Issue #780

“Every time we walk along a beach some ancient urge disturbs us so that we find ourselves shedding shoes and garments or scavenging among seaweed and whitened timbers like the homesick refugees of a long war.”
– Loren Eiseley

Oregon State comes to senses on beach smoking ban.

IL: Clark County. Entire Park District Board Placed Under Citizen’s Arrest. Group objects to board’s failure to allow public comment at meeting. Kraft said he wasn’t planning to pull out the citizen’s arrest statute at the park board hearing until it became clear the board was refusing to let people address them. Board members took immediate notice. “It’s not that they should have. They’re mandated to,” Clark County Sheriff Jerry Parsley said. “The people need to have their voice. It’s not a dictatorship. It’s a democracy.” Wallace said, he’d be willing to split those court costs seven ways with his fellow board members.

MO: Columbia. Housing authority smoking ban still needs final approval. Radtke said at the meeting that the Board of Commissioners would consider residents’ suggestions for “tweaks” to the policy, such as whether or not shelters or additional lighting should be provided to increase safety for smokers outside.

NC: Mount Airy. City tobacco-free plan goes up in smoke. “I think that’s taking away freedom,” Commissioner Shirley Brinkley said of prohibiting smoking in the Great Outdoors. “This is God’s country – the air is His and it’s free.” Brinkley was quick to say Thursday that she does not approve of tobacco use, and wishes the world could be free of cigarette smoke. And citizens have the right to prohibit someone’s tobacco use in their homes, said Brinkley, but she believes banning smoking in outside public venues is problematic. “I just think we have to be very, very careful taking away the use of free air,” Brinkley added, saying the ban on tobacco use would be “imposing too much control over people who’ve paid the bill for the recreation facilities.”

Illegal cigarettes? Blame government: An ongoing advertising campaign to stop people from buying illegal cigarettes puts all of the blame on the buyer and none on the one entity that could actually do something about it – the government. But why do otherwise law-abiding people go to the black market for their smokes? Easy. Price. So governments created a black market with high tax rates while allowing criminals to control it by refusing to enforce the law.

New threat for smoke-free campaign: High tobacco prices create home-grown demand. The plants, which she believes are of the “Virginia” strain, do best in warm climates, particularly during the summer. Once dried, the tobacco leaves are shredded in a blender.

The New Tobacco War: They may be safer, but could e-cigs renormalize smoking? Johnson decided on his own he needed to make a change and began to wean himself off smoking using e-cigarettes. Almost immediately, he was able to cut his cigarette use, stretching each pack of 20 cigarettes to last a full day, then two. By September, he was down to just five cigarettes a day.

Scotland: Health campaigners fury as new e-cigarette advert to be first ‘smoking’ commercial shown in 49 years. Angry health campaigners think the 20-second clip will “sexualise and glamorise” the nicotine devices.

RFID Technology: Human tagging. Radio-frequency identification (RFID) is the wireless use of electromagnetic fields to transfer data, for the purposes of automatically identifying and tracking tags attached to objects. RFID tags, antennas, readers, database system, cell phones, and more.

Camera Technology: Constant camera surveillance, red light and speed cameras, security cameras, and more.

TV Technology: I’m terrified of my new TV: Why I’m scared to turn this thing on – and you’d be, too. From facial recognition to personal data collection, this thing is downright scary – and so are the implications. The amount of data this thing collects is staggering. Information, a built-in camera – with facial recognition, a microphone for “voice recognition” and an ominous warning: “Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party.”