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"I was not born to be forced. I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest."
-- Henry David Thoreau, On the Duty of Civil Disobedience
If you're a content vaper who has left the hazards of traditional tobacco smoking behind for the healthier benefits of vaping, you may want to stock up on your favorite e-liquids and put those e-cigs in a safe place! The nannycrats are coming and they have legions of misguided millennials behind them, such as the group "San Francisco Kids vs Big Tobacco." And a child shall lead them, right over a cliff, as San Francisco repeats the oft-failed experiment of prohibition and misinformed voters follow mal-educated minors like lemmings down the slippery slope of nannyocracy.
You'll discover that playing the "we must protect the child" card is a common tactic among nannycrats even when there is nothing to protect them from. The vaping industry caters to adult taxpayers. If you're a kid, get lost! We're not looking for your business. That's a Big Tobacco scheme and the vaping industry is NOT BIG TOBACCO! Unfortunately, legislation such as San Francisco's recently passed Proposition E fails to make that critical distinction.
Our beloved San Francisco, sadly, is not an isolated case. The distinctions between vaping and combustible tobacco smoking are constantly blurred so nannycrat politicians can pass "feel good" legislation which only serves to advance their own interminable political careers.
As a result of Proposition E, we at Velvet Cloud are forced to leave our hearts in San Francisco as we move our organic e-liquid business (and the retail tax revenue it generates) to more hospitable environs which still respect the concept of the free market and individual pursuits of happiness. We want our loyal Velvet Cloud customers to rest assured that we'll continue to supply the 100% vegetable glycerin, vegan-friendly e-liquids that they love.
Vapers and the vaping industry are facing forceful tactics nationwide with direct attacks on individual companies such as vape pen manufacturer JUUL. In New Jersey, a 75% tax on e-cigs and vaping products will drive a trend back to relatively cheaper combustible tobacco products if nannycrat Governor Richard Murphy has his way. The key word here is "combustible". That is, burning tobacco inhalants with their tar-laden, cancer-inducing characteristics. Adult taxpayers across the nation are subject to bans on vaping in public. Flavored liquid bans are the latest underhanded tactic for unscrupulous nannycrats to make some easy political hay and that particular "ban wagon" is rolling across the country.
This rampant avalanche of vaping misinformation has led to overreaching legislation such as Proposition E, passed by well-intended but misguided voters right here in our beloved city of San Francisco on June 5, 2018. Misinformed voters, incorrectly associating flavored e-liquids and the infant $3.5 billion vaping industry with the $35 billion Big Tobacco leviathan, are victims of vicious anti-vaping media campaigns operating on the Nazi minister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels' fundamental principle of misinformation.
"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it."
The "Big Lie" in the case of Proposition E is associating flavored e-liquids with Big Tobacco products. In 1988 the US Surgeon General declared that while "nicotine addicts, tar kills." Many smokers felt the need for a healthier nicotine delivery system in order to eliminate the health hazards from cigarette tar. Vaping was invented by innovative ex-smokers in order to find a way to divorce themselves from the addictive tar-coated tentacles of Big Tobacco. Make no mistake, Big Tobacco wants the vaping industry dead and they're using naive nannycrats to do their dirty work.
The masterstroke of the Big Tobacco minions was to draw flavored vaping e-liquids into Proposition E and then have RJ Reynolds provide the major funding to oppose the ban. The poor nannycrats were analogous to a tic-tac-toe player against a chess master, leading voters to pass the ban in a knee-jerk reaction against the traditionally demonized Big Tobacco.
To be fair, most of the nannycrats today aren't personally responsible for launching the anti-vaping myths so prevalent in both social and mainstream media. That's not to say they won't hesitate to use the resulting hysteria to further their own careers.
Some of these self-appointed anti-vape crusaders are walking fossils like Republican NY state senator Kemp Hannon. (Yes, that's his real name, you can't make stuff like that up.) Elected in 1989 (!) this NY State senator is like a dog with a bone, repeatedly trying to force anti-vaping legislation by playing the familiar "We must protect the minors from the harmful e-cigarettes card."
The distinguished but out of touch codger sharpened his political wisdom teeth and filled his campaign coffers by demonizing Big Tobacco way back in the last century. Now, whenever he hears the word "cigarette" he compulsively scribbles new legislation to force down the throats of his constituents. The "E" in "e-cigarette" doesn't seem to process past his hearing aid, and flavored liquids and vaping products get scapegoated along with combustible tobacco, despite the fact that they are as similar as apples and aardvarks.
Taking his cue from the federal Facts Don't Apply agency, the senator is apparently ignorant of what the exact effects of e-cigarettes are, especially when compared with the combustible tobacco version. Research has been pointing to the healthier benefits of vaping as an alternative to traditional tobacco smoking for 3 years now.
NY vapers, as well as San Franciscans victimized by "Kids Against Big Tobacco" should point their perennial senator and misguided millennials to the 2015 press release from Public Health England, an agency of the UK government. The title of their landmark survey is below:
"E-cigarettes around 95% less harmful than tobacco estimates landmark review."
Not to mention the myth-busting subtitle from the same British Government Report that Nannycrats and the FDA are trying to squelch:
"Expert independent review concludes that e-cigarettes have potential to help smokers quit."
England's Royal College of Physicians sensibly urged doctors to "promote the use of e-cigarettes, NRT (nicotine replacement therapy) and other non-tobacco nicotine products as widely as possible as a substitute for smoking in the UK." according to this report at National Review titled "Promote Health by Not Defending the E-Cigarette Ban".
As the nannycrats' refusal to acknowledge the facts about vaping persists, their self-serving antics are drawing fire from such politically diverse sources as the National review article above, as well as Rolling Stone Magazine's expose' article "E-Cigs' Inconvenient Truth: It's Much Safer to Vape"
Many of the politicians leading the anti-vape charge have, like our old pal Kemp Hannon, been firmly entrenched in elected office for decades. Old Kemp has been around longer than cell-phones and the internet for Pete's sake! They're like incompetent substitute teachers who never go home, mal-educating the public with self-serving propaganda which leads to feel-good lobbies like "San Francisco Kids Against Big Tobacco".
Others, such as junior Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth are political puppies eagerly jumping on the anti-vaping "ban wagon" and bouncing along in blissful compliance with the interminable incumbents to facilitate a quick climb up the political ladder.
Incumbents such as Minority Whip Dick Durbin (who has been a fixture in the Senate since 1996) score political points by attacking what he and others see as an easy target to further their burgeoning political careers. We have to wonder just who benefits from the vaping ban movement? It's certainly not the American vaper who, as an informed consumer, chooses to leave the tar of combustible tobacco smoking behind.
While deplorable Big Tobacco is a $35 Billion dollar industry selling lethal cigarettes, and Big Pharma makes a compatible fortune with smoking cessation pills, patches, and potions, the fledgling vaping industry can only muster $3.5 billion. Both of these behemoths will benefit immensely if they can kill the vaping industry.
So which of the three will attract the lapdogs of Congress or your local City Hall when it's time to follow the money and fund their campaigns? You can check out who's on the nannycrat ban wagon at the Ultimate List of Anti-Vaping Politicians at vaporvanity.com.
We didn't want to leave you in a funk of bad news here! There are some signs that politicians are paying attention to the facts. Senator Leyonhjelm is leading liberals in a discussion on how vaping bans will lead to more deaths. Legal challenges to nanny laws are having an effect too, as we pointed out in our recent post. The Trump administration is also looking at reining in the FDA and offering hope to the vaping community, according to a June 14, 2018 article at American Thinker.
Vapers can make a difference too, as well as informed adult taxpaying consumers in general who prefer to decide for themselves what to eat, drink, smoke, dip, or vape at their own discretion. Go to the polls and vote accordingly, to retain those liberties.
At Velvet Cloud, we're committed to providing the vaping community with the highest quality, purest, vegan-friendly, VG e-liquids to enhance your pursuit of happiness. We just won't be doing it from San Francisco for now.
© 2024 Velvet Cloud.
