Mr A

Census 2011

2011-02-20T23:39:00.000-08:00

Remember how in the 2001 Census thousands of people put their religion down as "Jedi Knight"?

Ten years on, and in an almost unrecognisable fascist state where private property rights have been ignored and civil liberties trampled on, we now have the chance to complete another.

Whether you want to make a statement or you just want to annoy them by having some fun and meddling with their plan to force you to disclose personal information about yourself, then fill in the religion box as "Smoker."

Let them know how much they have irritated you. Your religion is smoker and you will not be persecuted by the rent-seekers of ASH.

Tobacco Control are spearheading an Inquisition.

Let's just highlight that fact.

A Book Review? Is it about smoking?

2010-07-25T06:46:00.000-07:00

Heh, no.

But it is by a seasoned campaigner for all things good, free and (anti) Righteous, a certain Mr Leg Iron of "must-read-blog-and-surely-to-do-well-in-this-year's-Total Politics-poll" blog Underdogs Bite Upwards.

Leggy recently complained that there were hundreds of Google searches apparently being undertaken using the search terms "Who is Leg Iron?". Well, these weirdos at least must be happy as we now know - Leggy is a certain K.K. Hillman, of 21 Smoky Drinky Place, Scotland.

He's recently posted a few stories on Underdogs Bite Upwards as a prelude to publishing a collection of his previously-published fiction and, as a writer in my other life (it's not hard to work out who I am - I shamelessly have my writer's blog in my blogroll) I was suitably intrigued.

"Fears of the Old and the New" collects together nineteen short stories as well as a truly brilliant take on Poe's "The Raven" where the horror of the original is replaced with the far more gut-clenching terrors of New Labour:

"Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a one-eyed gorgon of the Monster days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But with mien of lord and lady, squatted down upon the floor -
Sat beside a pile of mended phones that lay upon the floor -
Scowled and sulked, and nothing more."

Hillman's stories are proof that economy is a virtue in short story writing; many are only a few pages long and they benefit from this length, their message being conveyed simply and hitting the brain like a finely distilled Scotch rather than being diluted by padding like a weak ale.

Hillman's approach reminds me a lot of Stephen King or later Ramsey Campbell; normal, everyday suburban settings - involving a man with raucous chav neighbour or a middle-aged divorcee who spends too much time in the pub and inadvertantly makes his own impression on Christmas - settings which highlight the creeping horror that later emerges to even greater effect.

But I was also reminded of those old Pan Horror collections or the 70s Hammer Horror TV show, where modern settings are still somehow suffused with Gothic Horror. In stories like "The Skull", where a couple inherit a house complete with yellowed skull, or "The Transformation Ritual," "Drinking Buddies" and "Hell.net" which transpose vampires, magic circles and demonic invocation into the modern age.

But there is a vein of dark humour that runs through the stories. Hillman doesn't take himself too seriously, and, like Roald Dahl, amongst the satire, horror and occasional gore there are also laughs to be found. Here stories like "The Beer Monster" and "Last Christmas" shine. In the former,a man disgruntled with the all-night parties of his heavy-drinking neighbour, manages to buy a six pack of lager which contains a homicidal genie that will kill the first person it sees. There are unforeseen consequences to this, consequences which, having read his blog, I suspect he would like to see befall all "Righteous" who are so thin-lipped and joyless that the very smell of smoke or alcohol makes them retch.

As no stranger to the question, "What is real?" in my own stories, I particularly enjoyed "The Imagination Virus" which deftly shows us the effects of a virus that can alter our own perception of reality and "Telephone Pest" which could have come from Philip. K. Dick's pen circa 1957.

Hillman's prose style isn't flashy; but it's witty, economical and invites you into the worlds in the collection, which is surely what all good prose should aim to do.

Overall, this is a great little collection, although I have to admit I was disappointed that it didn't contain a story called "One Stop After Marchway", which manages to pull off the trick of being both funny and clever at the same time. That said, it can still be found at Leg Iron's blog, here.

Well worth a read.

The book can be bought from Amazon or downloaded and read on the PC. More details (including a Discount Code that gets you 15% off the price of the print version) here.

Your Freedom and other useful links

2010-07-25T06:08:00.000-07:00

Okay, okay, I know Cleggy has already said the chances of removing the smoking ban are minimal (well, in fact, he's discounted it completely), but it's good to keep up the pressure - if nothing else it shows the idiots in their ivory towers what real people think and highlights that everything that spews from ASH is a lie and not to be trusted. And anything that shows up ASH is to be fully encouraged, as far as I'm concerned.

So, here's my proposal to cut funding to ASH on the Your Freedom sight. They cut the original one as it didn't mention a specific law to be repealed. To be honest, I came up with the Charities Act because I just wanted to get something against ASH on the site that wouldn't get pulled. That said, it does seem to me that if ASH can't hide behind their "working in the public good" front they would be seen for what they are - a political lobbying group, something which is not allowed by the Charity Commission's own rules:

Cut all public funding to ASH

Oh well, there goes my anonymity... :)

And another one, although it makes the same mistake my first proposal did, so I suspect it may get frozen at some point.

Then of course, there are the smoking ban threads. Surprisingly (considering how popular the smoking ban supposedly is) there have been hundreds of these. Unfortunately, it seems the moderators are working full-time to close them down and direct comments to a handful of main ones. Thankfully, these are amongst the most commented upon threads on the site in their respective categories and are doing okay votes-wise, on 3-3.5/5, as of today. Remember to rate as well as comment.

The Smoking Ban in the Repeal Unnecessary laws thread.

The smoking ban in the Restoring Civil Liberties thread.

And of course don't forget Brian Binley MP's Early Day Motion on the Ban. Write to your MP encouraging them to support this EDM by using They Work For You. It's quick and easy.

It may sometimes feel like we're fighting a losing war, but I definitely get the feeling that attitudes are changing. Now the restrictive weight of a Labour Government has been removed from our shoulders and the possibility of having certain civil liberties restored has become less of a fantasy, I think many people are starting to reject the healthist brainwashing of the last few years and are thankfully beginning to show some common sense again. Recent comments on the "Billie Piper smoking next to child" non-story in The "Labour Mouthpiece" Guardian and Daily "I'm furious but am not quite sure why" Mail seems to testify to that, especially when you consider that this is The Guardian, FFS!

Also, good to see that Billie isn't taking the witch-hunt lying down. She's a fine actress, but my estimation of her as a person has just doubled.

ASH get owned.

2010-07-20T12:05:00.000-07:00

Not a lot more to add, really. Back in 1990 ASH tried their usual corrupt tricks during a Parliamentary Select Committee, got found out and were nicely roasted for it. Of course, this wouldn't happen today (as Christopher Snowden's "Dark Market" so amply demonstrates; now ASH and the Government are too busy working together to lie and obfuscate), but still - it always brings a smile to my face on a wet and dreary afternoon.

(h/t to HairyChestnuts for reminding me of the URL).

Anti-Tobacco Explained

2010-07-15T03:44:00.001-07:00

I came across this brilliant series of posts in the Comments section over at Velvet Glove, Iron Fist. The author chooses to remain anonymous and I will of course remove this post if he wishes me to - althoughI sincerely hope he does not.

It's a brilliant piece of writing that puts all the pieces I've always known about Tobacco Control (the junk science, their Nazi origins, the global sphere of anti-tobacco, the elements of "control" and denial of freedom through Public Health) into one coherent history. It's simply an astonishing piece of writing and I reproduce it in full for you here. THIS is why I fight smoking bans - those idiots who complain about smelling of smoke when THIS is the real issue, really are just useful idiots.

It's nothing less than a war - a war on freedom. And a war on rational thought.

"Very briefly, consider what are known as the “hard sciences”, e.g., physics. A critical function of science is pinpointing; the attempt to discern high-level predictors (antecedents) for specific consequents. An understanding of the laws of motion, etc, etc, allows one to predict from a position on the earth and with near-perfect accuracy the timing of sunrise/sunset and eclipses, for example. An understanding of underlying causal processes allows for the highly accurate pinpointing of a consequent, i.e., a priori, from an antecedent or cluster of antecedents. And this accuracy is not in relative risk terms but in absolute probability terms. High absolute predictive strength is ultimately a main “gold standard” of causal inference.

Some examples of the nonsense that is produced by a reliance on the relative-risk statistic: Consider a control group and an experimental group of 100 people each. (it doesn’t even matter what the experimental measure is). In one experiment there is 1 (baseline) person in the control group and 7 in the experimental group demonstrating a particular measured consequent. In another experiment, there are 10 (baseline) persons in the control group and 70 in the experimental group demonstrating a particular consequent. In both instances the RR will be 7.0. Yet the two situations represent very different circumstances. In the first instance, the absolute predictive strength of the experimental variable for the consequent is 6% above a baseline; in the second, 60% above a baseline. There is very good basis for causal speculation in the second circumstance that is not so for the first. It would be impossible to claim any causal understanding when, by using a particular predictor, you would be wrong 94% of the time, i.e., as in the first case. Alternatively, epidemiology would jump to causal conclusions entirely on the basis of a high RR in both circumstances. Consider another example, where there are 45 (baseline) persons in the control group, and 90 in the experimental group demonstrating a particular consequent. The RR would be 2.0 – far lower than the 7.0 in the very first instance. Even though the RR=2.0, there would be a good basis for beginning to entertain a causal basis for the relationship between an experimental variable and a particular consequent because of an absolute predictive strength of 45% above a baseline.

Relative risk is not – should not be – a basis for causal argument. RR only includes positive consequents following an antecedent. It does not account for negative consequents (non-occurrences of the consequent). Therefore, the conditional-probability context along which relative risks occur is hidden. A proper measure of absolute predictive strength is, say, a correlation co-efficient such as Pearson “r” which accounts for both positive and negative consequents in the presence of a specific antecedent(s).

A critical scientific goal, then, is the identification of antecedent(s) that uniquely predict a specific consequent with 100% accuracy. Understandably, in some realms of enquiry the subject matter and complexity make this sort of accuracy an impossibility. However, the goal is still to strive for predictors with a [absolute] predictive accuracy at the upper-end of the conditional probability scale, i.e., high-level accuracy.

Relative risk is the statistic of choice for conmen. It would not be surprising that the vast majority of epidemiologists have never heard of absolute predictive strength. Epidemiology runs almost exclusively on the relative risk statistic. And we have seen how misleading it can be.

The psychological danger of abuse of relative risk. Consider the very first example where there was 1 and 7 per 100 in each of control and experimental groups for a particular consequent. Ninety-three percent of the experimental group (risk factor) is comparable to 99% of the control group, i.e., they do not demonstrate the particular consequent in question. With an RR=7.0, epidemiology will tell the entire experimental group that they are “at risk”; the typical advisement being that they (all of them) should eliminate the “risk factor” to eliminate their risk, i.e., causal implication. This claim actually contradicts the very data that is being referred to. Ninety-three percent of the experimental group does not demonstrate the consequent in question. Therefore, eliminating the risk factor will not modify their risk at all – they were never “at risk”. For the other 6% above a baseline, the absolute predictive strength is so poor that it provides no basis for causal argument. Remember that for causal argument, there must also be an accounting for why a consequent does not occur for an antecedent(s) in 93% of cases, i.e., the preponderance of cases are counter-examples or anomalies to the causal proposition. You will notice that the epidemiological “reasoning” is upside-down: It makes the atypical appear typical, and the typical to appear atypical or non-existent. Telling people that they are “at risk” with causal implications when in fact they are not, is an assault on psychological health which will then have further detrimental social, moral, political, cultural, and physical consequences.
It needs to be considered that the vast majority, if not all, identified “risk factors” for heart disease, cancer, etc, have an absolute predictive strength of 10% or less; for dietary epidemiology, the predictive strength in many cases is barely above 0% accuracy. These are on the bottom(wrong)-end of the conditional-probability scale. Second-hand smoke claims are barely above 0% accuracy, i.e., if you use secondhand smoke as a predictor for a particular [disease] consequent, you would be wrong just short of all of the time. Deranged, then, is epidemiology’s use of the term “cause” in referring to a near-0% accuracy level in the same way that the “hard” sciences refer to near-100% accuracy. This relative-risk/”causal” insanity is being inflicted on societies around the world on a daily basis. It is a constant terrorizing.

Consider the three major risk factors for early-onset heart disease – hypertension, high cholesterol, and smoking. Remember that the word “major” is a relative term. In terms of absolute predictive strength, they are not major at all but are very poor predictors, each being under 10%. Yet, all persons that have these “risk factors” are aggressively advised that they need treatment to reduce the “risk”. It should be obvious by now that most are not “at risk” and there is no basis for a direct causal argument. Obvious, too, is that the treatment of these risk factors is lucrative for the pharmaceutical cartel, specifically, and the medical production-line, generally. Even more perverse is that while these people are being treated, they are actually well. It is an excellent money spinner. You can be medically treating well people for 10, 20, 30, 40 years with the promise that it will alleviate the potential for a detrimental consequent a long way in the future and when most of those being treated do not even demonstrate a statistical association, let alone a causal basis, with the consequent in question. Worse still is that the medication has potential side-effects.

The question then arises as to how epidemiology has come to be in this sickly condition. The simple answer is eugenics and statistics. It should not be surprising that the originator of the term “eugenics”, Francis Galton, was a statistician. Others that advanced the idea were also statisticians, e.g., Karl Pearson. Eugenics is a materialist view of the world. It views humans in the same way that it would view a herd of cattle. And the eugenicists believe that they can breed or foster a superior “human herd”. In this sterile materialist framework, there is no mind, soul, spirit, God, freedom. The eugenicists see themselves as an [self-installed] elite separate from the herd and “perfectors” of the herd. The eugenicist is obsessed with such things as smoking, alcohol, diet, exercise. A particular statistical trick, aligned with eugenics and allowing eugenics to proliferate, is population(herd)-level statistics. The population or “the herd” is viewed as “one organism”. The relative-risk statistic, in this contorted view, seems to make sense. You compare different groups on different measures, and all that you’re concerned about is significant trends indicating differences between the groups (herds). This is why relative risk differences are erroneously assigned to the entire membership of an experimental group. The critical problem is the construct of “one organism”. A group of people is not “one organism” but a collection of discrete individuals and particular measures occur in individuals. Further, the “group trends” indicated by relative risk does not translate at all into high predictive strength at the individual level. As seen earlier, relative-risk differences are usually produced by an atypical (small) subgroup within the overall group. As soon as you ask “how well does an antecedent predict a consequent at the individual level”, the epidemiology house of cards comes crashing down. Remember that epidemiology does not ask, conveniently, for predictive strength at the individual level.

What should be noticed is that epidemiology advances numerous causal claims but is very light on actual coherent causal explanation. It does this in at least two ways. Given that there is no consideration at all of absolute predictive strength at the individual level, a gathering of “eminent” epidemiologists can agree to conclude that a particular RR represents a causal relationship between a risk factor (an antecedent) and a specific consequent. This can be termed causal argument by consensus. An RR could be barely above 1.0 or 5.0, etc., etc.. There is no fixed standard. Only the consensus of the group matters. A second way is to invoke the “precautionary principle” (also Rose’s Paradox). Even for low RR’s (e.g., barely above one), epidemiologists can argue that although the causal status of a statistical association is in question and although the RR difference is small, it involves sufficiently large numbers at the population level that policy changes should occur as if the statistical association is causal as a precaution. Both “causation by consensus” and the “precautionary principle” are deceptive ways of bypassing the requirements of coherent causal argument, and that will involve absolute predictive strength. This conduct is delinquent and fraudulent, to say the least, with many dangerous ramifications. The quickest way to bring epidemiology into check is to require that those claiming causation between factors bet all of their worldly possessions on their ability to accurately predict an outcome (absolute predictive strength) in specific individuals on the basis of their nominated antecedent(s). The causal claims would immediately stop.

Eugenics also has inbuilt prejudices, such as antismoking and anti-alcohol. Consider the well-worn claim: “Smoking causes lung cancer”. For smoking and lung cancer the RR is 10.0. For every one in a hundred in a control(non-smoking) group, there are 10 instances of lung cancer in a group of lifelong heavy smokers. The RR seems high, but the absolute predictive strength is poor (10%). In other words, if you use lifelong heavy smoking as a predictor for lung cancer, you would be wrong 90% of the time. As indicated earlier, epidemiologists do not comprehend the need to explain why 90% of lifelong heavy smokers do not develop lung cancer, i.e., the preponderance of evidence is for the non-association – even in just statistical terms – of heavy smoking with lung cancer. Therefore, relying on the RR and the antismoking bias in eugenics, a “causation by consensus” produced “Smoking causes lung cancer”. You can search the medical literature of the last half century and you will not find one example of a coherent causal explanation of the above claim. The simple reason is that such an explanation (referring to both positive and negative instances), based on the available evidence, is impossible. So acute is the antismoking fixation within eugenics that any statistically significant RR, regardless of how low, is referred to in causal terms (causation by consensus).
And, so, there is now a plethora of diseases “caused” by smoking. The eugenicists have even tabulated the “toll”. The Center for Disease Control has produced a program called Smoking Attributed Disease & Mortality and Estimated Cost (SAMMEC). It is entirely a statistical exercise. Relative risks for a variety of diseases/mortality are converted to attributable numbers on the basis of assumed attributable causation. The numbers are summated to produce an overall “death toll” from smoking. Via another set of questionable assumptions, the disease and death toll can be converted to a monetary “cost to society”. Worse still is that, in statistical terms, RRs for specific disease/mortality may involve cross-correlations with many other factors (confounders). These confounders are not partitioned for the toll associated with a specific risk factor (e.g., smoking). Consequently, and as indicated by other posters, if we were to summate the toll from all un-partitioned risk factors, we would end up with an annual statistical death toll far in excess of the actual annual death toll. So, this conduct is not only misleading but it is maximally misleading. Within all of this nonsense, the eugenicists can play all manner of other statistical shenanigans, e.g., claims that reducing this risk factor by X% will reduce a particular consequent by Y%, etc, etc. and goes by the name of “preventive medicine”. We hear these sorts of claims on a daily basis. Yet nowhere in all of this obsession with numerics, statistical gymnastics and cost/benefit analyses – this sterile physico-arithmetic fantasy world - that eugenics is notorious for is there any actual coherent causal explanation or predictive strength at an individual level. It is all population(herd)-level statistical derangement. Further, nowhere in this insanity is there any consideration of the detrimental consequences of this conduct along psychological, social, and moral dimensions: these dimensions do not figure in the materialism of eugenics. The madness of these madmen is not part of these madmen’s definition of madness.

Another excellent example is “exposure to ambient tobacco smoke causes Sudden Infant Death Syndrome”. Fortunately, SIDS is a rarity. SIDS is a “syndrome” defined by exclusion: When no other cause of death can be attributed, it is assigned to this unknown syndrome category. The relative risk for exposure to ambient smoke (indirectly measured) and SIDS is around the high 1.0’s. However, the absolute predictive strength is barely above 0%. Epidemiologists would have us believe that an unknown aspect(s) of tobacco smoke “causes” an unknown syndrome via an unknown process(es). This sort of inflammatory trash, i.e., non-explanation, with considerable psychological, emotional, social, and moral consequences is what passes for “causal explanation” in eugenics-driven epidemiology. Obviously, the causal claim has been produced by delusional “consensus”.

So, it can be said that epidemiology reasonably employs aspects of the scientific method, particularly in data collection. However, at the interpretation level, the conduct is squarely anti-scientific and fraudulent. It routinely violates edicts of statistical and causal inference. And this incredible problem is endemic. Those that are attracted to epidemiology and Public Health are probably already of a materialist persuasion. They are then further trained in this delusional thinking. And it is not as if epidemiology has recently gone off the rails. It was never on them from the outset. Epidemiology is a dangerous scientific masquerade.
What has allowed this grand, dangerous fraud to be perpetrated on a global scale? (very briefly)

At the turn of the last century, eugenics became mainstream in the USA, the UK, and a number of Scandinavian countries. The USA appears to be the most prominent. The mega-wealthy in the USA (e.g., Rockefeller, Carnegie, Ford, Kellogg) were supporters and funders of eugenics (and antismoking, anti-alcohol). Rockefeller and Ford were also prominent supporters of Nazi eugenics. Rockefeller and Ford had trade agreements with the Nazis through the 1930s. There was also a very intimate relationship, through treaties, between Rockefeller’s Standard Oil and Germany’s IG Farben.

Hitler was a student of American eugenics. National socialism was “applied biology” and a continuation/extremizing of American eugenics. The American eugenicists saw Hitler as the “darling” of the movement, a leader that could apply eugenics principles unfettered by, say, constitutional concerns. During the 1930’s, the Nazi regime was actively promoted in the USA, particularly California. IG Farben, the German petro-chemical giant, is considered to have financed Hitler and the National Socialists into power, and with whom it partnered in its invasions, i.e., industrial socialism (see Dr. Rath website).

A well-buried, little-known, fact is that in late-1933/early-1934, just after the fascists were installed to power in Germany, there was an attempted coup in the USA intending to install a fascist government. This is known as the “Business Plot”. A congressional investigation concluded that there was an attempted, but failed, coup. The wrong man was picked to lead the coup, who then turned whistleblower. No prosecutions followed (possibly deals). However, the attempted coup involved a “who’s who” of the mega-wealthy in the USA. (google “Business Plot”. Some documentaries have been done on it. If anyone wants links, I can provide some).
At the end of WWII, and given the atrocities of the failed Nazi regime, the American eugenicists and mega-wealthy went to considerable lengths to distance themselves from their connection with the regime. There were a number of headline prosecutions at the Nuremberg trials. But many Nazis were given access to, and freedom in, other countries (Operation Paperclip). The leaders of IG Farben, instrumental in many atrocities, were given light sentences and then went right back to their business dealings. The giant IG Farben was ordered to be split up. A number of these split entities are now high-profile pharmaceutical companies, e.g., Bayer, Hoechst (now Sanofi-Aventis??).

The point of the above is that eugenics did not die with the defeat of Nazism. Given its association to horror, eugenicists laid low for a while post-WWII. They then started up again in the 1950’s, careful not to use the “E”[ugenics] word. However, the biological reductionism, the healthism, that has gathered momentum over the last four decades, its obsession with smoking, alcohol, diet, exercise, disease – to the exclusion of all other dimensions of the human condition, is eugenics by other names. The obsession with statisticalism and population(herd)-level control to the detriment of individual autonomy, is all eugenics. Eugenics is dictatorial/fascist. Public Health is a key instrument of eugenics. The mega-wealthy have had a century-long interest in eugenics. They are particularly interested in this deranged ideology because it allows the appeasing of a number of their other obsessions – greed, avarice, megalomania. The mega-wealthy, not all, have an utter contempt for ordinary people. Their interest is in installing a eugenics “elite”, which they control, to oversee the remainder of the population. This remainder is a human labor force/herd that are viewed as no more than cogs running the industry that profits the mega-wealthy. This is what was seen in Nazi Germany.

Through Public Health and Health and Safety, through the constant terrorizing of the public with phantom dangers, eugenics has essentially medicalized the human condition, medicalized ordinary life. It controls the thinking of the masses. It is all about population control.

Having digressed, we return to epidemiology. Why is epidemiology, or Public Health, the way it is? Because that’s the way the elite (controlled by the mega-wealthy) want it. If you adhere to the rigors of scientific enquiry, and statistical and causal inference, you cannot control the population. Rather, through a masquerade of scientific enquiry, a bastardization, “science” can serve the State – “science” working to an agenda. The mega-wealthy, through philanthropy, through “charitable” organizations, through political and educational organizations, have dictated over the last three decades what and how people are taught from primary through to tertiary education, and the types of people that make it through to high administrative positions and political office. Through their influence over government, they dictate what themes will be funded in academic research (and which will not). They dictate that the tiny enquiry of epidemiology wields extraordinary public-policy power and that it remains exactly as is. The Public Health bureaucracy has been burgeoning over the last number of decades. Contemporary Public Health (and preventive medicine) is population control. Rockefeller, an early benefactor of eugenics, was the primary force behind allopathy (cut, burn, poison) being installed as the primary medical establishment. He also created the American Cancer Society, the American Medical Association, the American Heart Foundation, the American Lung Association early last century. These are essentially protection fronts for the allopathic medical establishment. This allopathic medical model has been replicated in countries around the world. Remember too that the medical establishment was a frontrunner in the Nazi regime. There are progressively more and more of these disease and dismembered-body-organ organizations. There’s even a British Liver Trust. (Why do we need these dismembered-body-organ organizations at all?) There are numerous other “charitable” organizations and NGO’s. They all toe the Public Health line and collectively they constitute a formidable, ever-growing, eugenics network, whether many are aware of it or not. And they are all directed by the eugenics-driven medical headquarters - the World Health Organization, a post-WWII creation. Through this network, societies and cultures around the world are being overthrown, converted to sterile, uniformity. Many countries are already resembling low-security prisons. They can get much worse."

The author of this post then recommends the book Rampant Antismoking Signifies Grave Danger where many of the epidemiology issues above are considered in greater detail (www.rampant-antismoking.com), and I see no reason why I shouldn't do the same.

On a similar tack, Frank Davis has a great post on Czech President Vaclav Claus, survivor of a Communist regime and now outspoken critic of the EU, also commenting on smoking bans and their links to authoritarian regimes, the UN and the WHO. Well worth a read.

Confused why Nick Clegg won't even consider an amendment to the smoking ban? Still think it's only about having a fag in your pub?

The True Cost of the Smoking Ban

2010-05-03T04:36:00.000-07:00

Here's an appeal from Frank Davis. It makes heartbreaking reading and is the result of the hate-filled, vindictive smoking ban. Post this to your own blogs - let Arnott and the lunatics at ASH see what they have wrought to the "Great Generation" in the name of their bogus campaign of hate. Let the politicians see how they have ruined thousands of lives with that one smug vote that they hurriedly got out of the way before skuttling off to lunch that day in 2006.

And this is without the rapes, the murders. Only last month a gay trainee Policeman was almost beaten to death as he was forced to stand outside a gay bar late at night. Why? Because he was having a fag and couldn't do do safely inside. Indeed, attacks on gays outside gay venues have increased (and why are they standing outside rather than being inside, where it's safe? I'm sure you know). A german tourist was dragged down an alley and raped. Why? Because she'd been forced to separate herself from her friends and family because she, you guessed it, wasn't allowed to smoke in safety inside the pub. Drink spikings of vulnerable girls' drinks in nightclubs have skyrocketed since the Ban, each squalid piece of sexual violence the direct result of the bile spewed forth from ASH and their supposed aim of saving a fictitious 40,000 lives from passive smoking, even though we know the evidence strongly states there is no such thing and not even one death certificate has ever been produced listing passive smoking as a cause of death.

And then there are the pubs of course. 3500 of them gone in less than three years. A survey released last week showed that in some British cities 30% of their pubs had closed. All that stress, all that unemployment, all those families torn apart by bankruptcy, sackings, poverty and stress. Then of course there is the millions lost in tax revenue as people choose to not go to venues that cater to them. Again, all because of the ban.

Then there are the suicides caused by depression and anxiety and of normal, hard-working, respectable people who have been deliberately and systematically "denormalised" by the Labour Government, ASH and their Ban. Some of the respondents to Frank Davis' appeal mention suicide but how many do it without giving the reasons why? How many are caused by the Ban? I know of at least one - an ex Tax Inspector who couldn't take feeling like an outcast and exile in his own country. So he flung himself off Beachy Head. These are real people, Arnott. These are real deaths, not the fictitious numbers you pay your pets in white coat to generate. Read the following statements by real people, many of them disabled and elderly, and then spread the word. I want ASH humiliated and possibly imprisoned for what they have done. I want ASH to be outlawed - after all it is nothing less than a terrorist organisation. It uses (political and financial) force to spread fear and terror based on bullshit and lies. And real people suffer at their hands. I'll let you read on, coutesy of Frank Davis:

Last night I posted up a piece which was, in part, about the social isolation and disintegration that I thought the smoking ban was causing. This evening, among the responses, there was the following anonymous message:

I am getting too old to stand outside pubs or restaurants. Plus I was taught that it was only 'ladies of the night' that stood in the street smoking.

I have been 3 years away from any social contact other than the odd hello with neighbours.

Being a widow with no family it was always going to be hard to get back into some semblance of normality with regard to socialising, but I didn't think that it would be this bad.

I used to meet up in a cafeteria with some lady friends, but now that has stopped as a few of the ladies were smokers and didn't want to stand in the street to have a cigarette.

I went to a quiz night at the local pub as there were quite a few elderly 'singles' there. That has stopped. I also playe bingo once a week and that too has stopped as there is no pleasure in having a drink there with no cigarette.

I am now on anti depressants and wish that I had the courage to kill myself and join my dear husband.

Thank you politicians for making my life not worth living after working from age 14 until 68. I am now 74 and have lost my soul and will to live in this lonely place.

Nothing needs to be added. Here in a nutshell is the social devastation caused by the smoking ban. It falls most heavily, of course, on the elderly.

I think these stories must be told. There must be thousands upon thousands - millions even - of people all over the country, and all over the world, in much the same situation. People who had their social lives destroyed. People who have become profoundly isolated and depressed as a consequence of smoking bans.

Our politically correct news media will never report any of it. They won't report it because for them smokers are non-persons, people who don't count. So it's only going to be on blogs like mine that such people are going to find a voice.

So I'd like to appeal to my readers, particularly the elderly (65-70+) and vulnerable ones like my anonymous commenter, to write to me to describe their personal experiences of the smoking ban. I'm interested in younger readers' experiences as well, of course.

And I'd like to ask readers if they know any elderly and vulnerable people who may have become isolated. Phone them up! Pop round and see them! Ask them how life has been for them. Get them to tell their story.

I'm sure there are thousands and thousands of horror stories out there, that need telling, and which antismokers would prefer never get told at all. When the stories start being told - and they will be told -, they might begin to feel ashamed of what they've done.

I've set up a googlemail account: cfrankdavis@googlemail.com

And I've also put up a (rather crude) box in the right margin, which will stay there.

Emails are welcome from all over the world, but since this a UK blog, non-UK writers should give some indication where they are, and what sort of ban is in force where they live.

Any suggestions are welcome.

Reblog this everyone. Let Arnott and her sick, greedy friends have a taste of their own medicine.

Post of the week!

2010-03-14T05:05:00.000-07:00

My post of the week is this utterly brilliant fisking of the recent Commons debate on minimum alcohol pricing by the Filthy Smoker over at Devil's Kitchen.

Read it and weep.

Get Nick Hogan out of jail now!!!!

2010-02-28T10:03:00.000-08:00

There is a donation button on Old Holborn's blog. Pay with Paypal or card to help Nick pay the ridiculous costs they imposed. Once he's paid he's free to go. Not only can we get Nick out but we can truly stick it to the system. Imagine how the Stasi will feel once Nick walks free within a week because despite their manipulations of the law, the people won't stand for it.

Free Nick AND show the bastards in power what we think of their bans. ASH and their ilk may have the funding and the ears of the slackjaws in Parliament, but we have right and strength and dignity on ours, things they simply can't understand.

Please donate at Old Holborn's blog or by going directly to the Paypal page.

Can you imagine this on the BBC?

2009-11-28T16:57:00.000-08:00

As you know I hate anti-science. I hate the way the anti-tobacco groups routinely lie, not only fudge but blatantly invent data. I hate the way they don't even pretend to practice real objective science and when caught out just shrug their shoulders knowing that the MSM will never pull them up on it. I hate the way scientifically illiterate Righteous journalists parrot their nonsense "research" because they are too stupid to understand its flaws or because they're too lazy to do anything more than simply reprint whatever sordid Press Release is shoved under their unquestioning, bigoted noses.

But as we all know anti-science isn't only practised by the anti-tobacco groups. It's practiced by the Intelligent Design advocates who try to reconcile the realities of evolution with the machinations of an all-seeing Sky Fairy. And of course it's practised by those evil bastards in the AGW "community." I won't go on about the CRU emails here (when it's covered so much better at Bishop Hill's blog and Devil's Kitchen). And I won't go on about how truly revolting it is that these scum are spending billions on trying to scare us with the Carbon Pixies when millions are dying every day from poverty, malaria and HIV, when the seas are so full of oestrogenising chemicals that record numbers of fish are becoming hermaphrodites and human fertility has halved since World War 2. I won't even go on about how they scaremonger the perils of carbon in the air (present at a density of only hundreds of parts per million) when the rain forests are still disappearing and we are in serious danger of being without power in only a few short years time.

No, instead I want just want you to think about how the MSM have dealt with the revelations from the CRU scandal (and the new, similar revelations that are coming in from a New Zealand Climate Change Research facility). The BBC has barely mentioned the scandals. Indeed, the day after the CRU emails came to light the "Today" program mentioned Climate Change in no less than four different pieces. And in the coverage they did give the leak they focussed more on the fact that the University had been hacked than on the incendiary contents of the emails themselves. And of course, being the BBC they managed to mention "mainstream science" and "concensus" in the very piece that should have been outlining how the AGW zealots have been fiddling data, lying to the public and manipulating the scientific publication process. But while we have the BBC blatantly attempting to manipulate the issue, what do the Yanks get? Yes - they get this.

Two questions for you.

1) Will we ever see anything like this on the BBC?

and 2) Will we ever see a similar piece with Stanton Glantz, that other arch-liar and religious fantasist (masquerading as a scientist), wriggling uncomfortably in a chair while being forced to face the fact that he's been exposed?

Sadly, we live in Brown's Britain so I think the answer to both questions is "No."

But I live in hope.

And we should all do everything in our power to let the politicians know that we know we're being lied to.

At Last!! Scientists Come Out Against the Anti-Smoking Movement!!!

2009-07-06T11:46:00.000-07:00

Yep, people may throw all sorts of facts and figures about the Ban at the anti-smokers - "they're repressive", "they're closing businesses", "they don't work" and even when they accept your point (which doesn't happen often - the deluded Nazis at ASH are still claiming that not only are 40 pubs a week not closing as a result of the Smoking ban, but it's actually good for pubs!) they'll always come back to their trump card.... health. "Think of the chiiildren!" "100,000 lives saved since the Ban!" "Do what you like but when it can kill me it needs to stop!"

Well, we all know the multitude of studies that show there is no link between second-hand smoke and illness (outnumbering those that do show a link by 5 to 1) and of course all the studies that show no link are printed in proper academic journals. You know, ones you may have heard of like "The British Medical Journal", "The Lancet" and "Nature" (as opposed to the anti-tobacco "studies" which appear in such suspiciously titled tomes as "Journal for Tobacco Control" and "Transactions Against Tobacco - hmmm, I wonder how independent they are?). So, I won't go into those again. But as our politicians have the attention spans of goldfish and can't read academic studies (and even those who can are often so scientifically illiterate that they can't spot the obvious methodological flaws anyway) here it is - just for our politicians - "Scientists speak out against the anti-tobacco movement." So will you please stop listening to every lie, falsehood and fabrication that passes their lips? Please?!!

“Junk science has replaced honest science and propaganda parades as fact. Our legislators and judges, in need of dispassionate analysis, are instead smothered by an avalanche of statistics—tendentious, inadequately documented, and unchecked by even rudimentary notions of objectivity.”

- Robert A. Levy, Senior Fellow in Constitutional Studies, The Cato Institute; Adjunct Professor of Statistics for Law, Georgetown University Law Center and Rosalind B. Marimont, former mathematician and scientist with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (formerly the Bureau of Standards) and the National Institute of Health.
From: Lies, Damned Lies and 40,000 Smoking-Related Deaths. Regulation 21 (4)
/regv21n4/lhttp://www.cato.org/pubs/regulationies.pdf

“I am sorry, I know that is what you would like to be given, but the point is that these risks are small and difficult to measure directly…. I am sorry not to be more helpful; you want numbers and I could give you numbers…, but what does one make of them? …These hazards cannot be directly measured.

- Sir Richard Peto, Epidemiologist, Oxford University, speaking at UK House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs, which was inquiring about government policy on the management of risk, including the claimed risks of ets.
Cited in: From: Stoking the Rigged Terror of Second Hand Smoke, Regulation, Spring 2007.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv30n1/v30n1-5.pdf

“Data torturing of epidemiological studies concerns the many responsible scientists and public health researchers who work honestly, openly and willingly in the service of sound science. We are seeing an enormous diversion of funds and talent from truly important health risks – and the real possibility that anxiety raised by false health scares is in itself a health risk.”

- Michael.R. Fox, Phd. Chemist, Richland W.A (1999) Toxic Toxicology: Putting Scientific Credibility at Risk. Littlewood & Fennell: Independent Public and Health Policy Research.
https://hawaiismokersalliance.com/uploads/Toxic_toxicology.pdf

"Are there 450,000 smoking-related deaths per year in America? Maybe...but no human beings are ever studied to find out".

- Dr. Bernard M. Wagner, editor of Modern Pathology
- Cited in Colby (1999) http://www.lcolby.com/colby.htm

“The plain truth is that no credible measure of ETS exposure has ever been possible. Therefore, epidemiologic studies of ETS have produced statistical estimates of risk based not only on improper exposure data, but also on exposure data that are illusory.”

- Dr Gio Batta Gori, Former Deputy Director of the National Cancer Institute, Division of Cancer Causes and Prevention, Acting Associate Director, Carcinogenesis Program, Director of the Diet, Nutrition and Cancer Program, and Director of the Smoking and Health Program
From: Stoking the Rigged Terror of Second Hand Smoke, Regulation, Spring 2007.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv30n1/v30n1-5.pdf

“The scare-mongering that has passed for science is appalling. Not only is tobacco far less pernicious than Americans are led to believe, but its destructive effect is amplified by all manner of statistical legerdemain—counting diseases that should not be counted, using the wrong sample as a standard of comparison, and failing to control for obvious confounding variables. To be blunt, there is no credible evidence that 400,000 deaths per year—or any number remotely close to 400,000—are caused by tobacco.”

- Robert A. Levy, Senior Fellow in Constitutional Studies, The Cato Institute; Adjunct Professor of Statistics for Law, Georgetown University Law Center and Rosalind B. Marimont, former mathematician and scientist with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (formerly the Bureau of Standards) and the National Institute of Health.
- From: Lies, Damned Lies and 40,000 Smoking-Related Deaths. Regulation 21 (4)
- http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv21n4/lies.pdf
-

“The available evidence suggests that, far from being a significant health risk, secondhand smoke is little more than a nuisance--and one that is being dealt with effectively by private action.”

- W. Kip Viscusi, Economist, Duke University
From Cato Institute Policy Report, Jan/Feb 1996.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/policy_report/pr-jf-rg.html

“The influential 1993 EPA report "Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking: Lung Cancer and Other Disorders" was as phony as a three-dollar bill. State officials and private businesses that believed that ETS was a public health danger (and not just a nuisance) were completely misled by the EPA.”

- Dominick Armentano, Professor Emeritus, Economics, The University of Hartford; Adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute
From: The Second-Hand Smoke Charade; The Cato Institute.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5811http

On the 1993 EPA Report: "Yes, it's rotten science, but it's in a worthy cause. It will help us to get rid of cigarettes and become a smoke-free society".
- Alvan Feinstein, Yale University epidemiologist writing in Toxological Pathology.
- Cited in Colby (1999) http://www.lcolby.com/colby.htm

“The actual damage from smoking is neither known nor knowable with precision. Responsible statisticians agree that it is impossible to attribute causation to a single variable, like tobacco, when there are multiple
causal factors that are correlated with one another. The damage from cigarettes is far less than it is made out to be.”

- Robert A. Levy, Senior Fellow in Constitutional Studies, The Cato Institute; Adjunct Professor of Statistics for Law, Georgetown University Law Center and Rosalind B. Marimont, former mathematician and scientist with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (formerly the Bureau of Standards) and the National Institute of Health.
From: Lies, Damned Lies and 40,000 Smoking-Related Deaths. Regulation 21 (4)
- http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv21n4/lies.pdf

“NTP (National Toxicology Program) implies that even the tiniest exposure to toxic or carcinogenic substances somehow constitutes a life-threatening risk. This is patently absurd – contravening a basic tenet of toxicology: the dose makes the poison.”

- Michael.R. Fox, Phd. Chemist, Richland W.A (1999) Toxic Toxicology: Putting Scientific Credibility at Risk. Littlewood & Fennell: Independent Public and Health Policy Research.
https://hawaiismokersalliance.com/uploads/Toxic_toxicology.pdf

“The EPA was determined to prove that ETS was a serious carcinogen that justified stringent regulation. To do that, it simply set aside 19 of the original constellation of 30 ETS studies and then, defying all scientific standards, simply changed the "confidence levels" in the statistical analysis from 95 percent to 90 percent. When the highly manipulated smaller sample finally "confessed" that passive smoking was a health risk, the EPA proudly announced it had "proven" its preconceived conclusions. And the sordid tale gets worse. The EPA chose to omit entirely from its analysis two recent U.S. ETS studies that had determined that passive smoking was NOT a statistically significant health risk. Worse for the EPA, including those studies with the "cherry-picked" 11 produces a result that shows no statistically significant health risks associated with passive smoking, even at reduced confidence levels. In short, even employing the EPA's own corrupt methodology, ETS was simply not a "Group A Carcinogen," as the agency had boldly asserted.”
- Dominick Armentano, Professor Emeritus, Economics, The University of Hartford; Adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute
From: The Second-Hand Smoke Charade; The Cato Institute.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5811http

“Of the 75 published studies of ETS and lung cancer, some 70 percent did not report statistically significant differences of risk and are moot. Roughly 17 percent claim an increased risk, and 13
percent imply a reduction of risk. Thus, reported studies do not offer consistent results, and overall cannot be interpreted for or against risk.”

- Dr Gio Batta Gori, Former Deputy Director of the National Cancer Institute, Division of Cancer Causes and Prevention, Acting Associate Director, Carcinogenesis Program, Director of the Diet, Nutrition and Cancer Program, and Director of the Smoking and Health Program
From: Stoking the Rigged Terror of Second Hand Smoke, Regulation, Spring 2007.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv30n1/v30n1-5.pdf

“Of those chemicals present in ETS (Environmental Tobacco Smoke) only a very few can be classified as toxons or carcinogens. Some basic physics, a bit of chemistry and a series of rather simple mathematical calculations reveal that exposure to ETS is hardly a dangerous event. Indeed, the cancer risk of ETS to a non-smoker appears to be roughly equal to the risk of becoming addicted to heroin from eating poppy seed bagels.”

- Michael.R. Fox, Phd. Chemist, Richland W.A (1999) Toxic Toxicology: Putting Scientific Credibility at Risk. Littlewood & Fennell: Independent Public and Health Policy Research.
https://hawaiismokersalliance.com/uploads/Toxic_toxicology.pdf

“The world must protest the ongoing deceit and the squandering of public monies for rigged and incompetent ETS studies. And people should feel offended by the complicity and sham paternalism of health authorities and of profitable tax exempt charities. Such an officially imposed tyranny has no
place in countries that claim and presume to be free, enlightened, and just. We are not children, nor bumbling simpletons who need to be deceived for our own good — a deceit that is doubly grating when the wilfully flawed surgeon general’s report on ETS runs against statutory requirements of “ensuring and maximizing the quality, objectivity, utility, and integrity of information (including statistical information) disseminated by a government agency.”

- Dr Gio Batta Gori, Former Deputy Director of the National Cancer Institute, Division of Cancer Causes and Prevention, Acting Associate Director, Carcinogenesis Program, Director of the Diet, Nutrition and Cancer Program, and Director of the Smoking and Health Program
From: Stoking the Rigged Terror of Second Hand Smoke, Regulation, Spring 2007.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv30n1/v30n1-5.pdf

“As we prepared our comments earlier this year on the 9th RoC subcommittee’s decision regarding ETS, we dug into the original risk assessment proceedings of the EPA. It became absolutely clear that the so-called “independent scientific bodies” were not independent at all. Rather these groups – Scientific Advisory Boards – were pressurised by a wide variety of political and procedural forces to cast their weight (quite reluctantly in several cases) on the side of ETS as a carcinogen.”

- Michael.R. Fox, Phd. Chemist, Richland W.A (1999) Toxic Toxicology: Putting Scientific Credibility at Risk. Littlewood & Fennell: Independent Public and Health Policy Research.
https://hawaiismokersalliance.com/uploads/Toxic_toxicology.pdf

“Indeed, the carcinogenic mechanisms of tobacco smoking “are not well understood.” What is more cancers once “associated” with smoking are being quietly removed from the official lists. Stomach cancer – which is likely caused by undetected H. pylori, is one example; cervical cancer – in which fresh evidence suggests that human papillomavirus (HPV) may be the sole cause – should soon meet the same fate […] How many hundreds of millions of dollars are being wasted on senseless, useless – and quite possibly harmful – “Blame ETS” research? How much more time and talent is being diverted from useful research into chronic infections from bacteria and viruses that are major causes of cancer worldwide? How many more absurd “risk alerts” will it take before the public laughs scientists out of a position of trust altogether?”

- Michael.R. Fox, Phd. Chemist, Richland W.A (1999) Toxic Toxicology: Putting Scientific Credibility at Risk. Littlewood & Fennell: Independent Public and Health Policy Research.
https://hawaiismokersalliance.com/uploads/Toxic_toxicology.pdf

Thanks to enraged and everyone else at F2C who pointed me in the right direction for this.

Please join this campaign if you value your freedom.

2009-07-02T01:43:00.001-07:00

Hell, just join the "Save Our Pubs and Clubs" campaign if you like having a pub that is open.

We all know the Smoking Ban changed the definition of what "public" and "private" property was in this country. You may well hold the deeds to a property, it may well be in your name. You may even have the bank statements to prove that you bought the property outright with your hard-earned cash. But when it comes to smoking that isn't enough. Oh no, the Smoking Ban enabled the Government to define what is private and what is public. So you may own your pub outright, but you can no longer smoke in YOUR pub, in YOUR business, EVEN WHEN CLOSED because the Government has decided that your property is no longer private. It is "a public space".

At present it is mainly pubs which are affected (albeit at the cost of over 100,000 jobs and with a twentyfold increase in pub closures), but proposals are on the way from the anti-smoking lunatics to ban smoking in your car and even in your own home (visit Freedom2Choose for details on these new ill-thought out illiberal initiatives).

So in the meantime please join this campaign and do all you can to fight Government "denormalisation" (using your taxes!!), junk science and the intervention of the Big State into our lives. Allow people who have invested their time and their money into a business to choose what they want to do to give their business the best chance of success.

The truth about Third Hand Smoke

2009-05-16T09:07:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Chris Snowden, author of the brilliant "Velvet Glove, Iron Fist" (highly recommended by this blog) and Freedom 2 Choose who pointed it out to me.

You may remember how Great Ormond Street Hospital used "Third Hand Smoke" as justification for its anti-smoker apartheid where they denied smokers certain services available to all other members of the general public. Well, the report they cite as proof of this dangerous phenomenon, where smokers themselves are "toxic," wasn't based on the scientific analysis of particulates or tests on the toxicity of smoke. Oh no.

It was a phone poll. The lying deviants phoned members of the general public and asked what they thought. By that reasoning therefore, we can stop spending money on the search for alien life. After all, half of Americans believe in aliens so it must be true!

Read the shocking truth about yet another junk study into smoking here. It's all referenced. It's all true. Wait for them to start measuring Jews' skulls again. That's the level of "science" we're talking about here....

Not one life saved by the Draconian Smoking Ban

2009-05-16T04:24:00.000-07:00

This just in from the good folks at Freedom 2 Choose.

Well, what a surprise - the mythical figure of lives saved by the smoking ban is complete fabricated bullshit! Then again, it's not like the professional liars at ASH to just make things up so they can spoonfeed shit to our gullible porcine leaders.... Is it?

SHS Deaths-Where Are They?

I was reading a story on the failed smoker ban yesterday, and I noticed that one ban-fan stated that Scotlands ban had saved "over 3000 lives per year since it was introduced". Well, I was surprised by this revelation as I have been looking, along with my colleagues here at F2C, for over four years to identify just one death. And here we have a cultists blatantly informing the world that over 9,000 people are still alive today as a direct result of the Scottish ban!.

I wrote to the Scottish Executive and asked them for up to date mortality figures for Scotland for 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008. They obliged, and sent me a ton of information. It was the work of nanoseconds to download a spread sheet containing the numbers I needed. Ready for a shock?

Here are the mortality figures, for all causes, for the last four years. Remember: the
zealots guaranteed that 3,000 lives per year would be saved. There was no doubt,
no hesitancy, the promise was carved in stone. So, we should see that 3,000
drop in deaths straight away.

Look:
2005-55,747
2006-55,903
<<<<2007-55,986
2008-55,699

Fairly constant, I'm sure you will agree. Did you spot that 3,000 drop after the ban was introduced in March 2006? Me neither.
Further digging reveals that neoplasms (cancers) remained fairly constant as well.
So if second hand smoke kills, and we have all but eradicated it from the workplace (including bars, clubs, bingo halls and cafes), we should have seen the promised drop in mortality. It is now clear to me that the infantile smoker ban has saved zero lives. This in entirely in line with our predictions.
One significant increase, bizarrely, was in "poisonings". There were 48 in 2005, and 76 in 2008. Another increase I noted was in "mental disorders". We now have almost 1,000 more people with mental illness than we had before the vindictive ban. Is there a connection? I don't know. You can decide for yourselves.
What I do know is that the anti-smoker jihadists are pathological liars.

We continue to prove that.
We continue to be right.
Sooner or later we will end up in court to prove once and for all that prohibition is senseless, destructive, and harmful to us all.
We'll let you know when we are ready to do just that.

So F2C look beyond the epidemiological studies and statistical wizardry and look at ACTUAL death rates and discover that yet again we have been lied to.

Not one life saved.

When will Call-me-Dave wake up to the damage these lying fantasists do to the economy and the social fabric of the nation? When will he commit to cutting their enormous Government funding and reversing the divisive, fascistic measures they've instituted?

I'm not holding my breath.