Hello, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Carlos Ag. and I am the new owner of SmokingLobby.com! I just wanted to say hello to all the forum members which come here on a regular basis, and of course invite all our new visitors to join the discussion on smoker's rights in our pro smoking forum. As has always been the case with Smoking Lobby, both smokers and non-smokers (and even some anti-smokers) are allowed to participate in the discussion about smoker's rights. I realize this is a very heated debate, and people have a lot of things to say about smoking - how smokers are being criminalized, abused, discriminated against, and treated as second class citizens. Hopefully we can enlighten some people about the fate of smokers, and shed some light on some of the myths surrounding the dangers of cigarettes.

This whole experience has taught me a lot about people in general, and why our efforts in this country standing up for the minority rights of smokers has failed, and always will fail.

Here's the problem with this country: when something starts going a little south, we beg and plead and cry like little babies, "Oh please help me, give me free money and charity, give me donations, I deserve it ... blah, blah blah, boo hoo hoo." The Speakeasy debacle is a prime example of this and angers me to no end. They started Speakeasy several years after I started Smokinglobby for the express purpose of taking my traffic away and funnelling resources away from Smokinglobby. They could have offered to help me run SmokingLobby, so we could have created a huge forum for everyone to go to for Smoker's rights, but they didn't. And then Smoker's Club added a forum to steal traffic, and then a few years later Forces created one.

Make no mistake - Smokinglobby may not be the first Smoker's Rights site on the internet, but it was definitely, AS A FACT, the first Smoker's Rights FORUM. The first forum which gave members a voice to be heard. When I started this site I did it because I wanted to fight TheTruth.com and all the anti-tobacco legislation, and there was NOT ONE site on the internet which offered a forum for smokers to discuss their rights. So I created it. And asked for no money, no handouts - I built it from the ground up with sweat and perseverance.

So you can imagine the anger and ire I felt when these copycat clone forums popped up for no reason other than to steal traffic and make a quick buck. They could have just linked to my forum, or they could have partnered with me - but I didn't receive ONE OFFER from any of these douchebags - and the motha uckers at Smokers Club, Speakeasy and Forces know damn well who they they are.

So now I see those idiots at Speakeasy have decided "smokers rights" isn't cool anymore so they want to throw in the towel. And what happens? My own forum members donate money to them to keep their site alive. Sickening.

Make no mistake - Speakeasy is NOT a website. It offers no news, no facts, nothing - it is just a forum, in direct competition with Smokinglobby. They do nothing different - there is absolutely no reason in the world for the two to exist seperately. If all forum sites were merged they could have created one powerful voice to be heard.

And that is why the smoker's rights movement has failed and always will. I offered to partner with Smoker's Club years ago so that we could have one forum with thousands of members that could make our collective voice be heard as one. But no, they make money off their ads and wanted to steal as much traffic as possbile. Forces is just as bad - they actually tell their members to install the Alexa toolbar and artificially drive up their traffic rankings so they can make more money (see http://www.forces.org/tavern/viewtopic.php?t=1038)

Now, I understand we are in a capitalist society and although I may not like Forces and Smokers Club for openly competing with me in a free market, I still RESPECT their right to do so. They care about making a few bucks rather than partnering to create one forum 10,000 members strong. As capitalists, that is their right.

But the Speakeasy pussies are a bunch of whiny bitches that just want welfare handouts. Just like the Democrats and Socialists that took away all our rights to smoke, they want free handouts to keep them afloat. So even though I competed with them and BEAT them in a fair, open market (they have 900 members, this site has 2,600), they cry poor and get free handouts.

AND YOU PEOPLE ARE THE ONES THAT GAVE IT TO THEM. Here was a chance to merge the sites and make this forum 3,500 members strong - and actually make Speakesy's owners earn money because I would have PAID them - but our "smokers" decided no, let's keep our numbers weak and seperate.

Divided we have been conquered.

And before everyone thinks I'm just being greedy - I don't want to run anything other than a forum. Forces can keep their news platform, Smokers Club can keep their Newsletter, etc. It was intention only to partner and run one forum - AND SPLIT PROFITS, if there were any (which there actually aren't)!!! Smokinglobby is the original Smoker's Rights Forum, and it was my child, so I wanted to see it grow to become the one place on the internet legislators and news media could come to to hear one voice.

Instead, you have splintered our cause into several factions and the last several years have seen the final death of public smoker's rights as we know them. In a few years, smoking will be outlawed altogether. I hope you can get your donations to Speakeasy written off now while you can, because apparently all you people ever cared about was money.

From KTKA News, New York, NY

Soon, smoking will be banned in many public places in Manhattan.

Tonight, voters in the Little Apple approved a smoking ban.

57 percent of voters said yes.

This summer, the Manhattan city commission decided to put it to a vote.

And supporters of the ban say they fought hard against misinformation in the campaign.

"They saw through all of the stories from the other side and finally what the city commission didn't do and what hasn't happened until now, the voters passed this ordinance...Very exciting," ban proponent David Seay said.

This is an issue the Manhattan city commission refused to decide three times.

That last time, they decided to put it on the ballot.

The ban goes into effect in 60 days.