smoking indoors on private property is not a health issue, it's a property rights issue. the folks who are fighting it are some of the last brave souls on the planet, because they are not fools for the PC BS machine.

vote with your dollar. if you don't like smoke, don't support the establishment. if they need or want your business, they will change their policies by their own decision.

but if it's their property and their business, they should be able to decide. they are there 24/7 investing time, sweat and money. if they make more money and/or enjoy their own life more by running a business that permits smoking (in a building they OWN, mind you), it should be their CHOICE, not yours, not the government's.

and no, i don't smoke. but i support the rights of property owners more than i support the whimsy of diners.

The people fighting the tobacco ban are hardly brave souls. They have financial backing of one of the largest corporations in the nation to make their lawsuit. If they were risking their own money to pay their lawyer fees, it’d be a different story. If you want brave souls go look to soldiers, fireman, and police officers, not people who seek to maintain their profit margin at the expense of their patrons and employees health.

Smoking is a health issue; I don't see how smoking in a public place isn't a public health issue.

Also, as I stated above, I don't plan on spending my money in their establishments, not that I ever did. The proprietor has a right to do whatever they want in their establishment within the bounds of the law. Just because the smoking ban would be a new law, is no more different then fighting a new ban on food with a greater then 1% of rat feces in it, or drinks with a greater then 90% ABV. The law is made by people elected by the public, if the public is unhappy with laws passed by those elected officials, then they will elect someone who will repeal the law and allow smoking again. Instead they are serving the big tobacco corporations direct interest, and that support is evident in their financial support of the law suit.

Calling a ban on smoking, something universally recognized as unhealthy and CANCER CAUSING, PC BS is complete nonsense. Isopropyl alcohol is a poison that will kill you given enough consumption of it, would you be opposed to a ban on more then 0.5% ABV of it in public restaurants and bars? Of course drinking rubbing alcohol doesn’t even affect the patrons around you or the server bringing you your drink, so it isn’t even close to an exact comparison.

It is also illegal to smoke marijuana and crack in bars and restaurants in Allegheny County. Should restaurant proprietors be given the right to decide what substance is smoked in their establishment carte blanche? I don’t buy into the Tobacco company’s “BS” that their product is anything other then a substance that should be controlled and subject to the same restrictions defined for all other addictive drugs.

Smoking in public is murder, one little puff at a time. We don't allow shooting in restaurants, so why smoking?