“Just the Facts, Ma’am”
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Kevin Godbee - Sep 8, 2011
- 5 min read
By C. R. S. Lyles
Tobacco could kill 1 billion this century.
That’s the headline of a heartwarming news article published in Reuters a few years ago which claims that "if current trends hold, global health experts said" that if we don’t lay off the smokes, then by 2100 we can kiss about 14% of the current population goodbye.
The report was gleaned from information published in the 2009 Tobacco Atlas by the World Lung Foundation and the American Cancer Society.
Here’s some of the numbers that were tossed in there for dramatic effect:
- Tobacco use costs the global economy $500 billion a year in direct medical expenses, lost productivity and environmental harm.
- 100 million people were killed by tobacco in the 20th century.
- Tobacco accounts for one out of every 10 deaths worldwide.
- Tobacco will kill 6 million people in 2010 from cancer, heart disease, emphysema and other diseases.
- Occupational exposure to secondhand smoke kills 200,000 workers every year.
First off, the whole "cost of direct medical expenses, lost productivity, blah blah blah" argument can be immediately marked off with the counter-argument of the tobacco tax.
For example, in 2007 alone the state of Texas tripled its cigarette tax revenues from $523 million to $1.5 billion despite a 21 percent decline in sales.
And that’s just the state of Texas, one state among 50, among dozens of countries who produce cigarettes, pipe tobacco, cigars, etc. who are all being charged an increased tobacco tax.
I think that this can cover the expenses. Hell, with the kind of money we’re talking about here, health facilities could probably afford to employ full-time personal masseuses for each of the patients that comes in.
Now, this article was published back in 2009, before anyone could accurately figure how the figures would be by the end of 2010.
However, we do have the luxury of examining that information, all of which can be found on the public websites of the American Cancer Society (ACS), the American Heart Association (AHA), and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
In 2010, there were approximately 1,529,560 new cancer cases (all kinds of cancer, not just lung cancer), and approximately 569,490 deaths between both sexes (again, from all types of cancer).
There were approximately 667 deaths caused by bronchitis, 12,790 caused by emphysema, and 111,020 attributed to other chronic lower respiratory diseases (CLRD).
And, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, "every 26 seconds someone has a heart attack, and about every minute someone dies from one."
Let’s round those deaths up exactly one every minute, which gives us 1,440 deaths a day. Add them all up and that gives us 525,600 deaths a year.
Now, here’s where I get lost every time a health crusader tries to whittle some logic out of persecuting smokers based on statistics like this, because to me, here’s how the math breaks down:
- 667 bronchitis deaths + 12,790 emphysema deaths = 13,457 deaths
- 13,457 deaths + 111,020 CLRD deaths = 124,477 deaths
- 124,477 deaths + 569,490 deaths from cancer = 693,967 deaths
- 693,967 deaths + 525,600 heart disease deaths = 1,219,567 deaths
1,219,567 from cancer, heart disease, emphysema and other diseases.
I really haven’t heard of any new and terrifying side effects that tobacco causes besides the good ol’ standards of lung cancer, heart disease, and emphysema, but there must be some really ravenous and quiet effect that it has on people because that’s the only rational way that the other 4,780,433 lives that the World Lung Foundation and the American Cancer Society predicted tobacco would claim can be justified.
Now let’s really put that number to the test and see what comes up. The approximate number of deaths in 2010 range from between 59 and 60 million depending on which source you use, so let’s do the math and see if the WLF / ACS prediction was correct:
- 1,219,567 divided by 60,000,000 equals just a little over 2%
Now, granted, this figure didn’t remove the deaths by all the natural disasters and war casualties that occurred last year, but a claim of one in ten people is 10%, and….you get where I’m going with this.
Which leads me to the claim concerning 200,000 occupational secondhand smoke (SHS) deaths made by the World Lung Foundation and the American Cancer Society.
A handy piece of information for any smoker to know off-hand are the facts that were listed in the 1993 EPA report because this information will come in very handy should you ever find yourself in a debate with a vehement anti-smoker who will cite all the health hazards related to second hand smoke.
In 1992, the EPA issued a report which claimed that Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) caused 3,000 deaths per year (ETS is an interchangeable term for second hand smoke.)
However, the EPA announced these results BEFORE the study was finished, and the study that was being conducted was a Meta Analysis, or an analysis of pre-existing studies.
And even in the report itself, on page 3-46 the EPA estimates that nicotine measurements in non-smokers blood, "would translate to the equivalent of about one-fifth of a cigarette per day."
These facts were discovered while I was cruising around on the Internet and came across a website run by a Mr. Dave Hitt.
Mr. Hitt’s website provided a startling amount of information concerning second hand smoke under a tab titled (appropriately enough)The Facts.
On the CDC’s website, they make the claim that second hand smoke causes 3,400 annual deaths from lung cancer and 46,000 annual deaths from heart disease.
Just where are they getting these numbers from, anyway?
And how exactly is it possible to trust a source whose claims can be proven wildly inaccurate with just thirty minutes of searching on Google?
No matter how hard I’ve looked, I’ve yet to come across a clear explanation on how the process of data collecting, statistical equations and drawing conclusions from the process’s results works in regards to deaths attributed to second hand smoke, but then again I don’t really expect to find a clear answer about it.
Ignorance is, after all, the greatest tool that the shepherds use to keep the "sheeple" in line.
Carter R. Lyles is a student at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL and at the University of Florida in Gainesville. He is a journalism/psychology major, and in addition to his work at Pipes Magazine, he has contributed articles to The Alligator, Thursday Night Magazine, and The Fine Print. |
Written by Kevin Godbee
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 634! Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Warren Ertle. Warren is an extremely accomplished musician with a PhD in music. He started early as a percussionist in sixth grade. Later his grandmother got him a cheap Casio keyboard which he taught himself to play. He started playing in blues bands in high school, and has been a pianist with jazz big bands for years. Even though he was already a professional musician, he took his first real piano lesson when he enrolled in college with his studies in classical music. He is of course a pipe smoker. At the top of the show we will have an Ask the Tobacco Blender segment with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl, which is one of the most popular boutique pipe tobacco companies in the USA.
Soon now, supposedly, our neighborhoods will shift from grinning pumpkins, skeletons in various assortments, and zombies dashing about to pretty reindeer, angels, and flashing lights illuminating homes with sparkling stars and laughing, scurrying Santas. But, lest we forget, there is the turkey season, fancy pie aromas wafting from kitchens, and a national pardon of a big Tom Turkey. Remember, now, that only one of these holiday personalities is a pipe smoker. And that is the hefty, bearded fellow in a bright red suit sitting in a sleigh with a herd of deer hitched up and ready to streak across the globe, bringing tidings of joy and many presents. Ok, the scene is set for the next couple of months, right? So, before we get too far off the beaten path, let’s just take a deep breath of fresh autumn air, shall we? Ahh. That’s better, isn’t it? What’s got the Pundit in a snit is not all the Halloween spooks who came a-jostling for candy. Or the wild turkeys gobbling in the backwoods or all the fuss and feathers over the big one—Christmas. No, it is that we might need to take note of all the little things that mean so much to us. Like a good sunrise (seriously, Pundit has not gone all Pollyanna.) Mayhaps we need to appreciate more of what we have than what we have not. Or something like that. Like, a good pipe in the morning with coffee as the dawn brings us coolish weather now that we have flipped the calendar to autumn. But it also brings beautiful leaves that have become a spectacle of technicolor in the wind. It is the little things. The rereading of an enjoyable book and finding something you did not see or learn in the first go-round. Or a stunning phrase you commit to memory with the re-read, while smoking that favorite pipe. And you notice a superior puff that just seems to be different. It’s in the air and the seasons of meaningful little things. It’s aromatic! Or perhaps it is that sense of satisfaction knowing and appreciating you made it to another day. With the world in a kind of rinse-and-repeat history, reminiscent of a Shakespearean play, it is perhaps a good moment to remember some of Pipedom’s philosophers whose cogent thoughts brought light to clear a path in the mists of confusion and confounding opinions. Ok. No gloom and doom. Just some down-home thoughts. Think of times in the past when history was running off the rails. It took our pipe-smoking thinkers (the mind workers of the world) to speak of better pathways to more light. Think for a moment, with a pipe in hand, these wizards of the world and word: Albert Einstein, J. R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edwin Hubble, Bertrand Russell, C. S. Lewis, and Jean-Paul Sartre. All learned and enlightened. They offered wisdom instead of storms of meaningless roads to nowhere. All while smoking their pipes! Maybe especially with the help of their pipes in the art of thinking and philosophy. Recall the words of Mr. E=MC2 when he said, “I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs.” Amen and amen! Dealing with world-rattling events takes a calm and objective view of things, to the Pundit’s way of summing it up. You just don’t go messing around with quantum physics without a calm and objective approach, methinks. Or as the extraordinary physicist Robert Oppenheimer said after he and a team in the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos Labs developed a way to split atoms into bombs during World War II. “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds,” said Oppenheimer referring to the development of the first nuclear bombs dropped on Japan. It must be pointed out that Oppenheimer was more of a cigarette smoker than a pipe smoker. Nonetheless, pipes were part of his personality. Now, if you have read some of the great authors of the past and present, their pipes were always nearby. Reading Sir Arthur Conan Doyle can be a three-pipe problem at times. S. Lewis and Jean-Paul Sartre require time with your pipes to reflect on the existential problems and solutions these authors provide in learned novels and other narratives. Or take Edwin Hubble and Bertrand Russell, philosophers of another world. Pipes are required for reading. The quantum lode of ideas Pundit is attempting to sort out is that our pipes are relaxing and stimulate our thoughts and creativity. Especially in these last months of the year. Many times Pundit has had that light bulb flick on while smoking my beloved pipes. And friends in Pipedom, it ain’t easy to turn on the lights in Pundit’s rock pit head. Now it’s time for a quote from a Pipe Smoker of the Past. Shelby Foote was born Nov. 17, 1916, in Greenville, Miss., and died June 27, 2005, in Memphis, Tenn. A fact is not a truth until you love it—Shelby Foote. A parting thought: It is said that famed Southern author William Faulkner carried a packed pipe in a coat pocket wherever he went. That’s one effective way to deal with workday conflicts and confusion. A calm and objective judgment in our everyday human affairs, as the quantum man said.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 633. Our featured guest tonight is Jon David Cole. JD is the Owner/Tobacconist at The Country Squire in Jackson, MS, and the accompanying online store. We’ll have JD and Brian talking about what’s new at the store and in the business in general. At the top of the show, Brian will discuss tobacco growing, what happens to the leaf, and provide updated information on where tobacco is being gown today. Tobacco production originated in the United States and we were once the #1 producer. It’s quite different now.
Well there’s nothing like a touch of the plague to usher in the changing season. Leaving the airport just when the first advertisements for all things pumpkin spice began to appear—lattes, muffins, shampoos, trash bags, and myriad other concoctions—so, too, my ability to breathe freely disappeared. The unfortunate side effect of losing one’s sense of taste and smell for weeks is the utter inability to enjoy tobacco. Not that I consider myself an expert on anything but my own tastes, but be forewarned that this review was made with mildly impugned sensory equipment. Just when a comforting pipe was most needed, its comfort was denied. Be that as it may, the road to recovery found me limping along on one lung this past month, trying to wrest the particulars of two blends on offer from Sutliff: the latest 175th Anniversary blend, Silver Quarter, as well as their spooky seasonal Maple Shadows II. Silver Quarter is a new style on offer from Sutliff, their first coin-cut blend. Naturally a Virginia-Perique, it is enhanced with a traditional core of black Cavendish. In the tin it holds much promise, with a lightly bready and very woody, if ever-so-slightly sour, aroma. After some time acclimating to air, the bouquet softens further and offers hints of the burley with some chocolaty notes wafting through the more dominant dry grassy aspect. The tin art is of a coin-style bas-relief bust, presumably of a founding Sutliff brother, à la The Old Boss On the reverse of the tin we find the blend’s description: Reflecting on Sutliffs 175 years of tobacco excellence, we came across a brand that embodies true value, SILVER QUARTER. This name pays homage to Sutliffs roots, the legacy of two brothers who popularized pipe smoking in the burgeoning mining society of San Francisco. We celebrate this heritage with a coin cut composed of the finest African Virginias, complemented by a core of Perique and Black Cavendish. The tin notes are, forgive the pun, on the nose for a good VaPer blend: mild tart sweetness peeking out from behind dried hay and slight chocolate undertones, with a lightly tannic finish of weathered oak. It is always a joy to prepare a coin cut, my preference being to put a few in my palm and vigorously warm my hands together to fully break them apart. These well-formed discs pack and light easily, and smoke with little prodding to the end of the bowl. For technical points it scores well—it smokes light, and it’s easy to tend the ember. While it gets sharp after a few quick bowls, pacing should be heeded to easily smoke down to the heel without inviting bite. Of the flavor, though, I am left a bit wanting. There are tart and high notes aplenty, but very little of the lemony citrus I would anticipate, as well as scant midtones; they tend more toward the red wine-vinegary and sour. The flavors are muted, also, lacking the sweetness and piquancy of other marques—the small measure of Perique tickles the nose now and again with peppery hints, and there is a smidge of a deeper sweetness to be found in the Cavendish from puff to puff, but overall it lacks some dynamism. The Virginias, to my palate, come off a bit on the dry side, and here they dominate the blend. The aftertaste and mouthfeel are neutral, again evincing more of the dry, woody, tartly tannic end of the spectrum. The blend has plenty of polish, but not enough depth or richness (*yet) to make it a standout. Here, comparisons are inevitable: Luxury Bullseye Flake has more sweetness, both from its Virginia as well as its Cavendish, and a better finish; Davidoff is similar but with a pronounced umami that is absent here; as for Escudo, I haven’t had any fresh tins lately so it would be unfair to compare. While it rates as a solid, fairly mild smoke, particularly to lovers of the genre, it does not surprise with any exceptional flavors. To be fair, all the boxes have been checked for the blend to benefit from some real aging, and it would be worth checking in on this after a couple of years sealed away. I’ve set half my tin aside to sample again in a month or two, in case I’m merely suffering from the lingering effects of parosmia, and will amend this review in that case. Maple Shadows II, on the other hand, made up for the weeks of sniffling and sneezing I’d endured. Offered in a full 8 ounce tin with delightfully spooky Halloween art, it’s (hopefully) enough to last through the season. Somehow I had missed this last year, so it’s a real pleasure to get some in my candy bucket this year. As the chilling winds of autumn draw eerie prattle from contorted, deciduous limbs, we find ourselves possessed by the spirit of the season. Bewitched by a dissonant charm, we’ve created Maple Shadows. In a season that is defined by the unlikely harmony of treats and frights, we’ve joined the enchanting sweetness of maple with the earthy spice of Dark Fired Kentucky for a smoking experience that captures the senses with an otherworldly fusion of flavor. This may be the best aromatic blend Sutliff’s ever made—and they make a ton of them. First off, it’s not overbearing in the least—quite the opposite, it is also one of the more restrained aromatics they’ve ever made, with a clear but very light topping that melds oh-so-well with their choice Kentucky added to the mix. Opening the tin, the sweet maple is up front and center, but so too is the must of fallen leaves, bready pie crusts, and a crackling fire in the hearth—a perfect invocation of Herbstdüfte in a can. Packing best in an open and capacious bowl, the flavoring is subtle, and recedes to the background while puffing. With a sweet coffee or tea to accompany, the aftertaste of the maple is reinvigorated on the palate […]
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 632. Our featured guest on tonight’s show is the host of the Pipe & Tamper Podcast, Mike Murphy. Brian and Mike will have an extended chat revolving around the days before, during and after the Las Vegas International Pipe Show. We will hear about their travels to the show and the anxiety of Hurricane Milton bearing down on Florida at the same time while running a show and not knowing if your house is going to be there when you get home. In the end, the show went great and our homes survived, although many others in Florida were not so lucky. We’ll have clips from the show, and shoutouts to other podcasts and vlogs that were broadcasting from the pipe show.
Vegas Baby The show started out strong on the 14th floor hospitality suites hosted by the Vegas Pipe Show and Smoking Pipes as well as room hopping to carvers, estate sellers, and vendors to pre-game for the festivities. If you’re interested in what that looks like I’ll refer you to last years pipe show round up. I circled with Brian Levine to get the totals in comparison to last year: This year’s show numbers: 108 Exhibitor tables, 445 attendees, 3,250 Raffle Tickets, 100ish dinners, 172 Rooms in the Hotel. Last year, by comparison, 107 exhibitor tables, 425 attendees, 2,200 raffle tickets, 104 dinners, and 175 rooms on Friday and Saturday nights. We were at capacity, basically, when it came to vendor tables and the dinner, so there is no physical room for growth at this point except for attendees. That said, we filled that smoking lounge to the brim. New Carvers Spotlight Garret Woo (Pipes by Woo) How long have you been carving? Garret: I’ve been carving since 2021, and I’m guessing your next question is probably how’d you get started carving? James: Yes. Garret: In 2021 I took a break from my full time job – that included machining and assembly work and I thought maybe it was time I made something that I would like and I started looking at youtube and Instagram and putting together my shop. I did struggle on the stems to start and there was a lot of failure at the beginning. James: How many pipes have you made so far? Garret: I number my pipes, so I just finished up 186. James: What is your favorite shape you’ve been making? Garret: I really dig Canadians and pipes with longer shanks and lovat Canadian blends. I like to play with different shapes of stems on the longer shanked pipes. The billiard would be my go-to shape but I want to learn more techniques on freehanded shapes. I like to put brass and copper adornments on my pipes with my machining background it helps. James: What is the craziest thing you’ve seen at this show? Garret: The first thing that comes to mind is the table over there with C-Pipes with the shapes and the size and petiteness and the intricate details they did. You can check out what Garret is working on by going to his Instagram. Stefan Cashwell James: how long have you been carving? Stefan: about 3 years. James: What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen at the show? Stefan: The Adam Davidson pipe with the clear shape and the bamboo—I don’t know if it’s 3D printed or what, but it’s amazing. James: What’s your favorite shape to do? Stefan: That’s a tough question. I think they’re all the same shape, but what’s fascinating is that Dublin, volcano, and blowfish are all the same depending on how you turn them. Playing with that, with all its variations, is a lot of fun. My favorite accent to use is also horn; it’s finicky, but it’s a great accent on pipes. You can check out Stefan’s work on his Instagram. Science: Meet Pipes I chatted with Chris from the San Diego Pipe Club; he started off doing stem replacements for estate pipes but also improved the airflow. James: How are you doing 3d printing? What is the thought process? Chris: It’s a 3D-printed pipe with a briar insert. The design is a calabash meets a Peterson system meets a metal Falcon/Kirsten radiator style. It is a bottom draft smoking bowl like a radiator like those metal pipes. The inside chamber is a calabash. The stummel and accent rings in the stems are all 3d printed. The insert is briar, olive wood, or I have the potential to use meerschaum as well. This idea came about through the San Diego Pipe Club, wanting to see if we could 3D print a pipe and being curious about the technology; I have a printer and design ability, so here we are. James: What’s the type of plastic you’re using? Chris: It’s all PLA plastic, a renewable potato starch plastic that is food-safe. The stummels are printed with a plastic that has wood in it 40% wood fiber, bamboo, rosewood, ebony, redwood, and walnut are the woods I’m printing. For the accent rings I just got a new material that I’m printing that has 40% copper, so its real metal that you can sand, and polish the same as wood filament. The stems are 3d printed as well. The concept is renewable and cheap from a production standpoint, with the ability to make a very high quality smoking pipe based on the experience. By combining the calabash system pipe and bottom draft hole and using 3d simulations to see airflow, I can see where I’m having eddies and ripples in my current, and see where my moisture and all the particles are dropping back out from a vapor to a liquid. Most people who have tried these say the stems are clean, and they don’t even have to run a pipe cleaner afterward because everything collects at the bottom. Chris has also been experimenting with color-changing plastics so you can see the hotspots. Chris said he was able to use this to slow down his cadence, which, of course, could mean you could get a slow-smoke training pipe to teach yourself to perform better. If you’re interested in learning more or want to check one out, you can contact him on Instagram: Copper Beard Pipe Works The Negative Space The show was buzzing about one specific pipe, which had everyone guessing how it was made. I chatted with Adam Davidson briefly about it. James: How did this idea come to fruition? Adam Davidson: Smokingpipes.com had an expo back in August open to all of the makers they carry. The theme was to make a pipe utilizing bamboo. Given that the last time we had the expo I made a smooth Almond with three bamboo shanks, […]
Mr. Lyles you know too much, please report to your nearest “education” camp for reprogramming.
Great article. Thanks
Bravo, Carter. A great look inside the lies. I was once told by someone who worked in the records department of a large hospital that whenever someone snuffed it, if the deceased had ever been a smoker, it went in the roles as a tobacco related death, even if the ultimate cause was a gunshot, car accident or suicide. I have no idea how true or, if it is, how widespread this would be, but it would certainly skew the statistics a little bit, don’t you think?
But, the public will believe what they want to believe, and if false statistics based on questionable data can support their dislike of something, they’ll be all over it. Try making BBQs illegal because of the carcinogenic effects of the resulting nitrosamines, and see how much support THAT gets.
Thanks for raising my blood pressure a bit. I was feeling a little too calm today.
Greg, I cant speak to widespread trends, but I can say 100% this was the case with my wifes father. He died at 76 years old after a series of strokes, and because he was a smoker the cause of death was officially listed as tobacco use. I cant find any reason for it, except to skew the numbers of tobacco related death.
Things like this just make me angry. We are losing sight of the bigger picture and have skewed the very foundation upon which this nation was built. Great article. Keep on keeping on.
It’s been many years since ANY Death Certificate in the USA listed the cause of death as “natural causes” or “old age”… I think those became invalid entries in the mid 1950’s….
Great Article Carter!
Methinks in some cases national (U.S.) figures have been confused with global figures.
The attacks on tobacco remain idiocy, however, so the thrust of the arguments is correct.
1.) “Smoking Kills People.” So, let’s target Al-Quaidda infestations and carpet-bomb them with cartons of US-made cigarettes, thereby supporting American agriculture and showing our trust in Cancer Society claims.
2.) If pipe smokers are 2% of all nicotine addicts, how many deaths am I responsible for? I want to paint a “Kill” flag on my car door for each one that can be confirmed to my tobacco consumption.
3.) “You and the Cancer Society can pry my pipe from my cold dead hands.”
Good article as always, Carter. Unfortunately a rebuttal of fact and logic is futile against a crusade of behavioral control. Statistically speaking, that is.
A man is offered a cigarette prior to facing a firing squad. He smokes the cigarette, takes his place against the wall, and is summarily dispatched. His death was recorded as “smoking related”.
This is one of the more poorly written articles I’ve ever read in a commercial publication. Organization is nonexistent, reasoning is opaque, and the conclusions don’t necessarily follow from the facts presented. Mr. Lyles, please don’t waste my time reading your rough drafts, I don’t have the patience to connect your dots with my lines of conjecture.
Wow Cortez. That was harsh. Who peed in your Cheerios?
Oh, I was just workin’ myself up to do a review of Mixture 79. 🙂
I believe it was H.G. Wells that says in one of his writings that the devil likes to quote both scripture and statistics. Let’s face it though gentlemen the tobacco industry has been just as good at twisting the facts as the anti-smoking establishment. They apparently have learned from the same political and scientific hacks. Actually I think I’ll write an article, Why Tobacco is Good for You, and publish all the related joys and pleasures of the ancient weed for everyone to ponder. Our world is full of itself.
For a good read, take on How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff.
As an advocate of smokers’ rights, and in general, freedom from excessive government intrusion upon personal lifestyle choices, I believe our interests are best served by avoiding the obfuscating fog of tiresome statistical arguments and the occasional snide rejoinder (ahem).
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After all, such an approach is based implicitly on the premise that the most salient studies, or the most exhausting litany of them, will win the day — and that’s not the issue here! What is at stake is personal freedom; and to me, the most promising approach is to champion our nation’s founding principle.
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The notion is so basic there should be no debate. Yet, the ongoing controversy testifies to the inherent fragility of that freedom threatened by our opposition, which is daily growing in political strength and tyranny. Remember, human rights were presumed, and the U.S. Constitution was constructed not to enumerate them, but to limit government intrusion. This should be our thrust.
As always,your spot on in your analyses and conclusions. You think like a scientist and write the truth as you see it.
I sometimes feel compelled to write a comment whenever I see one of your treatises even thouth I have come to realize that you have the fire in your belly and would write the truth even if no one ever read it.
We need more like you.
cortezattic – The Constitution was constructed to limit government intrusion for some groups – certainly not for slaves or women – but fashions seem to keep changing with regard to whose human rights the founding principles include.
In the fist segment of the PBS Prohibition series one of the activist leaders claimed that just one drop of intoxicating liquor could destroy an entire family.
This week the government is giving out $103 million in grants for prevention. Prevention is the bread and butter for some groups. As for the rest, prevention makes patients of us all.
Maybe, someday, they’ll leave us alone. Good article.
@Nameshy: Point well taken: principles have never gotten in the way of legislating fashion. One hopes for improvement though; and maybe the slavery, equal protection and suffrage amendments (13 – 15, and 19) are evidence of it.
Does anyone know where we can get the true truth and the real facts? I mean this in all seriousness. I had my first pipe in the late 1970s and was so besieged with well-intentioned concerns for my health that I put it away for the last 30 years. Last year I finally said to heck with it… and started collecting and smoking pipes (again). I’ve had so much enjoyment from the aromas, the feel of various briar textures in the hand, the happy peaceful contemplative mood that comes with it, etc etc etc… and then I go to the movies and see a “commercial” (already irked because I was already paying for NOT commercials) with terrible pictures of surgically traumatized “smokers” from some organization with “truth” in its name. It DOES scare me. The one voice in my head says, “Jer… you’re 55… the time when most intelligent people quit smoking as opposed to take it up. What are you doing to yourself?” I have held the hands of people dying from lung cancer, emphysema, and various other smoking attributable causes and I surely don’t want to risk that. But I also take seriously the positive perspectives of so many of the contributors here. What I would really like is to base my understanding and lifestyle decisions NOT of beliefs and feelings, but on valid statistical risk factors and medically sound information. Where are these things? HELP!
Jerwynn, your question is a good one. Tobacco in cigarettes is normally inhaled. Tobacco smoked in a pipe is almost impossible to inhale. The fact that for hundreds of years pipe smoking was very popular but the major diseases that are associated with smoking only came into existence when machines were invented that could mass-produce cigarettes. This should be documentation of the most solid scientific kind. The evidence is further confirmed by the government’s own mortality tables, which illustrate the vast gap between cigarette smoking and pipe smoking.
A glance at the results of the first Surgeon General’s report were so positive that he himself switched to a pipe. Since that time they attempted to build up the figures as best they could, but without much statistical significance. Currently they discovered that some of what they had thought was a tobacco problem turned out to be HPV.
Nameshy, thank you very much! I really appreciate your response. In the last year since returning to the pipe, every time I go into a pipe-store or meet a pipe-ster or pipe-maker, I want to ask if they have ever known any other real pipe-smoker that actually got mouth/throat/esophageal/etcetcetc cancer. I never do because I wouldn’t want to bring sad recollections to anyone who might have lost a friend to that. But then it occurs to me, so many of these people, who have been happily piping away all their adult lives, are my age or older and are obviously still living and happy about it! Hmmmmmmmmm… I must have another pipe to ponder the mystery of it!
Jerwynn: I was just having those thoughts, although I have been smoking a pipe for some time now.
I was at the VA this week for cholestrol medication review and of course the ususal questions come up. What do you eat? How much, when etc? Then the unevitable ones come. Do you drink alcohol? I say no because I was the guy that could not drink responsibably and havn,t had a drop for 10 yrs. Then the “how about tobacco use”? I said I smoke a pipe. She wasn’t puzzled or anything. Then looks at my file and said that with my risk factors I would be 30% likly to have a heart attack within the next 10yrs. I called her about smoking a pipe and not cigarettes and how they add chemicals in cigarettes to keep people addicted and not inhaling a pipe. She said it didn’t matter and that even if you only smoked 1 cigarette a day you are still considered a risk factor because of it. Then asked me if I needed assistance with a stop smoking program LOL!!!
My mother died of a heart attack at 56. They told me that was a risk to me as well and told me it did not matter that my mother was more a less mentally ill and laid on the couch all day, everyday and didn’t do anything except eat potato chips and never left the house.
Great article, I needed to see this and be reaffirmed of what tobacco nazis are up to….Joe
Jerwynn: I was just having those thoughts, although I have been smoking a pipe for some time now.
I was at the VA this week for cholestrol medication review and of course the ususal questions come up. What do you eat? How much, when etc? Then the unevitable ones come. Do you drink alcohol? I say no because I was the guy that could not drink responsibably and havn,t had a drop for 10 yrs. Then the “how about tobacco use”? I said I smoke a pipe. She wasn’t puzzled or anything. Then looks at my file and said that with my risk factors I would be 30% likly to have a heart attack within the next 10yrs. I called her about smoking a pipe and not cigarettes and how they add chemicals in cigarettes to keep people addicted and not inhaling a pipe. She said it didn’t matter and that even if you only smoked 1 cigarette a day you are still considered a risk factor because of it. Then asked me if I needed assistance with a stop smoking program LOL!!!
My mother died of a heart attack at 56. They told me that was a risk to me as well and told me it did not matter that my mother was more a less mentally ill and laid on the couch all day, everyday and didn’t do anything except eat potato chips and never left the house.
Great article, I needed to see this and be reaffirmed of what tobacco nazis are up to….Joe
As far as I’m concerned, Tobacco smoking IS protected under the First Amendment. Smoking has been a form of expression for thousands of years, and never really hurt anyone. . .untill now!! Hmmm! It’s not the Tobacco. . .It’s been since the advent of the diesel engine.