Big Win for e-Cigarette Importers

News Flash - the Federal Court turned down the FDA's efforts to ban e-Cigarettes. (See the New York Times article.)

The bigger question is why would Government agencies and anti-tobacco groups be against a product that relieves some of the greatest harms of smoking (second hand smoke, the smell, the hacking cough) and works as an anecdotally acclaimed means of quitting?

3 reasons:

1. Money
2. Power
3. Self-righteousness

Their attitudes are so repugnant that I feel like smoking again. I won't, but I am willing to fume.

Here's why.

1. Money. The government has found a fantastic source of revenue built on the backs of tobacco addicts. Like any addict - in this case, revenue addicts - they are deeply reluctant to give it up. When the time is ripe - we'll discuss a 12 step method for the tobacco taxers.....

The same applies to the major anti-tobacco groups. There are a small handful that get the lion's share of the paltry few million the government doles out from its tobacco revenues. They are just as dependent on this tax income and so they too have every incentive to attack (Tobacco Free Kids being high on his list). The game has become fixed to the point where they actually function as a handmaiden to the tobacco industry - warding off newcomers (competition) and making it seem like the tobacco companies are staying away from kids. They also support big pharma and its plethora of patches, gums, pills and other cessation paraphernalia.

2. Power. Agencies like the FDA derive their power from what they control. First you ban, then you control. Overlaps with money. (Also reminds us of the record companies and downloading - is it any coincidence that Time Warner's Richard Parsons told Napster "first you stop, then we talk." Now he runs Citibank. Guess what - all are in ruins. Note to FDA: the internet has changed all that - dictatorships just don't work like they used to.)

3. Self Righteousness. Everybody loves to point out somebody else's weakness and health groups are notorious in this regard. The fact that people have reasons for smoking - however troubling - is of zero interest to them. Just stop. Have will power blah, blah, blah. Smokers are motivated by deep reasons that rarely disappear just because they quit - they are typically sublimated to other practices. Often medication - both good or bad (e.g. how many smokers were really using tobacco as a crude form of Ridalin, or Prozac, or an upper or a downer).  The worst fears of these zealots emerge when smokers appear to be enjoying themselves. You can't really respond to them - unless there truly is a skeleton in their closets - except to let their own fanaticism do its own discrediting.

Guaranteed - all 3 of these types will have something to say about the children. This makes children smoke blah, blah. I say this makes children distrust politicians. As usual this is just a smokescreen, no one is promoting this for kids just for people who already smoke.....but the tactic always pulls at someone's heartstrings - including smokers'.

Bottom line - for better or worse there are approximately 40 million smokers in the U.S. as they get up from the back of the bus they will realize that fate has given them a reprieve in he form of e-Cigarettes. Once the word truly gets out and they learn to rust these products, and understand the actions of these high-placed malefactors - I predict there will be a huge backlash. Some heads will roll. The argument will change completely.

He fact that this innovation came to us from China will also deliver a lesson about what happens when Government gets too involved - its stifles ideas and protects the insiders who become effectively corrupt. Of course, they never see it that way - hence point 3. self-righteousness. But there it is - another little vignette about why we are on our way to becoming a lost force in the world.