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by linkup
on Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:02 pm |
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This was posted Jan 11,Phila.
City gets serious about those cigs16 spots got citations yesterday. In some places, patrons were puffing. In others, signs were missing.
By Andrew Maykuth
Inquirer Staff Writer
Frank DiClaudio was surprised Tuesday when a city health inspector showed up at his South Philadelphia bar. The inspector wasn't due for a few months.
But the official didn't come to check whether the kitchen of DiNic's Tavern on Snyder Avenue was tidy. He came to enforce compliance with the city's new antismoking ordinance.
Bad timing. Two patrons lit up in front of the gumshoe. DiClaudio had not even bothered to hide the ashtrays.
The inspector handed DiClaudio two $75 tickets and dashed out the door.
"We're talking Gestapo tactics, storm troopers," complained DiClaudio. "I guess they're trying to make a point."
Yes, indeed.
City health officials said yesterday that they cited 16 Philadelphia bars and restaurants on Tuesday in the first day of active enforcement of the city's smoking ban.
More than 20 health officials inspected 586 establishments, said Jeff Moran, a Health Department spokesman. They found a total of 19 violations at 16 establishments, ranging from failure to post no-smoking signs to encountering patrons actually smoking.
City Council passed an amended smoking ban in December. The ban affects about 4,000 bars and restaurants.
First-time violations carry a $75 fine. A second violation costs $150. A third violation gets the maximum: $300.
Moran said one of the city's priorities is to get out the word that it is serious about enforcing the smoking ban.
Small neighborhood taverns that depend primarily upon alcohol sales can apply for a waiver of the law, but until the waivers are granted, they must comply with the ban.
DiClaudio said his patrons learned quickly about his run-in with the law and already have fled. He said business was off 90 percent yesterday. "My customers are going to the State Store, buying a bottle and taking it home," he said.
DiClaudio said he intends to contest the tickets because the inspector neglected to get the identities of the smoking patrons. "I'm not going to pay these citations," he said.
The establishments cited were:
Danny Boy's Bar & Grill, 1559 E. Hunting Park Ave.; J.C. Tavern, 2601 E. Venango St.; Red Door Tavern, 5912 Germantown Ave.; The Pro's Lounge, 6332 Germantown Ave.; Del Mar Lounge, 304 W. Chelten Ave.; Mermaid Lounge, 6745 Germantown Ave.; Tek Good Luck, 2225 Ridge Ave.; Snapper Head Cafe, 2126 E. Lehigh Ave.; Blarney Stone Tavern, 2634 E. York St.; Kelly Ann's Tavern, 4333 Spruce St.; Casbar, 5568 Spruce St.; Scooter's Pub, 3800 Lancaster Ave.; Doyle's Corner, 3000 Market St.; Commodore Lounge, 5507 Baltimore Ave.; DiNic's Tavern, 1528 Snyder Ave.; East Side Saloon, 1825 E. Moyamensing Ave.
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Contact staff writer Andrew Maykuth at 215-854-2947 or amaykuth@phillynews.com. |
Last edited by linkup on Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:13 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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linkup
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by linkup
on Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:09 pm |
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Cigarette tax may finance universal health coverage
Fucking Scum.Everyone should buy from Russia or Indians
DES MOINES (AP) — Democrats unveiled a plan Wednesday that would offer universal health coverage, with funding coming from a $1 per pack increase in the state’s cigarette tax.
‘‘We cannot reach universal health care without a large infusion of public dollars,’’ said Sen. Jack Hatch, D-Des Moines.
Hatch and Rep. Ro Foege, D-Mount Vernon, head the Health and Human Services Budget Committee, which will begin hearings on the issue next week.
Under the plan, the cigarette tax increase would be approved this year, raising about $134 million. About half of that money would plug the gaps in current health care programs for the elderly and poor, such as Medicaid and free clinics.
The state currently offers health coverage to the children of the working poor, and the measure unveiled Wednesday would expand that program to cover their parents.
At the same time, a special commission would be named to design a plan to offer health care to the roughly 250,000 Iowans who don’t have coverage. A report on that plan would be presented before the next legislative session.
The state’s insurance industry would be a key player in shaping that plan, Hatch said.
There are a variety of ways to expand health coverage, and Iowa is far from the only state beginning to deal with the issue. In Massachusetts, the Legislature has put in place a series of subsidies and penalties designed to make health insurance more affordable and requires everyone to have coverage.
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has called for extending health care to the 6.5 million Californians who don’t have coverage. It would require all to have health coverage, though the poorest would be subsidized.
Vermont, Maine and Oregon have already launched plans to expand coverage, as states are losing patience with the federal government’s inability to act on the issue.
Hatch said the state must intervene, because fewer businesses are offering insurance — the most common place for workers to get coverage. Nationally, only 60 percent of businesses offered coverage in 2005, down from 69 percent in 2000.
Foege said the time is right for the Iowa Legislature to act, with a Democratically controlled Legislature and Democratic Gov.-elect Chet Culver taking office Friday.
‘‘The Democrats have campaigned on universal health care for 25 years,’’ Foege said. ‘‘With a Democratic Legislature and a Democratic governor, there’s no better opportunity to cover every Iowan.’’ |
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linkup
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by linkup
on Thu Jan 11, 2007 11:17 pm |
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| Report every F..ing NIME like person who you see drinking and driving to POLICE!!!Find them.Follow them.Call Police on Cell when you are sure they are over legal limit.Then go home,lite up, and get drunk with Happiness! BOOZE! |
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linkup
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by lexikeri
on Fri Jan 12, 2007 8:44 pm |
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I think we need to start a campaign to Stamp Out Drinking. How many drunk drivers kill or get killed every year.
I'd like to see those statistics next to the ones of people who die from second hand smoke.
Now dont get me wrong, a little for medicinal purposes dont hurt. (I dont think my bi-yearly drink hurts anyone) but I'd love to see all those booze guzzling anti's and politicians attitudes if we start attacking their habits the way they have ours. |
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lexikeri
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by Mo2
on Fri Jan 12, 2007 8:59 pm |
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Well if you use tyrant's language--if you let them choose the terminology, then you're doomed from the start. Words like "habit", "addiction", "Big Tobacco" , " sin", "harmful", etc... come from them, not from free individuals, worldwide.
It's always good to think before you speak though sometimes one may feel the need to just let it out. I've done that plenty of times. |
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Mo2
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Joined: Dec 11, 2006
Posts: 159
Location: OH-the hell hole state
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by ericblair2084
on Fri Jan 12, 2007 9:16 pm |
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I don't know where you guys have been, but they're 60 steps ahead of you. Only Johnny Cochrane/F. Lee Bailey (JoshNJ) and COC, Conservative of Convenience (O2Lover) still can't believe the the slippery slope will sweep them up next.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa501.pdf
Jackasses.
Backdoor to Prohibition
Radley Baldo
December 2003 marks the 70th anniversary of the Twenty-First Amendment, which repealed alcohol prohibition in the United States. The 13 years between the passage of the Eighteenth and Twenty-First Amendments saw the alcohol trade go underground, bringing with it all the ancillary crime that comes with a black market. Alcohol abuse in the United States went up, not down, and civil liberties and tax dollars were sacrificed to what amounted to a grand, failed experiment in state-enforced morality.
One would think that, given the failure of Prohibition, Americans wouldn't need to worry about its return. That may not be the case. A well-funded movement of neoprohibitionists is afoot, with advocates in media, academia, and government. The movement sponsors a variety of research organizations, which publish dozens of studies each year alleging the corruptive effects of alcohol. Those studies are taken at face value by well-intentioned policymakers at the local, state, and federal level. New laws are enacted that curb Americans' access to alcohol.
Some of those laws aim to make alcohol less available through taxation schemes, others through strict licensing or zoning requirements, still others by censoring alcohol advertisements. State and federal government officials have also sought to curb alcohol abuse from the demand side, but such efforts ultimately prove misguided. The 2000 federal law that encouraged local officials to lower the legal threshold for drunken driving, for example, will have little effect on public safety. Instead, it shifts law enforcement resources away from catching heavily intoxicated drunk drivers, who pose a risk, to harassing responsible social drinkers, who don't.
Taken together, the well-organized efforts of activists, law enforcement, and policymakers portend an approaching "back-door prohibition"--an effort to curb what some of them call the "environment of alcoholism"--instead of holding individual drinkers responsible for their actions. Policymakers should be wary of attempts to restrict choice when it comes to alcohol. Such policies place the external costs attributable to a small number of alcohol abusers on the large percentage of people who consume alcohol responsibly. Those efforts didn't work when enacted as a wide-scale, federal prohibition, and they are also ineffective and counterproductive when implemented incrementally. |
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ericblair2084
Enthusiastic Smoker
Joined: Mar 19, 2006
Posts: 718
Location: Exit 13/Sulfur Dioxide, Toxic Waste, Superfund, Landfill, $5 Billion in debt, Socialist, NJ
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by ericblair2084
on Fri Jan 12, 2007 9:20 pm |
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| That was over 3 years ago. If Josh and LtdGovtLover are lurking, and they ask, I'll tell them what has happened since. |
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ericblair2084
Enthusiastic Smoker
Joined: Mar 19, 2006
Posts: 718
Location: Exit 13/Sulfur Dioxide, Toxic Waste, Superfund, Landfill, $5 Billion in debt, Socialist, NJ
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by linkup
on Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:10 am |
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| Look at your legislative body of State Reps and know them.Follow them and if they drink at bars,report them to Police as DUI suspects.Justice will be ours! |
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linkup
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by Torquemeda
on Sat Jan 13, 2007 9:56 am |
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Look at your legislative body of State Reps and know them.Follow them and if they drink at bars,report them to Police as DUI suspects.Justice will be ours!
I think the only problem there is most politicians are like off-duty cops, nine times out of ten they are either escorted home with no charges or they're given a ride with no charges.
Had a guy tell me a few years back that he used to drink with all the cops in his area. He said he'd be all messed up and one of the cops he was drinking with would say, "I'll give you a ride, it's not like I'm going to get a DWI." Of course once this guy left his home area he got busted.
Wasn't one of the Kennedy's all toasted in DC and crashed his car a couple of months back? He got a ride home from the police and said he was on perscription drugs or something.
On the flip side, wasn't some politician or a member of New York's department of health arrested a few years ago for DUI? I can't find it now but she made some statement like, "This will help me to better understand what should be done to drunken drivers."
I actually think these legislative pricks, much like police officers don't necessarily have to practice what they preach.
Of course, if someone's reported enough times, something would have to be done...wouldn't it?
Better yet, aim at the city councilors. |
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Torquemeda
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by linkup
on Sat Jan 13, 2007 10:00 am |
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| Point taken TorQ,but if all of us would nail the MF's,we would win this f//ing war. |
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linkup
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