The Left is slowly working to ban the electronic cigarettes. Their reasoning has nothing to do with science since science clearly says these things are vastly less harmful than smoking. The second hand smoking claims, always dodgy in terms of science, evaporate with these things. What comes out of the smoker is water and no one has ever claimed harm from second hand water vapor. Plus, there’s no smell. That’s one of the major selling points, so, the liberal scolds had to come up with a different excuse:

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said the ban would make it easier to enforce the city’s Smoke-Free Air Act, which banned smoking in bars, restaurants and other indoor public spaces.

“Because many of the e-cigarettes are designed to look like cigarettes and be used just like them, they can lead to confusion or confrontation,” Quinn said.

So these anti-smoking zealots just hate smoking so much, they don’t even want to see images of it in public.  Therefore, in order to make it easier for the scolds to harass people enjoying themselves, they will now pretend virtual smoking is real smoking. This really does make the point that it was never about public health. It was always about imposing their values on others. It’s not even about the values, so much as the act of forcing people to comply with their rules. It’s about the scold getting scold the wicked.

Smoking is unhealthful and it is proper to encourage people to avoid the habit. At this point, everyone knows this. The costs of deleterious habits should always be on the person engaging in them, where possible. Smokers should be charged a hefty premium on their insurance and taxes levied on tobacco. Banning smoking in closed spaces is fine, even though the science is dodgy. Bars and restaurants that permit smoking should post a sign over the door making it known. Let the market sort that out.

Vaping, from observation and a little research, is a far less harmful activity than smoking and not a burden on others. It may pose no harm at all. If the nicotine is removed, you’re left with an asthma inhaler. The stuff in these things is propylene glycol, the same stuff they use in some inhalers. It is used in all sorts of food and medicines, approved by the FDA for decades. Sucking in anything but air is probably posing some risk and there may be some unknown risks with these things, but they are less harmful than smoking.

Sensible public health policy should always encourage the sorts of trade-offs that improve public health. In this case, giving people an incentive to switch from tobacco to vaping would be the wise policy. yeah, it looks weird seeing people wrapped in a cloud of vapor, but it beats seeing them outside the door smoking. Instead, the busy bodies are running around looking for a reason to torment those hooked on nicotine. It’s a good reminder that the people who rule over us are petty miserable tyrants.