke in this situation.
From one of Rod's links: Americans, people of exceptional goodwill, have been persuaded that Marxist-Leninist ideas and practices are congruous with basic American principles and do, in fact, fulfill the Founders' intentions.
Although I came across this in a very different context, I have a link to a video that seems to support the above sentiment. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l...h?
v=lfAdQrKMZTU
BTW, I got an e-mail today that HR2900 passed-- 403-16. Ron Paul wasn't even allowed to speak before the bill passed. Someone recently commented to me that there must be a full moon; I remind people that today is "Friday the Thirteenth".
INRE publishing....
For Dave and Michael, i don't think your in the "publish or perrish" league. Your main goal is to get the word out--yes? Well, there's nothing wrong with people who are publishing and quoting or refering to your paper. It's out there. GDF has made a good suggestion for a work-around, but even that isn't entirely neccessary--although it might help authors who wish to cite your publication if it is in an established journal, even if that journal isn't considered an "A" journal that, say, professors like to list on their vitas when they're being reviewed, re-locating or up for a raise. But, y'all don't share those concerns. You only need to have your work visible and cited. Because your analysis is rather novel--compared to drug-induced mainstream papers--you have an advantage in the visibility department.
Just my humble opinion.
I know this is mostly a science-oriented thread. However, here's something that may shed some light on the matter of Dave and Michael's article being treated shabbily by the med journals: Classism.
You see, the anti-tobacco movement is popular among the elite circles. It doesn't matter that they used fraudulent methodologies and junk science to get their way. The fact remains that rich yuppies, whose $10 martinis emit more class A carcinogenic vapors into the air than cigarettes, are not willing to give up their pleasures. It's perfectly OK for them to force everyone around them to inhale those silent, non-odorous alcohol vapors, but not ok for soemone from the working class to light up a cigarette to enjoy with their beer after a long shift.
In sum, since the science community, the medical establishment in particular, is comprised of wealthy people and controlled by wealthy people, their agenda - be it right or wrong - is the agenda that rules the day. And unfortunately, it rules everyone else's day too.
Were Michael McFadden and Dave Kuneman heirs to a fortune, their real and unadulterated scientific article would have received headline treatment.
DTB - From one of Rod's links: Americans, people of exceptional goodwill, have been persuaded that Marxist-Leninist ideas and practices are congruous with basic American principles and do, in fact, fulfill the Founders' intentions.
Although I came across this in a very different context, I have a link to a video that seems to support the above sentiment.
.........
I checked out the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force (for domestic terrorists) brochure mentioned in the video.
Hilarious!
One of the categories was:
Right-Wing Extremists:
- defenders of US Constitution against federal government and the UN.
No wonder people get suspicious and paranoid. In effect, you may be a domestic terrorist if you insist the US Consitution is the basis for our individual rights that are supposed to protect us against unconstitutional federal intrusion, and, difficult to believe, it implies that the UN has police power over US citizens!
Another:
Hate Groups
-- Skinheads, Nazis, Neo-Nazis (usually recognized by tattoos)
Perhaps we should ask for a revised version? Please add as an identifier for Nazis and Neo-Nazis:
-- Wears Suspenders
-- Supports censorship
-- Encourages children to spy on their parents.
-- Encourages school indoctrination oof children for political purposes
-- Chants: "SHS Kills," "440,000 deaths per year," "44,000 deaths per year," "Baby Killers!"
Defenders of the US Constitution????
to borrow from Soren -
"Bah"
Rod - I can't say enough times how much I appreciate your posts. It's like I get up in the morning and say "okayyyy... long as Rod's in the world, I know at least one person still has his eyes open"
(Not to take away from all of you other guys with open eyes -- it's just that Rod is always so "spot on.")
When Industry partners with right wing capitalism we loose money.
With left wing socialism we loose freedom.
With the current centrist political mood we loose both in much larger proportions.
Fertile ground for Fascist politics and repeating the nightmares of the past.
Without broad public support none of these outcomes would have been possible.
Important point, Jacqueline. Anyone hear "cigar bar exemption"?
Carmona, Elders and Koop had their day to testify.
To bad Kuneman and McFadden could not have theirs. Credible science was brought up by the SGs. K&Ms experiances would have been a proper example.
I wonder how Elders would have responded to Greatscots use of his sharp tool?
To answer Godownfighting:
I have heard of cigar bar exemptions in Staten Island, and I believe there are cigar bar exemtions in Illinois as well. Of course, the $100 cigar smoker gets more respect than the working class generic brand cigarette smoker. I began making the classism connection to the persecution of smokers when I was admonished by a fellow financial/property & casualty insurance professional at a continueing ed seminar to: "Quit smoking because others will think you're poor white trash dressed in a suit. You really need to go out with other middle class people more often and do what your peers are doing."
I was deeply offended by the casual use of the perjorative "poor white trash" in a lame attempt to cajole me into proper middle class behavior.
First, I am not a frightened, grasping status-seeker. Second, I refuse to give up something I enjoy just because "everyone else is doing it". That argument didn't get kids very far when I was growing up so it's downright foolish to see so many adults resorting to such social pressure tactics now with other adults. The third thing I noticed was that it is primarily the elite and the upper-middle class behind these smoking bans, under the pretense of "public health". An attorney who left a comment on my own blog http://classism-jacqueline-homan...n.blogspot.com/
repeated the canard along the lines of "But if the poor quit smoking, they'll have money to afford [insert item of choice here]and be able to pay for their basic needs."
Those hailing from the top two socio-economic classes have always put down the working class masses and the poor. This is also the same gang who rallied against universal healthcare 11 years ago during the Clinton years. Now they suddenly feign concern over the health of the poor and uninsured when it comes to justifying oppressive smoking bans. This is hypocritical at best.
Working class people are being fired at places like Scott's Miracle Gro and Weyco if they fail to quit smoking - even though they are not smoking on company property, even in their own cars in the employee parking lot. If they fail a random nicotine test because they smoked in the privacy of their own homes (where bans have consigned smokers), they are fired. This is being done in the name of "public health" and for "their own good."
Now if that isn't arrogant, I don't know what is. Especially when the sanctimonious anti-smoking "scientists" have been proven to be charlatans and purveyors of fraudulent studies and junk science about the health hazard of second-hand smoke.
Thus it is only reasonable to conclude that the entire anti-smoking agenda is classist at heart. It never has been about "public health" - it boils down to the entitlement and elitist attitudes of the wealthy and upper-middle class: "We don't like the sight/smell of tobacco smoke; so because we don't like it, you can't have it."
~Jacqueline S. Homan~
Jacqueline, one fellow at the bar assured me that smoking bans are really about yuppie dry-cleaning bills not public health. Yuppies want to be able to have the option of enjoying working class places and especially chasing working class girls in working class bars without smelling like smoke at the end of the evening.
Since the study of American smoking bans by Jerome Adda and Francesca Cornaglia found that such bans do not reduce the overall secondhand smoke exposure of nonsmokers in communities where they are enacted, why are they necessary in the first place?
Jacqueline;
Your impressions are entirely accurate this is about control and establishing classes above any protection or concern for their fellows.
There is no shortage of research which focuses on ethnicity and wage levels. The planning stages of TC are ripe with observations of how efforts affect different categorical sectors of the population.
In third world countries children as young as six years old smoke for one undeniable benefit. Smoking suppresses hunger pains. Which if the UN was really about compassion should be a reality to deal with first, before taking away their only defense in worsening the already hellish conditions.
The efforts of TC over the years claiming "most smokers want to quit and they are simply trying to help" do not compare well with the kind of attitudes they promote to justify the taxes and the exclusions from shelter and community interaction.
In these threads you can see a universal language unique to TC which decries smokers are inferior and incapable of relevant thought demonstrated on a daily basis.
Do they truly believe the act of smoking renders others as imbeciles and affords the right to non smokers to treat them as lesser beings?
Absolutely
The TC movement is entirely about empowering each other, leading them to believe an ability to torture and denormalize others magically elevates their level of class, when in actual fact and the point they always miss, they demonstrate the very worst in the human condition and the perceived hatred they receive from smokers is actually also akin to looking down at the ignorance displayed in reaction to a disgusting personality flaw.
In their own minds TC lemmings live in denial of the reality this is not as they are taught, any promoted denial phase of what is referred to as hard core smokers. Smokers are simply reacting to ignorance displayed and promoted by government agencies who no longer feel any need to actually listen to or respect the people they are supposedly working for.
By dividing us all into many separate groups and creating conflicts among those groups we become much easier to manage. We are viewed as sheep, all herded into separate stalls. If the wrong sheep ends up in the wrong stall bureaucracies tend to ignore it, confident that sheep will change through pressures applied; assimilate or be punished.
Callous Cowbell wrote, "Since ... bans do not reduce the overall secondhand smoke exposure of nonsmokers in communities where they are enacted, why are they necessary in the first place?"
Cowbell, simply because they're seen as a useful tool to reduce smoking. As Lady Elaine Murphy of the British House of Lords put it to me in an email, "The aim is (to) reduce the public acceptability of smoking and the culture which surrounds it. We know that legislation which discourages all public smoking will have the better impact on public understanding and perception of smoking as an unacceptable habit.
Hence fewer people will smoke, hence health overall will improve."
Social engineering straight out of Orwell, pure and simple.
Of course the antismoking lobby uses other tools as well: as Bill H points up they'll play the "dry cleaning card" as though yuppies normally never do laundry unless they happen to go to a smoking bar, or they'll play the asthma card as though the world was filled with smoke-sensitive innocents desperate for work who have no choice other than to work in smoky bars where they'll die because they can't breathe, or they'll just play their helpless innocent children card, and all the rest of the deck.
It's important to remember that Helena didn't turn up any real reduction in heart attacks among nonsmokers at all: if you actually read the study itself you'll find that while the authors blather on about secondhand smoke a dozen times in its four pages they quietly stick in a sentence right near the end where they admitted that "we do not have a large enough sample size to estimate" any effects from secondhand smoke exposure.
The fact that they neglected, despite the heavy directional thrust of their paper, to say "nonsmokers as a group experienced a slight but nonsignificant decrease" has often led me to wonder if they actually found heart attacks in nonsmokers INCREASED during the ban... but no, they wouldn't have held back something like that... would they? There was probably some other very good reason why they didn't note in more detail their separate analysis of nonsmokers... and some day perhaps they'll tell us why.
And then the Pueblo and Bowling Green authors will also share why they seemingly forgot to gather and analyze such information.
Until then, we'll just have to take the word of Vivian Nathanson, the head of Research and Ethics at the British Medical Association, when she commented on the Helena study by saying, "We estimate that second-hand smoke kills at least 1,000 people in the UK every year."
And then people wonder how the antismoking lobby managed to ban smoking in Britain?
Michael J. McFadden
Author of Dissecting Antismokers' Brains
http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com
Bar threatened with fine for.....wait for it.... having open windows that can let smoke drift inside!!!!
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/
...7320600,00.html
madness.
GreatScot
Greatscot;
I fell over laughing, That one went so far over the line...
And smokers are believed to be primarily of the ignorant and uneducated social class?
Right on...
LMAO
Good lord! Open windows at a pub? Then all the innocents inside will be forced to breathe (against their helpless will) car, bus, and truck fumes!
Oh wait...we don't care about those. Those are the components of fresh air.
There were two anti-smoking stories on the AOL front door today.
One from USA Today about the spreading outdoor bans. At least they gave a line to the other side:
"The study is flawed [Stanford study quoted above], partly because people don't sit close enough outside to cause a health risk, says Audrey Silk, founder of Citizens Lobbying Against Smoker Harassment. If the problem is littering, she says, "enforce the litter laws."
What's driving outdoor bans, Silk says, is "public hate of anything smoking or smoker-related.""
This one was my favorite:
Get Rich: Quit Smoking
http://www.smartmoney.com/dealoftheday/index.cfm?
story=20070105
That's all I need to do? I guess there are no rich smokers.
Excerpt:
"The savings on the cost of buying the cigarettes is relatively minor," says Frank A. Sloan, author of "Price of Smoking," and the director of the Center for Health Policy, Law and Management at Duke University. Smokers spend more on health care and earn less from Social Security (sadly, early death leads to fewer Social Security payments). Figuring in the varied long-term costs, he says, each pack actually costs a smoker $40."
I'm pretty sure the numbers are all made up.
Looks like I forgot to close a tag. Sorry if that's hard to read.
Re: GreatScots link:
"Regular Vince Wyre said: “I was at the bar getting a pint when the two officers came in and spoke to the manager and they then closed windows.
“There was no one smoking outside at the time. I like to sit there and watch the world go by and get the fresh air with my pint. I was so angry my beer was disrupted by these men that I asked for my money back
“I’m a supporter of the smoking ban, but this was an overzealous way to enforce the new law.”"
Never did it occur to this guy that these laws would be disrupting HIS life--Ha!!!
So now we have window police!!! Too funny
220 Dead Callous Cowbells
L L ! ! ! !
Love the evolving name idea.
.
Doctor,
Are you going to defend the 220 or not?
At least the people who did the Helena study had the stones to publish their methodology and allow people to critique it.
You are just hiding under your desk. That's weak.
You admit that these laws do destroy businesses. And your figures helped bring that about.
Don't you owe those people the chance to respond?
Have some courage. Explain why it made sense to destroy those people. Explain the risk. How you came up with the 220.
Cowbell quotess an antimoking official on the cost of smoking, "Figuring in the varied long-term costs, he says, each pack actually costs a smoker $40."
and then says, "I'm pretty sure the numbers are all made up."
You've got that right Cowbell. Visit my website below and click on "Smoking, Costs, and the MSA" and you'll see that ten years ago, when taxes were MUCH lower than today, even the New England Journal of Medicine did a main editorial pointing out how overtaxed they were compared to medical costs.
Antismokers lie about taxes the same way they lie about bans and everything else: the goal for them is the end that justifies any means at all.
Smoking bans are bad laws based on lies, and a law based on lies is no law at all. Any decent citizen caring about freedom and the future of their country not only has the right, but the duty to defy such laws or support others in their defiance.
Michael J. McFadden
Author of Dissecting Antismokers' Brains
http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com
DISPATCH FROM LONDON
Hookah bars see bias in smoking ban
Critics say Britain's new law disproportionately hits largely Muslim customers of cafes that offered the water pipes.
By Marjorie Miller, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 14, 2007
LONDON — Gone are the sweet-smelling trails of smoke that used to bubble out of the water pipes at Al Arez cafe on Edgware Road. Gone are five employees whom Mohammed Khalil sacked a day after Britain's national smoking ban went into effect this month.
And gone are many of the Middle Eastern, North African and South Asian customers who used to pack into Al Arez to socialize and smoke the pipes, also known as hookahs, filled with shisha tobacco.
"This is a disaster for us," Khalil said over a cup of sweet Arabic coffee in an empty restaurant. "We don't drink. I don't smoke cigarettes. But we smoke shisha — it's part of our culture. And this is against our culture."
URL for complete article: http://tinyurl.com/3xfuwa
Note: Link probably only good for today.
MJ McFadden: Of course the antismoking lobby uses other tools as well: as Bill H points up they'll play the "dry cleaning card" as though yuppies normally never do laundry unless they happen to go to a smoking bar, or they'll play the asthma card as though the world was filled with smoke-sensitive innocents desperate for work who have no choice other than to work in smoky bars where they'll die because they can't breathe, or they'll just play their helpless innocent children card, and all the rest of the deck.
I see what you're getting at...they're trying to play all the cards. However, I remind you that we have the strength of our humor. We are the jokers...and jokers are wild!
220 dead callous cowbells...ROFLMAO!!! I have to agree with Sunz. The evolving nick is fabulous!
Playing the "save the children" and "asthmatics" cards:
Burbank Leader, July 14, 2007
COMMUNITY COMMENTARY:
Public must be protected from smoke
By La Vergne RosowI
Lead in:
As I attempted to enter an Albertson's grocery store in Burbank the other day, I was engulfed by the smoke generated by two smokers seated on benches just outside the entry doors. I think they may have been placed there only recently.
Typically, store employees — smokers and nonsmokers alike — take breaks outside the building at patio furniture by the shopping carts a few feet further from the entrance. As a shopper, I have learned to grab a basket from the parking lot and avoid the often smoke-filled break area.
I held my breath as best I could and made a run for it, but entered the store, eyes stinging and throat burning.
Excerpt:
"Smokers are not bad people. They are addicts. As long as cigarette companies can legally get people addicted, I believe there should be places where the addicts can go to vent without impacting the general population.
Companies that encourage smoking should be allowed to provide such remote areas. Little-by-little the economics would address the issues."
...........
Rod note: You have to read the whole article. How this woman ever survived to tell this fairy tale is beyond my comprehension. This Commentary should be titled: Public must be protected from those afflicted with Anti Smoking Dysfunction Syndrome. It's obvious she passed this deadly syndrome on to her son!
URL: http://tinyurl.com/366mky
I held my breath as best I could and made a run for it, but entered the store, eyes stinging and throat burning.
How long before a moron pulls this trick and suffers a heart attack for their total stupidity.Several years ago we had none of this ridiculous behaviour.Dr Siegel non smokers and antis are now proving themselves to be the biggest bunch of prats out.Please continue to help feed this mania.People will become so petrified of tobacco smoke,you'll even end up with asthmatics working in coal mines and dust laden enviroments since their sensitising triggger will ONLY be the dreaded tobacco smoke.Mass hysteria on a scale never before known will come.It seems your 220 will never come to life,but were they ever dead to start with ? The maxim you constantly preach of protecting people from the deadly smoke,continues to scare people unduly,you're attempts at trying to put the reins on your fellow rantis isn't working.I wish you well in your endeavours,i will enjoy seeing the damage you will continue to wreak.Callous ? no not really,but with people being incited to become even more hostile as the antis pursue their social engineering ,my attitude will simply harden.
Michael S. --
I read through the articles linked on this thread and others, and look around in the world at the terrible social consequences of, at least, bar and restaurant smoking bans. Enough people seem to have taken a stand on this one, dug in their heels, so that there WILL be escalation on both sides. It's not going to get better. Many of those consequences you've pointed out yourself (destruction of ethics in public health science, workplace discrimination, vilification of smokers...).
I have to wonder if there is a point at which you say -- "While I support workplace smoking bans in theory, the consequences are too great. Perhaps there IS another way to achieve worker protection." If the authorities were lining up smokers and shooting them in the streets, would you still say (echoing the phrasing of the last sentence of this blog) "While I support workplace smoking bans, I deplore the shooting of smokers in the streets." Is there SOME point at which you might recognize that the price is too high for this particular method of achieving your goal of worker protection to be supportable?
GDF
Asthma Capitals of the US - 2007
From asthmacapitals.com
Below is a PDF file of interest. One of the things that caught my eye was the column for prevalence of public smoking bans (indoor bans: Workplace, restaurant and bars). This was considered a major factor in the in the percentage of asthma. I found it very odd that California cities often had very bad marks for this risk factor considering that California hasn't allowed smoking in workplaces, bars and restaurants for many years.
URL for PDF file: http://tinyurl.com/2mznz7
Oh, notice who funds the site and the survey
This hysteric is so very typical of the ASDS that it is laughable. Only these folks and the elites encouraging them are far more dangerous than I care to think about. Talk about leading the sheep to slaughter. Geeeeezzzzz 
Si, in the end, this blog has shown me that at least there are others in the world who have guts enough to call this what it is. Bu(( Sh*t!! in plain english. For that simple fact I am grateful.
.
Rod -- There is something even more strange about that link. Did you notice that the purpose was to rank the cities in terms of being the most challenging places to live with asthma. Yet, 2 of the top 3 worst, and 4 of the top 10, had "average" estimated prevalence of asthma. (2 of the top 3 and 5 of the top 10 had average self-report). Does that imply that the people of Atlanta and Raleigh, for example, have some sort of special immunity? High risks and average prevalence? Or that the risk factors are not adequately telling the story?
Even if I look at "crude" death rate, well Raleigh still comes out looking pretty good. And 3 of the top 10 are better than average. But why would I be interested in crude death rate (as opposed to pop adjusted) anyway?
While I imagine that chart could be useful for some things -- what a strange jumble it is -- especially the ranking.
Oh I get it! What the top 10 have in common is worse than average public smoking laws. and...
"factors were not evenly weighted"
no kidding?
godownfighting - While I imagine that chart could be useful for some things -- what a strange jumble it is -- especially the ranking.
.........
GDF,
Thank you. I assure you I had the same reaction.
Just a few minutes trying to make sense of the charts was the equivalent of shoving my face into a bowl of mush.
How to Turn Baloney into Breakthroughs [and bans!]
Bayesian Critique of Statistics in Health: The Great Health Hoax
by Robert Matthews
The plain fact is that 70 years ago Ronald Fisher gave scientists
a mathematical machine for turning baloney into breakthroughs,
and flukes into funding. It is time to pull the plug.
URL for PDF file: http://tinyurl.com/2522hu
Good grief -- speaking of faces in bowls of mush -- that chart actually made me LOOK UP the meaning of the words "rate" and "crude". I used to assume I spoke the language. Crude and rate in the same label?
The column label is "crude death rate for asthma" which is then defined as "recorded metro area deaths from asthma". I give up.
oh okay.. maybe they meant rate as in "with reference to the other cities" -- not as in "with reference to the population." Still an odd way to label/present that...
Stop me Rod, I'm in a brain spin. No, I realize, they couldn't have meant that either... Put the chart down and walk away GDF...
Eventually, we would like to publish because that would get our study into the Nat. Library of Medicine database.
That would not happen if we reframed it and submitted it to a non-medical journal.
The points about meta-ananlysis also are a concern. Perhaps someday, some anti will meta-analize all the cities studies which report sudden and significant declines in heart attacks, if ours is in a nonemdical journal, they have an excuse to exclude ours.
We do have plans to submit to other medical journals. and we know of some which may give us a fair shake. The trouble is, that inorder for our manuscript to remain timely, we have to coutinually update it with new states which have passed bans.
Our data source, hccup, adds new data each spring , for example, when we submitted to journal #1, only data through 2003 were available. By the time we were rejected, and prepared to submit to journal #2, the 2004 data were avialable. This caused us to ahve to include 2004 and Ma which now had a years worth of data.
We also had to add the following year's worth of data to the states which had already been included in the first paper. However, we noted that even with an additional year's worth of data, there was nothing indicating any improvement in heart attack rates compared to states which do not have bans or many local bans.
What happens is there is a "window" during which we ahve all the latest data and time to do another submission. That "window" runs from about June to January. If we submit after Jan, then by the time the reviewers get done with it, hcuup is beginning to add new data for the next year. ( It takes about 2 years for govt staticicns to compile all the ehart attack data and post it in hcuup. So, we are always 2 years behind the latest state bans.
Interestingly, in the first submission, we gathered all the data from 1997 to 2003 and developed least-squares regression equations which were used to calculate the confidence intervals below which we could conclude there was definitely no downward change in heart attack rates.
Of course, all the states with bans were within that confidence interval post-ban. We did note that the percentage of the confidence interval was lowest when the population was the hhighest. For example, the USA's confidence interval worked out to about a yearly 1.5% standard deviation from the ordinary expected change. California, with 1/10 the population of the USA , had a 3% yearly standard deviation from the ordinary expected change.
The other thing we noticed is that after 2001-2002, heart attack rates were falling in all states, and in the USA overall, probably due to increased use of cholesterol-lowering statins, and better screening before ehart attacks occur.
Now, to continue, when we did Oregon, which has about 1/10 the population of California, we found the confidence interval was about 6% SD from the ordinary expected yearly change.
So, it looks like whenever the population becomes 10 times smaller, the ordinary standard deviation from the expcected change doubles.
So, based on this, just what standard deviation from ordinary expected change would we expect in a city like Pueblo, which has a population 30 times smaller than Oregon, 300 times smaller than California, and 3000 times smaller than the USA?
We would expect, if Pueblo behaves within the same relationship, that we would expect a 20% standard deviation from the expected change to be an ordinary occurance. and the authors reported a 27% change which they attributed to the ban. Not that much different when one considers that that 27% change took place over a 3-year period, while our data were for one year periods. Throw in the overall decline which we found is happening everywhere, and you're there, without having to attribute any decline to a ban. ( Incidentally, the whole state of Colorado,had a 11% decline over the same 3-year period.)
Now, lets look at helena, which has a population 1/4th that of pueblo, or 120 times smaller than oregon, 1200 times smaller than CA, and 12000 times smaller than the USA.
We would easily expect a 30% ordinary SD from year to year. Of course, the Helena study only covered 6 months, which would widen that expected standard deviation somewhat. and again the reported 40% decline is well within an ordinary occurance.
The same holds true of Bowling Green which is about the same size as Helena and also reported a 37% decline.
The only outlier is the Piedmont region which is not a city, persay, but has a population of about 4 million, and reported an 11% decline, but that is in Italy, and we would have to obtain some Italian controls to really address that.
So, really, what we found from observing the behavior of randomness in annual heart attacks with respect to population size, is that the claim that bans lower heart attacks depends solely on sifting through many small cities, and reporting on ones whose random fluctuations happened to desirably coincide with a ban.
Dave K
Rod--
On "Public must be protected from smoke" at http://www.burbankleader.com/art...r-
comment14.txt , I caught a couple of other quotes...
"Obviously, I can avoid this one store, but ..."
Again, the rAntis have more buts than an ashtray at an AA meeting.
"The young manager said he was powerless to do anything because there was no law to enforce....As my asthmatic son was growing up, we were obliged to leave many an unfinished meal in restaurants where one smoker had the power to pollute the air for all diners."
I see a power theme. Evidently, this is the primary reason that rAntis do so much ranting: They believe the people who smoke are very powerful. I've previously commented that rAntis keep trying to raise tobacco taxes because they evidently believe that people who smoke are quite affluent. Her son is asthmatic, and she is afflicted with stinging eyes and burning throat when she encounters some SHS--outdoors. Clearly, she believes herself to be a victim at every turn. So, paranoia is clearly one of the ASDS symptoms.
Finally...
"As for now, bravo to the City Council for voting in favor of current scientific findings..."
Ah, yes, the impaired cognitive abilities of ASDS sufferers.
I am now starting an ASDS file. I've been procrastinating because I know that such a file will become very large very quickly--possibly unmanagable. Alas, I am duty-bound to try to help these poor unfortunates. As si said, "Several years ago we had none of this ridiculous behaviour." Seems we're breeding this victim mentality everywhere, like in a pro-ban man who feels victimized when his pub must close its wondows at the orders of the smoking ban police. ASDS appears to have reached epidemic proportions--we must act quickly!
GDF: I have to wonder if there is a point at which you say -- "While I support workplace smoking bans in theory, the consequences are too great. Perhaps there IS another way to achieve worker protection."
Well, *that* shouldn't make anyone's head spin. Alas, a great deal of damage has been done to speople who smoke, people who don't, air quality, economics, et cetera. I might change/add a little to the statement, though:
I have to wonder if there is a point at which you say -- "While I support workplace smoking bans in theory, the consequences are too great. Perhaps there IS a better way to achieve worker protection AND undo some of the harm that has already been done."
Also, although I don't have the article at-hand, there was a man who shot someone in New York for smoking around him. The story was not widely broadcast.
This is where you can view our chart of what happened in california after the 1995 and 1998 bans
http://thumbsnap.com/v/a0qy6Z7c.jpg
This is where you can view our charts of what happened in FL, OR, NY, MA,etc compared to the sum of states without bans, for controls.
http://thumbsnap.com/v/GnEcBGoG.jpg
Dave K
DTB - Ahhh... you ALWAYS improve upon my words.
(And I found a way to stop the other spinning - if I assume they actually DID mean "crude death rate" and that I should have simply ignored the defining note that led me to seek other definitions. Yes, I again speak the language).
DaveK: So, really, what we found from observing the behavior of randomness in annual heart attacks with respect to population size, is that the claim that bans lower heart attacks depends solely on sifting through many small cities, and reporting on ones whose random fluctuations happened to desirably coincide with a ban
You refer to randomness and give results on yearly bases. What about seasonal variation? That is my impression of the biggest prolem of the Helena study. The admissions dropped during a favorable season. (I think there was a recent Scottish report on the same phenomenon. More heart attacks in winter months.) Can you address this as well?
Also, the link you just gave, is that showing age-adjusted trends?
Rod--
INRE: "Bayesian Critique of Statistics in Health: The Great Health Hoax" by Robert Matthews
http://www2.isye.gatech.edu/~bra...bank/
pvalue.pdf
"Most importantly, just how did Fisher know that his figure of 0.05 was a safe point at which to declare a result `significant'? Incredibly, as Fisher himself admitted, he didn't know at all. He simply chose the figure of 0.05 because, he said, it was `convenient'."
"It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the real explanation for all the endless evasion is not scientific at all. It is simply that if scientists abandon significance tests like P-values, many of their claims would be seen for what they really are: meaningless aberrations on which taxpayers' money should never have been spent."
Look at john Daly's "The Big Liars" at http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/200...%
20February.htm
"The BMA, long separated from anything approaching real science, has come up with a "report" on, wait for it, smoking and fertility. Not only is it a long winded PC rant, full of the most egregious excesses of the debased statistics that characterise modern epidemiology, but they manage to sully the name of one of the few great names of that branch of science, Sir Austin Bradford Hill. Having taken his name in vain at the very outset, they publish an appendix containing his seven principles by which epidemiology should be conducted, but they add a cavillation to almost every one that completely reverses its intent."
The comment on the negation by addition is continued--by a comparison to Orwell's 1984. Interesting.
DaveK: "So, really, what we found from observing the behavior of randomness in annual heart attacks with respect to population size, is that the claim that bans lower heart attacks depends solely on sifting through many small cities, and reporting on ones whose random fluctuations happened to desirably coincide with a ban"
Which, if there was a specific intent... would be kinda, sorta like... fraud?
Smoking bans and extortionate taxes aiding North Korea?
Time Magazine
July 23, 2007 Issue
North Korea: The Sopranos State
By BILL POWELL, ADAM ZAGORIN
Lead in for full article:
In the heart of Pyongyang stands a gray, six-story concrete building that is not unlike thousands of others in the dreary communist capital, except that this one is protected around the clock by uniformed soldiers. The building is known as Bureau 39, and it is the headquarters of a worldwide criminal enterprise that is owned, overseen and operated by the government of North Korea.
SMOKES AND MIRRORS
Lead in for this section of the article:
DURING THE COLD WAR, SUBIC BAY IN THE Philippines was a critical strategic base of the U.S. Navy. The Navy is long gone (the base closed in 1992), and Subic Bay's facilities are now used strictly for commercial purposes--including, according to a detailed private investigator's report produced for the international cigarette industry in 2005, the smuggling of contraband cigarettes from North Korea.
North Korea is not the only player in the game. (Until recently, China was by far the biggest source of phony brand-name cigarettes, industry executives say.) The private investigator's report for the cigarette industry found that 10 to 12 factories in North Korea produce a total of 41 billion contraband cigarettes a year, shipped out of the North on "deep-sea smuggling vessels." They are then off-loaded at sea to smaller, high-speed vessels that deliver the cigarettes to traffickers in East Asia. That allows the deep-sea smuggling ships to remain in international waters, beyond the reach of any country's law-enforcement authorities.
URL: http://tinyurl.com/2umenv
GDF: Which, if there was a specific intent... would be kinda, sorta like... fraud?
I was having a discussion about penalties this with some people. Now, plagarism is a big sin in academics, yes? Are there actual penalties for plagarism? If so, could similar penalties be applied to scientific fraud?
Dave --
Have you considered presentations at professional society meetings? To have presented a version of the paper may suggest to editors that it isn't going to just go away. Or that there's interest in the topic. On the other hand, they could argue that the info is already out there. From my experience previous presentations are helpful, but in this case, with all the ramifications, they could be harmful. You may want to poll some more people on this. I wouldn't want to be responsible for advice that DEcreases your chances of publication. Just offering something to consider.
There's APHA, of course, but, not 'til next year. But, again like journals, if you CAN give it different slants you open up to different health related org. audiences. Heart attack data, for example has interest for the Gerontological Society...ummm... maybe the National Assn of Social Workers...EMT'S , Nurses...
Also, this isn't just an issue of public health, but public health policy. Although I understand your desire for a big name health journal -- I can't imagine a health *policy* oriented journal turning down data on one of the biggest "health policy" changes to ever occur.
But then, there are many things I can't imagine that occur.
DTB -- at least in this cae...
"On a rainy afternoon in June, Eric Poehlman stood before a federal judge in the United States District Court in downtown Burlington, Vt. His sentencing hearing had dragged on for more than four hours, and Poehlman, dressed in a black suit, remained silent while the lawyers argued over the appropriate sentence for his transgressions. Now was his chance to speak. A year earlier, in the same courthouse, Poehlman pleaded guilty to lying on a federal grant application and admitted to fabricating more than a decade’s worth of scientific data on obesity, menopause and aging, much of it while conducting clinical research as a tenured faculty member at the University of Vermont. "
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/2...9&
ex=1319169600
or maybe this one...
http://www.irbforum.com/forum/
re...e21a337870ffc02
(disclaimer - I'm just linking to what's said out there -- I have no knowledge about these cases)
Let's see, we have Anti Smoking Dysfunction Syndrome (ASDS), Repace's Plume of Doom Mass Hysteria Effect (witness the lady in the Burbank Leader Commentary), Big Tobacco Control's Random Numbers Generator (US EPA approved), the just-discovered "true" original version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (a long range plan by Jews to addict Gentiles to tobacco), and a lot of other recent stuff.
Also, any other syndromes, effects and/or diseases we've missed?
So, what is Glantzheimer's Disease? Any takers?
Rod: So, what is Glantzheimer's Disease? Any takers?
Fear of ventilation?
Fear of acceptable/tight confidence intervals?
The abiltity to defy the deadly effects of SHS while doing studies on SHS?
(And I still say that ASDS is a real disease...that needs massive funding...funnelled through me.)
GDF--Thank you very much for those links. I'm wondering....
The Unwelcome Discovery article came out late last year. Evidently, the U of Vermont worked with "Office of Research Integrity (which is within the Department of Health and Human Services) and the United States Department of Justice". Is that Office of Research Integrity the one to contact about research fraud in public health? Were any alarm bells sounding in that office after Judge Osteen gave his--rather lengthy--ruling?
Glantzheimers Disease. Hummmmm.
Just woke up from my nap, and not all here yet.
But as I was drifting off to sleep I did think we need:
P People
F for an
I Idiot
F Free
S Society
PHIFS. Okay maybe not great but post nap, it's my thought FWIW.
Glantzheimer's Disease
In a accute/chronic form is necessary for membership in
Axis of Idiots (AoI)
Any ideas on who else might be included?
DTB -- I have no idea. (that's why the disclaimer). This refers to GreatScots post on the other thread about stats and probability and Fisher and all that too. And I NEED a nap so I may babble a little.
Well first, it seems that to reach the level of research fraud (so far) we are talking about actually constructing data, rather than cherry picking.
But the problem is that there are SO MANY ways to produce fraudulent (in the moral if not legal sense) results. Dr Siegel's surprise and indignation bag may be bottomless, but mine's about to run empty. Most public health researchers, the slobs who produce the actual work, are not "evil" in the conventional sense of the word -- but just like everyone else - they're working for the paycheck. If you're funded by someone with an interest (and who isn't?), obviously there is a pressure to ask the right questions, and use the right procedures, to please the boss. Let's think again about the question of the difference between the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I don't personally know any public health researchers who don't tell "the truth". You can take it from there.
"Would you like fries with that?" You don't think that worker REALLY cares if you'd like fries with that -- do ya? It's a job.
Yes, public health should be above all that. Sometimes (reaching into my surprise bag) it seems to be. Largely, it isn't.
Now, short of allowing ONLY the independent practice of science, an idea that has all sorts of problems, what do we do?
But... if someone can convince me of the difference between constructing data and imputing OUTCOME data (as per an earlier thread post about a childhood obesity study)... I'll give ya' a Twinkie.
GDF: But... if someone can convince me of the difference between constructing data and imputing OUTCOME data (as per an earlier thread post about a childhood obesity study)... I'll give ya' a Twinkie.
Ah, yes. The Twinkie Defence.
Actually, although accusations of fraud are often geared toward those who *construct* data for the prupose of drawing conclusions, I was thinking more along those outcome lines. Stating conclusions that are not supported by the data presented--and I seem to recall a mention of that happening in a junkfoodscience piece. I see very strong conclusions put forward in SHS studies, even though the data either doesn't agree and/or the studies were picked with bias (as in meta-studies and, as you know, that's a big thing with me). My guess--just a guess--is that inappropriate math models are knowingly used to cause confusion or "faulty" conclusions. Honestly, I tnink hurling false accusations to discredit a valid study is also tantamount to fraud.
Disclaimer on synthesizing data: I've done this--but not as something from which to draw conclusions about data. Actually, we synthesize test data to benchmark/verify *procedures*--say, to look at the robustness and/or time considerations of a heuristic compared to an optimal solution strategy.
Has anyone contacted the FBI or CIA ,to see if they can help locate those 220 living/dead/zombified antis ?Surely almost 1WEEK LATER,SOMEONE MUST KNOW SOMETHING ?
Does Glantzheimer's disease spread to those who have been brainwashed,worshipped him as a demi god,or just come into contact with him ?Are the proclamations concerning any form of death arising from SHS the only symptom of infection,or is it usually in conjunction with falling out of your tree,or throwing your dummy out as well ? Presumably there is no known cure,as lobotomies don't always appear to work on the more extreme single cell amoeba.
si - Has anyone contacted the FBI or CIA ,to see if they can help locate those 220 living/dead/zombified antis ?Surely almost 1WEEK LATER,SOMEONE MUST KNOW SOMETHING ?
.........
Everybody,
I have put out an OIA (Operational Immediate Alert)to the IBOD (International Brotherhood Of Dowsers) seeking an Adept of the First Order (sorta like a tenth dan black belt)to assist in the search.
I don't know what he/she will charge for the search and I don't know what this Adept will require to "prime" or "condition" the dowsing tool - in the way a bloodhound is given an article of clothing to sniff.
Any suggestions how we might provide "priming" material?
si - Re: Glantzheimer's disease - Presumably there is no known cure,as lobotomies don't always appear to work on the more extreme single cell amoeba.
.............
Si, there are some studies that suggest that a seven day detox may be effective.
There is a spa in Arizona, Lago San Carmona, a pig manure lagoon, that has shown promise in alleviating GD.
All the excess excreta of Big Tobacco Control is transported to this special location. (Such is the volume, a large diameter pipeline was proposed. However, environmental concerns doomed the project)
Si asks----'SOMEONE MUST KNOW SOMETHING ?'
Perhaps at the Arizona Spa all re-reading their manual. Probably the section on how to deal when you're caught with 'ur pants down.
Zoom lense bring us this breaking evidence:
http://thumbsnap.com/v/vlRWqLRX.jpg
To continue my rant about less-than-whole-truth in public health:
A few days ago I posted a comment suggesting that Dr. Carmona should shoulder the responsibility for changing his message to the American people due to "pressure". Wouldn't ya' know it... I got an AMEN, so to speak from Dr. Siegel. And the further suggestion that Dr. Carmona had even watered down his remarks about SHS. The irony of that "Amen" was that it was a post I wished I could have taken back right after I wrote it. Because I realized that my real post should have been:
Dr. Carmona is to be commended for speaking out now -- but does he not realize that even the messeges he wishes he could have given, or did give, are likely to be based on work done by people, JUST LIKE HIM, who are producing their work under the pressure of political (funder) agendas? We can't trust him, and he can't trust the work he's reviewing. Wake up Dr. Carmona -- the problem in public health is about more than just you.
Do I get an Amen for that Michael?
GDF
GDF - Wake up Dr. Carmona -- the problem in public health is about more than just you.
.......
GDF,
There is a serious problem here. In California, and other places, SHMF (Second Hand Manure Fumes)Kills!
Every year, 10 to 20 people die of its effects. However, wearing hazmat suits, the bodies can be retrieved and positively identified, unlike the untold millions (or even those legendary 220 bartenders) who prematurely expired from the effects of SHS.
Saint Carmona of the (partial) Recantation may have martyred himself. If so, any stigmata of nicotine stains on his fingers will have disappeared.
May he repace in fecum.
In a 1994 piece Ebeling saw the future and the future is us:
http://www.fff.org/freedom/0794b.asp
~snip~
'
What I am referring to is an increasing political totalitarianism, in which a cultural elite of "beautiful people" claim to know how people should live — what lifestyles are in tune with their conception of the natural order of things — and what attitudes, beliefs, and forms of conduct demonstrate "sensitivity" for the planet and an appropriate "caring" for other people.'
This is what makes these people so dangerous. If they have their way — and if their policies are taken to their logical conclusion — America will be transformed into a politically correct concentration camp, with our cultural and health Nazis being the political guards and enforcers
~snip~
'As long as the owners resort to neither force nor fraud in the use of their property and in their dealings with others, the political authority legally and ethically should not be permitted to intervene into the owners' disposition over that which is theirs. Once we surrender this point, we undermine and subvert the very essence of what private property means — and we are on the road to socialist serfdom.'
~snip~
'For the health Nazis, the new path to a master race (sorry, I meant species) of supermen — excuse me, superpersons — may be found in compelling everybody to eat their greens (assuming they finally can decide whether or not plants have "rights") and regulating the consumption of red meat (that could reduce part of the cruelty-to-animals problem, too). '
A good read.
.
Another good piece:
http://www.fff.org/comment/ed0801c.asp
2001
~snip~
Philip Morris recently had a study done for the Czech Republic to answer the oft-made charge that smokers impose financial burdens on nonsmokers. Conducted by Arthur D. Little International, the study shows that smokers actually don’t impose burdens. They save the public money
According to the Associated Press, Matthew Myers of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids said the report promoted “a callous disregard for life.” John Connolly of the Action on Smoking and Health in Britain said, “The whole exercise is repellent and should be dismissed.” It is “a sort of extermination program for the newly retired,” according to the group.
One suspects that the lobby wants to rig the game. They should be free to demonize smokers for harming society. But anyone who shows that their claim is bogus is a ghoul deserving exile.
Clearly, there are things the anti-smoking lobby would prefer us not to know. Why? Because if we knew the truth the lobby would have a tougher time carrying out its program of social control.
.
Michael/ Dave,
FWIW I like the idea of (if all else fails) a Health Policy journal. Or.. what was the journal that published Silencing Science, the piece on post-Enstrom?
Tangent: Along the lines of Sunz's link, almost everyone should read Thomas Sowell's "The Visions of the Anointed."
Tangent:
Hookah bars see bias in smoking ban
Critics say Britain's new law disproportionately hits largely Muslim customers
...who might disproportionately blow up a subway. (*) Five'll get you ten, the hookah bars are soon given an exemption.
(*) 220 dead nonsmokers right there.
:
Sunz "callous" the new buzz word for smokers or those who do not sign up to the indoctrination ? I've seen far better examples of this in non smokers /antis suddenly coming out of the woodwork preaching their messages of how smoking damages their health,and how good smoking bans are.I just can't figure that if they are so sure now,why they have visited the same pubs and clubs for umpteen years before.No demands for smokefree pubs from them previously.A large chain tried smoke free pubs before the ban in a trial,they lost business and had to revert.Sorry Dr Siegel,keep your social engineering until you can find the 220.How can you be callous when these "deaths" are simply on paper,and no one knows what mathematical wizardry was used.Your silence has proved very helpful.In the words of Gian Turci of FORCES,the discussion is over,this is war.I rather think he is correct.
Can you fit those 220 onto a Trojan horse?
More from the john Daly's "The Big Liars" link provided by DancingTigerBait above at http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/
tro...ojan_number.htm
"One of the most effective forms of Trojan Number is the Virtual Body Count. Sub-editors cannot resist a headline Thousands to die of X. The most egregious example is the EPA's "meta-analysis" of Environmental Tobacco Smoke, which proclaims 3,000 US deaths from passive smoking. If you cut through all the statistical frauds, the results actually demonstrate that passive smoking is harmless."
In another genius thought Walt wonders----'...who might disproportionately blow up a subway. (*) Five'll get you ten, the hookah bars are soon given an exemption.'
(*) 220 dead nonsmokers right there.
_______
I would lay five that those deaths were listed as SHS related deaths!
.
Rod---"May he repace in fecum."
______
Forever and ever AMEN!!!
Si----""callous" the new buzz word for smokers or those who do not sign up to the indoctrination ?"
__________
I think Si it's for us willful types you know that just will not go along. In the cattle business those types are referred to as "taking the green eye". When a cow does that (won't be herded or contained easily) they win a trip to town (the slaughter house) sooner than the rest.
Speaking of which what would you refer to someone as who in the back recesses of his mind realizes this whole Anti thing has gotten off track, sets up a blog to voices his concerns, and the assuage his guilt refuses to answer questions?
.
Walts suggestion on the reading of Vision of the Anointed
For an interview w/Thomas Sowell about this book:
http://www.pbs.org/thinktank/
tra...nscript229.html
~snip~
"MR. SOWELL: We should listen first and foremost to our ownexperience. You seem to be saying, well, there must be alternative saviors. We should stop looking for saviors. I mean the society hasnot existed for thousands of years because it had a succession of saviors. It's existed because it has institutions and processesthrough which people can realize their own goals.'
.
An excellent review on The Vision of the Annointed here:
http://www.draftymanor.com/bart/...t/
sj_polit1.htm
Thanks Walt.
.
OT entirely.
Here is an great idea for some of the wonderful writers on this blog.
Writing is not a gift I was granted which is why I am amazed at the talent in this regard here. Thanks to you all for sharing your talent!!
Good Luck.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8...g8/
rodney1.html
.
In my above post (lewrockwell) I forgot to add the ~snip~
In an effort to make the cause of freedom more appealing, I have collaborated with the Mackinac Center to establish the Freedom in Fiction Prize. This international contest will offer a prize of up to $100,000 and create an incentive for authors to write the next best-selling book championing values necessary for a free, productive and truly compassionate society.'
Kevin, Walt, SamM, Rod G DTB and others looking for a chance at writing???? At lease have a look.
.
Si;
The War analogy is likely one of the fanatics biggest mistakes which will eventually turn this cult movement around.
Don't promote a big mistake. The only war we are witnessing is a war among ourselves as planned. When the public is finally made aware; we are only beating each other up as a result of promoted hatred the backlash of a unified community will be something to really fear.
Health scare has a lot of debts to pay.
For reference it's not like they had no warning;
http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/cg...14/suppl_2/
ii38
" Goodin’s assertion that "moral philosophy is an indispensable first step in [the] larger political campaign", little follow up work has been done.
In turn, this has allowed the tobacco control community to be defined by its desire to defeat the tobacco industry, at the expense of its desire to protect the public. This conclusion can be drawn from an examination of the metaphors used by the tobacco control community. One of the most common is the epidemiologic model in which the industry is characterised as a disease vector—that is, a flea or tick that should be controlled.8 Alternatively, the imagery has been that of armed conflict. Dr David Kessler referred to the efforts to pass Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation as "A Great American Battle"9 and other tobacco researchers have referred to tobacco control policy debates as "war".10,11 No less an authority than former Surgeon General C Everett Koop resorted to a pugilistic metaphor in his keynote address to the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco in 2003. When discussing if the public health community should enter into conversations with the tobacco industry, he advised that:
An industry that has delivered so many punches below the belt and kills a half million of its most loyal customers each year just to make money has no right to ask for Marquis of Queensbury rules.12
The power of the tobacco industry and its aggressive opposition to tobacco control programmes may mean that these metaphors are apt, but they are risky. For example, within Dr Koop’s statement one could read a subtle implication that the public health community would be justified in not following rules of engagement. Right or wrong, the implication of these metaphors is that the public health community will operate outside of the rules to do whatever it takes to win—hardly a moral foundation for resonating with the public. As I have argued elsewhere, the demonisation of the industry by the public health community could marginalise the tobacco control community if the public believes such a characterisation is unfair.13"
In an earlier thread we saw a bar owner who required his clients to really level the playing field, by making non smokers step outside for 10 minutes every hour. This simplistic act is likely passed over genius. If we could convince even one bar chain or hospitality organization to adapt a smokers night one day a week the patrons asked out of mutual respect to step outside so all would be treated equally, the community would be rejoined in an effort which educated all patrons of just how uncivilized a smoking ban actually is.
Leveling the playing field would rejoin communities and increase pressure on the self important politicians who supported smoking bans to take another look, and see if a compromise which respects the other 25% of the population can be found.
Isn't it time for the war to end" For the fear mongers, Liars and antagonists to see some justice?
For the hospitality industry although many bought into removing cigarettes from their bars, perhaps a glimpse at the future of hospitality will clue them into what their crooked partners in Public health are really focussed on; the end of those industries which serve alcohol for starters.
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/f...ll/317/7154/
333
The WHO and right here in Canada at the federal health ministry in training health interventions and effective lobbying tactics both used Bicycle helments as teaching tools in short order legislation became popular in forced use of helmets. What the researchers are now seeing is the legislation has not decreased the injury numbers nearly as predominently as it has reduced bicycle use. The reduced involvement by those who did not want to be saddled with rediculous overkill solutions are now likely headed toward cars and motorcycles as a primary transportation mode. So what was gained? And what was lost?
Similarly although smoking bans reduce the number of smokers in a bar do they really reduce the number of smokers? The exclusion of 25% of the population will change a lot of things, including the public perception of the type of people who now hang around the bars.
Predominantly Health Scare workers acording to the volumes of testimonies seen in the press, indicating how much they love the new surroundings.
LOL
Is it me, or has Dr. Siegel been remarkably quiet these past few days?
He seems to have gone quiet right after a few of us suggested a few workable alternatives to smoking bans, though he did mention in this blog post that he continues to support them.
I guess he's busy putting together that packet of educational materials so bartenders will be properly informed of his "danger" once the ban is repealed.
GreatScot: "IMHO the increase in home smoking is not an unintended consequence but a cynical, deliberate manipulation that will ultimately be used for the next logical step."
I sent the study showing increased home smoke exposure due to bans to all the Illinois reps and senators as they condidered the recent smoking ban. The study made more of a splash than anything else I have sent lawmakers, and was passed around by staff in derision of the ban. One representative on the committee drafting the ban said it was the only thing he had come across on the ban issue that made sense to him. Yet I wonder if any votes were swayed?
I have been warned by our side that using this study is a bad idea, that its use will backfire. But I decided that it was better to use it now when ban votes were being lined up and the pro-freedom side might benefit. It's better that politicians see it now than when the antis want to make their next move.
He's probably hanging out in a bar with the other health scare fanatics getting drunk on prune juice martinis and telling war stories.
Glantzheimers=
constantly being reminded of, and then again forgetting the Bradford Hill criteria.
DancingTiger...
( you are not dancing tiger bait; you are a dancing tiger)
No, we did not have access to age-adjusted data. Only raw (or as someone called it) crude data.
Over time, yes, there are changes in the age-profile of the populations we studied, particularly where we had access to data from 1993 to 2004, in the usa and california. and yes, that is a potential counfounder, however those changes took place gradually and uniformally over time; as a consequence, they are present in the background long term changes. We were looking for short-term changes which we easily would ahve detected if they had occurred, even against the background.
Yes, there are seasonal variations in heart attack rates, more in the winter months, and fewer in the warmer months Please see
http://www.sciencedirect.com/
sci...12e79942eb8b52c
and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entr...2&
dopt=Citation
Dr. Siegel blogged this when he discussed Pueblo.
Really, when a ban takes effect in the summer (like helena and pueblo) , the best approach is to look at the following complete year. Pueblo pre-ban data included 2 winters, one summer, and post ban data included 1 winter and 2 summers.
Just another way to 'cook the books"
godownfighting. we are considering journals like EHP, which have published studies from people like Rodger Jenkins.
Someone said that the journals which published the 4 cities studies really had a moral obligation to publish ours. I agree, and that's why we submitted to them first.
dave K
Someone go to Burbank and set up a charity hot dog sale outside that store. Let's see if that ranti complains about charcoal smoke.
Dave K;
I had been meaning to ask you about the age specific profile. [Asked and answered] Further what consideration was given population increases and if results as a Percentage of population numbers had been evaluated and or presented. [This of course could address the effects of so called fluid populations]
The ethnic factoring of contrasting rates of smoking and ETS exposures across demographics [although averaged out in total EMT numbers] if smoking bans "do" affect population health, they also tell a story of their own as well, when we break down urban populations as others do when it is believed convenient to do so.
The issues have peaked my interest and I have been doing a little research of my own. The slag of which admittedly has been dumped here during smoke breaks.
I have a hard time with the recent statements that 1 in 5 mortalities occurs due to smoking 20% of total mortality is a long way off the statement only half of smokers will die due to smoking. Consider 20-25% of North America smokes and close to 50% are ever smokers the numbers simply don't add up, it doesn't take an epidemiologist to see that, now does it?
Only a politician could make such wild exaggerations and get away with it, but only in concert with a corrupted and politicized media friendly world.
Do most of us really know where our tax dollars are flowing? Purchasing politics with the public purse is supposed to be illegal right?
Margaret-smoker -Someone go to Burbank and set up a charity hot dog sale outside that store. Let's see if that ranti complains about charcoal smoke.
.....
Margaret-smoker,
Interesting thing happening next door to Burbank, where I live.
Glendale, CA has a very high percentage residents whose roots are Armenian.
The local Big Tobacco Control paid shills and stooges are blasting them because they are bringing to America a "cultural" propensity to smoke!
The implication is that "Americans don't don't smoke," so you scummy Armenians have to get rid of your foreign, filthy habits to become true Americans!
Oh, BTC also threw in the filthy Asian "cultural" habit of smoking.
Quote:
"As for overcoming different cultural attitudes toward smoking, Gallegos, who supports greater restrictions, said they can be changed.
"The first-generation immigrants in Glendale, for them smoking is a cultural thing," he said. "But in a new country, everybody who smokes is going to have to learn to embrace the fact that America is going to be a smoke-free country.
We have smoke-free restaurants, we have smoke-free beaches, smoke-free bars — who would've thought that would happen?"
Note that Gallegos is a paid careerist in BTC.
A stooge of BTC:
"But when you realize other cities are doing something about it — when that problem's eradicated, it is glorious."
The problem eradicated? Why do I suspect "eradication" means eradicating smokers?
Kinda scary the amount of nuts out there.
http://www.downingstreetsays.org...ves/
001828.html
First Comment (dated Nov ,06).
"I organize and run an anti-smoking patrol in and around my local community, this being prior to the smoking ban being brought in next year. So far we have photographic and camcorder evidence of several people that smoke. I don’t mind telling you that I have approached my GP, dentist and local Police Superintendent. All three have told me that if I can supply sufficient evidence, i.e. names and addresses of anyone in the local community that is likely to flout the ban when it comes into force in 2007, then they will be ready to move against them, in their various ways.
For example, my GP and dentist will check to see if these smokers are on their patients’ lists, and if they are, then they will be prepared to refuse treatment when the time comes. My local Police Superintendent, whom I know socially, says that he would be happy to add names to a database if I can supply a sufficient number to him.
So, my query quite simply is this, will there be an anti-smoking hotline set up by your department, so that information gathered can be quickly conveyed to the relevant authorities, or other interested parties. If this service is to be introduced soon, then can a number be passed on to my local constituency headquarters as soon as possible? I look forward to writing to you again, Patricia. As advised I shall not make these views public.
Your PPS thinks this is a workable idea!
Yours Sincerely
Dr Kenneth Johnson (BSc,Cantab)
I know where I would stick his camera!!
GreatScot
One fellow I met travels across the country as part of a music scene and often goes to bars in various parts of the country with and without bans. He spoke at a council smoking ban hearing against bans and later said he believed the bar smoking ban controversy is really a fight between orals and anals. Once the anals take control of a bar thru a ban, he said the atmosphere of an establishment changes. Anyone know much about Freudian psychology?
According to this fellow, anals are always worried about order and their space not being violated. They want a controlled, predictable experience. Orals are effusive and expressive. They tend to spend more than they should and are less likely to worry about invading other's space by talking loud, addressing people they don't know or blowing smoke, but are more likely to buy strangers drinks. A bar without the orals is dull and predictable.
Bill,
Don't know about the oral anal aspect but I bet someone with psych background would be able to say a few words on this. I have my opinion, that I will keep safely to myself.
In some of the above posts I linked to some reviews of a book written by Thomas Sowell. One of the links I didn't posts describes this as the 'intellectual elites' thus:
http://www.fff.org/freedom/1295h.asp
'They want power to remold the world to fit their model of how they think the rest of us should live and act and what we should believe in and value'
' they are willing to do everything to shield themselves from any information and evidence that might contradict and undermine their utopian fantasies.'
'Sowell shows in a devastating manner how they either ignore or distort the statistical data to fit their preconceived ideas.'
'An especially powerful technique in advancing their visions for paternalistic government, Sowell argues, has been the manipulative use of words by the anointed. "Public service" means not the private market provision of goods and services desired and valued by the consumers of society'
'Through the manipulation of history, the abuse of statistical evidence, a distorted view of man and society, and the twisting of words and ideas, the intellectual elite — the anointed — are able to attain their goal: the control of other people's lives through political power over society. These techniques also enable them to maintain a fantasy world in which they can retain their conception of themselves as more virtuous, wiser, and better than their fellow human beings.'
And there is much more, I hope you enjoy it. IMO I'd say these type folks are pretty anal.
Kevin wrote:
"I have a hard time with the recent statements that 1 in 5 mortalities occurs due to smoking 20% of total mortality is a long way off the statement only half of smokers will die due to smoking."
20% of 2.4 million deaths = 480,000, roughly the claimed number of smoking and SHS deaths combined. I think that's where they're getting that ratio.
Dave K: DancingTiger...( you are not dancing tiger bait; you are a dancing tiger)
Who? Li'l ol me? I'm just a dancing...bored housewife. LOL. But thank you for the response.
Rod G: A stooge of BTC [said]: "But when you realize other cities are doing something about it — when that problem's eradicated, it is glorious." The problem eradicated? Why do I suspect "eradication" means eradicating smokers?
Didn't someone comment on an eerie news bit showing a woman gleefully saying that people who objected to the smoking ban were "gone now". Eradicated. LOL, in their dreams. People do what they want. Period. The idea is to recognize that fact and then work from there.
GreatScot--Yep, scary. Nutjobs exist. That's part of life. Nutjobs usually imagine that they have some secret power over other people. The scary stuff happens when nutjobs start getting hired, en masse, to "eradicate" part of the population.
Bill Hannegan: ...the bar smoking ban controversy is really a fight between orals and anals. Once the anals take control of a bar thru a ban, he said the atmosphere of an establishment changes. Anyone know much about Freudian psychology?
So, I have an oral fixation. rAntis have an anal fixa... Whoa.
Sunz quoting Sowell: 'Through the manipulation of history, the abuse of statistical evidence, a distorted view of man and society, and the twisting of words and ideas, the intellectual elite — the anointed — are able to attain their goal: the control of other people's lives through political power over society. These techniques also enable them to maintain a fantasy world in which they can retain their conception of themselves as more virtuous, wiser, and better than their fellow human beings.'
Nutjobs in their fantasy world...let loose in the real world. Also, thanks bigtime for the link to "Freedom in Fiction". I don't know if I could enter, but I could try. Also, I posted it in the Lounge of The Big Debate and got one positive response already.
finally, rather OT, I have a link: Doctors: we must all donate organs
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/
tol...icle2076248.ece
Note: There was a report recently of experiments done by paramedics on heart attack victims--to satify the curiosity of their PhRMA masters--unless the patient had "opted out" of the experiment in the community.
Closer to on-topic:
Vicar blesses smoke ban sign in protest
http://
www.thisislocallondon.co...._in_protest.php
Canon Garlick says the blessing with incense and holy water was made to mock the law and because all new items in churches must be blessed. He said: "There was an irony in doing the blessing with smoke on a No Smoking sign but we think the ban allows incense."
Quick PS:
A suggestion for nonsmoking bars/restaurants lacking atmosphere. Tobacco scented candles:
http://www.itsasoycandle.com/
sce...dcandles321.php
Get 'em while they're hot! *G*
si, I'm glad you liked it.
Talk about irony worthy of a Henry O story...Carmona complaining about outside political pressure on him from the administration when it was outside political pressure from left wing groups that forced him to issue that obviously bogus "study" to suit THEIR agenda.
I think that is what Dr. Siegel is railing against here on his blog. His previously respected and trusted profession has been co-opted and hijacked by political hacks. In fairness, the stupidity is probably bipartisan. (or maybe it's not)
I am astounded that the people quoted in this article claim the authority to define what American principles and culture are.
These BTC types are claiming that smoking is not American - it's foreign to our culture! And that immigrants had better shape up or ship out - the scum!
Smoking ban meets cultural resistance
BY EUGENE TONG, Staff Writer
LA Daily News
Article Last Updated:07/14/2007 11:41:49 PM PDT
GLENDALE — They've snuffed out cigarettes in Calabasas, Santa Monica, Burbank and Beverly Hills — and now a group of local residents has started pressing for a public smoking ban here.
Advocates behind the "No Butts Glendale" campaign have been pushing the City Council since June to consider outlawing smoking in parks, lines and within 25 feet of sidewalks and business entrances.
They also have started an online petition, which has collected 66 signatures since July 7.
But unlike some other locations, the move could be a tough sell in this city of 208,000, where local health officials say smoking is prevalent among the community's large Armenian and Asian immigrant populations.
URL: http://tinyurl.com/yvukgo
"There was an irony in doing the blessing with smoke on a No Smoking sign but we think the ban allows incense."
Oh GAWD! ROTFL! Go Vicar!
The "those who objected to the smoking ban are all gone now" quote was by way of me. It was said by a rep from a local bar and restaurant association on some anniversary of the ban(on TV so I didn't catch her name and can't link it). I can't believe she didn't go home and want to take THAT comment back.
But well -- I guess she no longer represented those who are gone. Scary thought that.
I also saw on TV a California resident who stated she was pleased about a beach smoking ban because she doesn't want to have to see cigarettes on the beach when she walks her dog.
Does that even deserve comment? Oh okay... y'all know what I don't want to see on the beach when I'm having a smoke?
Sunz - ty for the Sowell stuff.
GDF
This just in from Glendale (over to you rod): ...and now a group of local residents has started pressing for a public smoking ban here.
Advocates behind the "No Butts Glendale" campaign have been pushing the City Council since June to consider outlawing smoking in parks, lines and within 25 feet of sidewalks and business entrances. They also have started an online petition, which has collected 66 signatures since July 7.
Straight-faced Anchor: Wow, Rod. A whooping 66 online signatures. Well, yes, we call that an overwhleming response here. Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
LOL, somebody actually wrote that article with a straight face?
GDF: I also saw on TV a California resident who stated she was pleased about a beach smoking ban because she doesn't want to have to see cigarettes on the beach when she walks her dog. Does that even deserve comment? Oh okay... y'all know what I don't want to see on the beach when I'm having a smoke?
ROFLMAO!!! Honestly...*sigh* Well, we know who the healthists are gonna target next, don't we? All those nasty little non-purebreds in CA. That woman has bigger problems headed her way than she knows. I feel sorry for her dog.
Wow! Didn't even think about whether her dog was one of the California-approved purebreds. Is it mean of me to hope not?
Vicar blesses smoke ban sign in protest
Thanks DTB, another coffee laced keyboard! Still laughing. As always, I appreciate reading the insightful comments by all.
GDF: Wow! Didn't even think about whether her dog was one of the California-approved purebreds. Is it mean of me to hope not?
Yes. *wink* Both laws are terrible, and that woman's life probably revolves around "Fifi" and complaining to whoever will listen about whatever comes to mind. Maybe, without a dog, she'd have to get at least half-a-life.
smokenreader--Does that make your keyboard and SHS casualty?
Oh...hey, I found the 220 back at TBD but I lost them again. Bummer. If I can dig them up, I'll post here.
Here we go...
The vicar's protest. The mass during which he blessed the No Smoking sign with (smoking) incense was attended by 220 people. Those bartenders didn't die and go to Heaven, they went to Church!!
Vicar blesses smoke ban sign in protest
http://
www.thisislocallondon.co...._in_protest.php
*snip*
Around 220 people were at the mass and some joined in the procession outside.
*end snip*
Am I seeing (or not seeing?) things. Did I get edited? Did *someone* think my comment to Rod about "funny names" was serious, rather than... sardonic? A little edgy, I thought but gosh -- I didn't mean to seriously offend. Well, okay, I meant to offend those who believe they *know* what American culture should be. Well anyway, (or even if it was offensive in some other way that I wasn't seeing?) I apologize.
(Boy am I having a BAD weekend. thank goodness only 21 minutes left)
GDF
County of Los Angeles - Department of Public Health
Tobacco Control and Prevention Program (TCPP)
This site will tell you almost everything you need to know about how your tax dollars are supporting a full, all encompassing NAZI agenda on tobacco.
Excerpts:
"Creating smoke-free areas is legally defensible. The Technical Assistance Legal Center (TALC), a project of the Public Health Institute, has concluded that Equal Protection and Right to Privacy are not violated as a result of a smoke-free housing policy because smokers have not been designated as a protected class under anti-discrimination laws. Key legal findings are as follows:
· No court has ever recognized smoking as a fundamental right nor has any court ever found smokers to be a protected class. Claims to the contrary have no legal basis,
· The "right to privacy" protected by the U.S. Constitution only applies to marriage, contraception, family relationships, and the rearing and education of children, and
· There are groups of people - such as groups based on race, national origin and gender - that receive greater protection against discriminatory acts under the U.S. and California Constitutions than do other groups of people. Smokers have never been identified as one of these protected groups. This is because smoking is a behavior, not a condition of birth. Smoking is not an "immutable characteristic" because people are not born as smokers; smoking is a behavior that people can stop."
"...To address these priority areas, CDHS/TCS utilizes a social norm change approach that attempts to indirectly influence current and potential future tobacco users by creating a social milieu and legal climate in which tobacco becomes less desirable, less acceptable, and less accessible."
"Outdoor SHS can expose nonsmokers to toxic particulate concentrations similar to those found in diesel bus exhaust or in rooms with unrestricted smoking. The mixture of chemicals can react with existing substances in the air, yielding new hazardous compounds. SHS emitted from a burning cigarette does not immediately disperse in outdoor air, but first rises, then settles. As it descends, the cloud of smoke saturates the local area and spreads downwind to nonsmokers. With cigarette smoking in groups, multiple plumes of smoke will intersect and can spread in various directions. Nonsmokers then breathe in the carcinogens and toxicants contained in the smoke."
URL: http://tinyurl.com/3yowp5
'smokenreader--Does that make your keyboard and SHS casualty?.' ...DTB
DTB, is that a trick question?
Actually, I opened a window, let it sit for a while, and what’da know; it works just fine. Go figure. (true story).
Talk about "Paid Shills!"
Remember the Glendale story I posted a short while ago? This guy Gallegos is a hired gun! Take a look:
About Steven Gallegos who works "with" the American Lung Association and as Community Advocate for Glendale Adventist Medical Center. Sounds like volunteer work, doesn't it? Amazing the reporter for the Los Angeles Daily News didn't mention that Gallegos' company was hired for the campaign.
Public Health Policy Advocates
URL: http://tinyurl.com/2nrr74
Steven J. Gallegos, Principal Consultant
Recognized leader in public health policy advocacy and accomplished strategist in environmental and culture change
Our advocacy efforts and strengths in coalition building, strategic planning, communications, leadership, project management, public speaking have achieved public policy in health results for organizations including:
--Glendale Adventist Medical Center
-- Altzheimer's Association of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino Counties
-- American Heart Association
-- Coalition for Tobacco Free Los Angeles County
-- Los Angeles County Tobacco Control & Prevention Program
-- Centers for Disease Control & Prevention
-- Fit WIC
-- LA Collaborative (5-a-Day PowerPlay)
-- West Virginia Tobacco Prevention Program
Download his resume (in MS Word) here URL: http://tinyurl.com/39e88g
"Smokers have never been identified as one of these protected groups. This is because smoking is a behavior, not a condition of birth. Smoking is not an "immutable characteristic" because people are not born as smokers; smoking is a behavior that people can stop."
Would that be like a religion or cultural thing? I guess both are choices and are also now excluded from protection. As with fat people who can loose weight have no rights whereas ugly people are stuck with a birth defect are protected until surgery corrects the problem after which legal standing could change. Can Gays quit being gay? Perhaps the flamboyance as a behavior could be stopped. In order to avaid sexual preference as a behavior nullifying protections we have to agree Gay is a trait from birth which can not change, however the personality types who smoke for whatever reason are a matter of choice?
If in the case of a white kid who grew up in Jamaica and sounds Jamaican, can he be classed as a member of a protected group? or is it necessary for him to chemically change color first? Some of those poor kids born white in Black homes must be getting screwed over by the courts big time.
Since when did the courts decide personal choices and traits offered no protection from discrimination or promoted hatred. Someone dabbling in the legal field who created these arguments needs to go back to the drawing board.
A class is a group easily identified the single word description as a smoker does not afford anyone the right of legal discrimination and directed hatred.
Even bleeding heart Liberals [Quoting Bono] have rights against hatred and discrimination and everyone hates them although few are allowed to say it any more.
"Outdoor SHS can expose nonsmokers to toxic particulate concentrations similar to those found in diesel bus exhaust or in rooms with unrestricted smoking. The mixture of chemicals can react with existing substances in the air, yielding new hazardous compounds. SHS emitted from a burning cigarette does not immediately disperse in outdoor air, but first rises, then settles. As it descends, the cloud of smoke saturates the local area and spreads downwind to nonsmokers. With cigarette smoking in groups, multiple plumes of smoke will intersect and can spread in various directions. Nonsmokers then breathe in the carcinogens and toxicants contained in the smoke."
This one is an uneducated hysterical opinion which needs to be addressed.
Cigarette smoke because of the perhaps millions of combinations of what could constitute a cigarette has never been properly defined.
The idea the smoke we see is indicative of what is produced is essentially false. Many of the components trapped in a smoking machine are invisible and odourless. Nothing binds the components together and their disapation begins perhaps a nanosecond after they leave the end of a cigarette.
Each individual chemical has a specific gravity which determines if it will rise or fall each will after being burned return to a natural state of solid liquid or gas depending also by the temperature and air pressure they are introduced to as they are merged with so called clean air dissipates. Some of the harmful toxins or carcinogens it stands to reason will, because of gravity rise and not rain back down some will sink and others will attach themselves to other solid objects. To immagine the resulting creation of compounds which could cause harm needs a little scientific evidence to back it up because some toxins are rendered harmless when mixed with air or other chemicals also in the outdoor air.
To state the smoke as a whole remains as a whole and does not immediately disperse while retaining a toxic level which could harm non smokers while not aparently affecting the smokers themselves needs a little examination. Certainly more than ridiculous figments of a well paid and devoted imagination.
The author JR needs to stop spreading unfounded nonsense and go back to school to understand more about the snake oil toxins he spews.
The idea so called intelligent news editors believe this rubbish speaks volumes for the standards of what they teach people in school these days, Or is simply a reflection of their qualifications.
Religion is not an immutable characteristic, either. Can we discriminate on that basis?
" "...To address these priority areas, CDHS/TCS utilizes a social norm change approach that attempts to indirectly influence current and potential future tobacco users by creating a social milieu and legal climate in which tobacco becomes less desirable, less acceptable, and less accessible."
The plan to implement this discrimination and directed hatred which deliberately disrupts the right to peaceful enjoyment of one's own home I fully believe is actionable.
All it takes is a Lawyer who wants to get rich and a class action. Suing the schemers which as with the other protected classes named above, could easily establish legal precedent by the volume of those affected alone a consumer class being abused and in need of the court's protection.
Off topic: One of my poster colleagues here sometime ago showed a graphic which indicates that epi studies on SHS tend to converge to RR=1.0 the bigger the study. Could somebody please point me to this graphic.
Kevin, of course there are literally hundreds of reasons why statewide heart attack admissions could/would change over time, in a period, from, say, 1993 to 2004.
In fact, our data clearly show that did indeed happen in all jurisdictions we covered.
We did look at changes in the population demographics of California and the USA to determine if we would see something different. Both the populatin of CA and the usa increased about 10% during the period. While the population of the usa grew slightly older, the population of CA grew slightly younger.
The population of CA also quit smoking to a higher degree than the population of the usa, although there is also some data indicating that many CA smokers actually moved to other states.
Lots of things happened in ca which are somewhat unique. One, is the high cost of living drove many retirees to lower cost states. Ca is only one of 2 states which taxes real estate on the purchase value, and never adjusts that tax for inflation. Therefore, it makes sense for retirees to just let their kids live in their homes and move elsewhere.
I am retired. If i were retired in Ca, and had bought my house in 1960 and was still paying pretty low property taxes, I would just rent my house there, instead of selling it and use the high rental income to pay the mortgage on a new house to live in in a low cost state. The Wall Street Journal operates a program called Encore which studies where retirees go to retire. The states losing retirees fastest are NY, IL, CA,NJ,MI and those gaining the most retirees are FL, AZ, NV, NC, and TX.
Of course, I would think retired smokers would be even more likely to want to leave CA than retired nonsmokers.
In addition to all that, is also the growing hispanic population in Ca which is not comprised of too many smokers. So there was an ethnic shift too.
Yet, when you look at the data, ( I posted links to our charts previously in this thread) none of this seems to matter too much. California heart attacks did run roughly parallel to the USA. While it is probably true that all of these demographics do , to some extent, affect heart attack rates, it is actually quite obvious that they do not influence them very much.
So, we do see a situation where smokers either moved out of CA or quit much more than other states; the population grew younger, and if those factors, which are much more statistically compelling than the claims about secondhand smoke, did not cause any detectable shift in heart attacks compared to the USA, then it would be completely stupid to claim that a smoking ban could.
dave K
Kevin: " "...To address these priority areas, CDHS/TCS utilizes a social norm change approach that attempts to indirectly influence current and potential future tobacco users by creating a social milieu and legal climate in which tobacco becomes less desirable, less acceptable, and less accessible."
This is closely related to an article I read last night.
"...To address these priority areas, CDHS/TCS utilizes a social norm change approach that attempts to indirectly influence current and potential future tobacco users by creating a social milieu and legal climate in which tobacco becomes less desirable, less acceptable, and less accessible."
Very similar to what Lady Elaine Murphy wrote to me about their ban after my visit to the UK:
"Dear Mr McFadden,
You and many others have completely missed the point about smoking and health. The aim is reduce the public acceptability of smoking and the culture which surrounds it. We know that legislation which discourages all public smoking will have the better impact on public understanding and perception of smoking as an unacceptable habit. Hence fewer people will smoke, hence health overall will improve."
It's only in the last five years or so that they've begun admitting the social-engineering basis of their push for bans at all. It's only in the last two years or so that they've begun to be bald-faced enough to admit it publicly.
And I'd like to add a thought onto Dave's note about California above. If it weren't for the scapegoat of smoking we might well see the emergence of the Oceanic Theory of health. Those living along the west coast are constantly exposed to the air rushing in from the Pacific Ocean. That healthy inrush would be quite sufficient to explain the very consistent lower rate of heart attacks among Californians as compared to the US overall. Indeed, given the amazing consistency of the parallelism of the two graphs such an explanation probably makes a helluva lot more sense than one based on the vicissitudes of social habit and population changes.
Michael J. McFadden
Author of Dissecting Antismokers' Brains
Creator of the Oceanic Theory Of Health
http://pasan.TheTruthIsALie.com
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