Senate Bill 1147

[jlanger]

Interesting that a large amount of republicans in the House voted for this bill. Less government control my butt.

Perhaps this is an american tobacco industry thing? No more international shipments of tobacco?

As for totally banning it, I think that's a huge mistake, we all know that banning illegal substances just creates an underground black market for it. cigarettes, as bad as they are for you are a part of the American culture and won't be going away completely any time soon. IMO all substances should be legal, then we could better regulate and tax it. We'd at least get rid of the Mexican drug war most likely lol.

 

[Leche]

I thought GetSnus uses UPS.

I have read that the other shippers, UPS/FedEx/etc, have agreed to not ship tobacco products if this bill passes. Also from my understanding is tobacco products would become non mailable.

 

[mparker762]

Hell, there have even been done studies done that showed increased life expectancy among pipe and cigar smokers due to the relaxation benefits gained from these.

The first surgeon generals report, for one. Subsequent surgeon general reports "solved" this awkwardness by ignoring pipe-only and cigar-only smokers.

 

[gentlemanfarmer]

I have dipped snuff for quiet a few years. I am trying to quit but it's a slow process. The major problem I have with outlawing tobacco is the amount of jobs this country would lose. There are alot of tobacco farms in the southeast and a total ban would mean some families losing there way of making a living. Being a farmer myself I have a soft spot for the american farmer and know that it is hard enough to make a living without gov. interference. But to answer the original question I have never bought tobacco online because the corner store is just handyer.

 

[Geo Dude]

My point exactly.

If one method of taxation fails, the taxes won't go away - something else will be taxed more.

Watch for the penalty tax for folks who don't get enough physical exercise. It's a coming my friend.

Okay.

Your post seemed to have a bit of a sardonic tone to me, but I couldn't quite detect it strongly enough and decided to act as if you were speaking 'straight' instead. Sorry about that, should have went with my first instinct.

As for a penalty tax for folks who don't get enough exercise: Hell, they'll probably just do mandatory 'fat camp' for people of all ages instead of taxing and it label it something like 'self-esteem raising courses.'

 

[Geo Dude]

The first surgeon generals report, for one. Subsequent surgeon general reports "solved" this awkwardness by ignoring pipe-only and cigar-only smokers.

And now they're 'solving' the issue with the new Columbia study by using a sample size of under 50 people (in terms of pipe-only and cigar-only smokers) and claiming that since a proportion of them had 'lung problems' that therefore cigars and pipes are as dangerous as cigarettes without of course controlling for the amount of use, whether the people inhale or not, etc.. Sorry, but when I can go down to the local B&M and meet more 70 + year old folks who have smoked cigars and/or pipe for their whole lives without lung troubles than the sample size used in the study, I feel that we're getting into "the plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data'" territory, rather than actual science.

 

[mparker762]

1st surgeon general's report on smoking and health

Some of the numbers vary between the quotes because they're talking about different studies, sometimes talking about combined results, etc.

Also that PDF isn't the hottest. The text has been OCRed but the figures and background are bitmaps and the sizes don't quite match, so the text is hidden on the right side. If you select it and paste into a text editor you'll get all the text.

pg 36:

Death rates of cigar smokers are about the same as those of non-smokers for men smoking less than five cigars daily. For men smoking five or more cigars daily, death rates were slightly higher (9 percent to 27 percent) than for non-smokers in the four studies that gave this information. There is some indication that this higher death rate occurs primarily in men who have been smoking for more than 30 years and in men who stated that they inhaled the smoke to some degree. Death rates for current pipe smokers were little if at all higher than for non-smokers, even with men smoking 10 pipefuls per day and with men who had smoked pipes for more than 30 years.

pg 85:

For smokers of cigars only or of pipes only, three of the studies show small increases in overall death rates, ranging from 5 percent to 11 percent. The study of men in 25 states, however, gives slight decreases for both types, as does the British study for the two types combined.

pg 92:

For cigar smokers (current and ex-smokers) in the 25-state study 19 percent stated that they inhaled to some extent. The mortality ratio is 0.89 for non-inhalers and 1.37 for inhalers. The latter increase of 37 percent (based on 91 deaths) is statistically significant, but as the data have not been sub classified by amount of smoking the result may be partially a reflection of the increase in death rates noted in Table 4 for heavy cigar smokers. In the Canadian study, 13 percent of the cigar smokers classified themselves as inhalers, but the number of deaths is insufficient to present a breakdown of the mortality ratio by inhalation status.

Among the pipe smokers there were 28 percent who inhaled in the U.S. study and 18 percent in the Canadian study. The U.S. mortality ratios are 0.8 for non-inhalers and 1.0 for inhalers; the Canadian data contain too few deaths to allow a breakdown by inhalation.

Later surgeon general reports handwaved this awkwardness away by claiming that there were too few cigar and pipe smokers to get decent statistics on so they just rolled them in with cigarette smokers and claimed the cigarette results were valid for cigar and pipe smokers too. They may have been right about the small number of pipe-only and cigar-only smokers, but that hardly justifies the category error they then committed.

 

[PipeCop]

What about pipe tobacco?

Pipe tobacco has its own problems in the house with HR 4439

Give it time... Soon they will be taxing shave soaps, lotions & blades...

 

[Leche]

The way I understand this is some RYO tobacco brands skirted the last tax hikes by relabeling as a pipe tobacco. Ludicrous but apparently effective enough to get the leaches on it.

 

[Geo Dude]

The way I understand this is some RYO tobacco brands skirted the last tax hikes by relabeling as a pipe tobacco. Ludicrous but apparently effective enough to get the leaches on it.

Exactly. And if the greedy bastards really cared about just catching RYO in their vise they would simply start taxing the RYO brands which label it as pipe tobacco. It's really NOT difficult to tell the difference between the real thing and RYO. But, they obviously saw another market they could rape with their taxes and went for it as indicated by the TN senator's lying in regards to the issue (claiming that RYO and pipe tobacco are the same thing). But, let's be fair, if they really cared they would keep RYOs at a lesser tax rate than factory cigarettes since they're demonstrably safer and less addictive than factory cigarettes. I hear that there was some significant cigarette lobby legislation behind the scenes to get the original RYO tax passed (Marlboro, etc. fought for it, apparently) and it seems accurate in terms of how things really work.

 

[Mazeman]

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNINSovzBtI[/YOUTUBE]

 

[C Reed]

making drugs of any kind illegal just does not work it never in human history has, not even a little bit. seeing as how it has failed I think legalization, heavy taxation (most to be used for addiction counseling and health care) and extreme quality controls of all narcotics should be policy.

But what do I know, I don't even smoke.

 

[plexibass]

To everyone who supports the "total ban" of tobacco, if I'm not mistaken, they had a little thing in the '20's and 30's called prohibition that did not really go that well. Either way, each paycheck, I take about 100.00 and but some liquor and some cigars and pipe tobacco and put it in my PROHIBITION BOX just in case. I want to be well stocked so I can make a fortune if this happens ala Joe Kennedy! Nice to have a dad who lived through this and can relay the stories from the day.

 

[Geo Dude]

To everyone who supports the "total ban" of tobacco, if I'm not mistaken, they had a little thing in the '20's and 30's called prohibition that did not really go that well. Either way, each paycheck, I take about 100.00 and but some liquor and some cigars and pipe tobacco and put it in my PROHIBITION BOX just in case. I want to be well stocked so I can make a fortune if this happens ala Joe Kennedy! Nice to have a dad who lived through this and can relay the stories from the day.

Not to mention all the problems Canada had with smuggling and the violence involved when they simply raised the taxes on cigarettes enough to make them unaffordable to the average joe, without even putting in place a complete ban. And, for that matter, the current drug war in the US isn't going much better than prohibition did.

 

[Stubblefield]

The bill has been signed into law. Here is the introductory text of the full bill. It would appear that the main reason (well, the stated reason) is to accelerate the collection of taxes on tobacco products sold on the Internet (currently they can be purchased while avoiding taxes).

Mind you, there is no discussion of making tobacco illegal here, it seems more of a revenue issue (which is a serious enough issue in my mind, being a taxpayer).

. . . .

One Hundred Eleventh Congress

of the

United States of America

AT THE SECOND SESSION

Begun and held at the City of Washington on Tuesday,

the fifth day of January, two thousand and ten

An Act

To prevent tobacco smuggling, to ensure the collection of all tobacco taxes, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; FINDINGS; PURPOSES.

(a) Short Title- This Act may be cited as the ‘Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act of 2009’ or ‘PACT Act’.

(b) Findings- Congress finds that--

(1) the sale of illegal cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products significantly reduces Federal, State, and local government revenues, with Internet sales alone accounting for billions of dollars of lost Federal, State, and local tobacco tax revenue each year;

(2) Hezbollah, Hamas, al Qaeda, and other terrorist organizations have profited from trafficking in illegal cigarettes or counterfeit cigarette tax stamps;

(3) terrorist involvement in illicit cigarette trafficking will continue to grow because of the large profits such organizations can earn;

(4) the sale of illegal cigarettes and smokeless tobacco over the Internet, and through mail, fax, or phone orders, makes it cheaper and easier for children to obtain tobacco products;

(5) the majority of Internet and other remote sales of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco are being made without adequate precautions to protect against sales to children, without the payment of applicable taxes, and without complying with the nominal registration and reporting requirements in existing Federal law;

(6) unfair competition from illegal sales of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco is taking billions of dollars of sales away from law-abiding retailers throughout the United States;

(7) with rising State and local tobacco tax rates, the incentives for the illegal sale of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco have increased;

(8) the number of active tobacco investigations being conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives rose to 452 in 2005;

(9) the number of Internet vendors in the United States and in foreign countries that sell cigarettes and smokeless tobacco to buyers in the United States increased from only about 40 in 2000 to more than 500 in 2005; and

(10) the intrastate sale of illegal cigarettes and smokeless tobacco over the Internet has a substantial effect on interstate commerce.

(c) Purposes- It is the purpose of this Act to--

(1) require Internet and other remote sellers of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco to comply with the same laws that apply to law-abiding tobacco retailers;

(2) create strong disincentives to illegal smuggling of tobacco products;

(3) provide government enforcement officials with more effective enforcement tools to combat tobacco smuggling;

(4) make it more difficult for cigarette and smokeless tobacco traffickers to engage in and profit from their illegal activities;

(5) increase collections of Federal, State, and local excise taxes on cigarettes and smokeless tobacco; and

(6) prevent and reduce youth access to inexpensive cigarettes and smokeless tobacco through illegal Internet or contraband sales.

 

[andrew98]

Heart disease is the number one cause of death in America. Does that mean the government should ban fast food joints and monitor what we eat? Think about it.

And you have to be 21 to drink. It makes no sense.

-Andy

 

[airplanedoc]

(2) Hezbollah, Hamas, al Qaeda, and other terrorist organizations have profited from trafficking in illegal cigarettes or counterfeit cigarette tax stamps;

Here you go, it looks like Bin laden is to blame.

 

[Omnichron]

I don't smoke, but I am not for stiffing the smoker either. Government has overreached on this segment of the population quite much. It is ridiculous the extent they have gone to on this group of people... some might say it is discriminatory and criminal.

 

[Norwester]

I do think this will effectively kill Swedish snus in the US. Few places carry real Swedish snus, and the prominent stuff like Camel is garbage. Getsnus and other online stores that don't carry cigars will go out of business. Hopefully the big razor companies will never lobby a bill to ban mail ordered shaving stuff.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s111-1147

"Just to review, the PACT Act is being put in to place so that proper taxes for the sale of tobacco products are collected. What this means is that all online retailers will have to label each package as containing tobacco products on the outside of the package. Failure to do so will cause the items to be deemed non-deliverable. Age verification will also be required at the time of purchase, as well as at the time of delivery by the carrier. We must also comply with all state and local laws pertaining to that state as if we were located in that area.

We understand your concern with the changes that will occur with the signing of the PACT Act, as we are concerned as well. There will be a 90 day period from the signing of the law until it goes into effect and we plan on taking this opportunity to look at the obstacles we will be working with in the very near future. Unfortunately, there is no way for us to identify the exact changes that will occur at this time, as the law has not yet gone into effect. Once we see the final version, contingency plans that we have strategized about for some time now will be put into place.

We understand the frustration that all of our fellow snusers are feeling at this time, as there is a lot of uncertainty surrounding what exactly the PACT Act will bring. We, at GetSnus.com, hope to alleviate that frustration and will be working hard to see what we can do to face these challenges ahead.
Sincerely,
Jill C
GetSnus.com"

Getsnus is owned by Swedish Match and they've put a lot of money into their warehouses in the states as has The Northerner. I've read statements by UPS that they will continue to ship tobacco under PACT. Its all going to be more expensive and a general PITA but thats what happens to anything that the gov sticks their nose into. Heres a link with tobacco tax rates by state.

http://www.tobaccofreekids.org/research/factsheets/pdf/0169.pdf

 

[mretzloff]

Interesting that a large amount of republicans in the House voted for this bill. Less government control my butt.

Republicans, or at least the truly conservative ones, believe in less government control in the economy, but more in people's daily lives. This is why they oppose social programs, such as welfare, but favor anti-abortion laws and bills, such as this one.