Where the Flavor Isn't

[The Straight Story]

Where the Flavor Isn't

Eshoo bill would put a stop to flavored cigarettes enjoyed by children and hipsters. Does it go too far?

By Molly Zapp

IT'S NOT really fair for the government to control what we smoke," says Julian Shipp, manager at Mac's Smoke Shop in Palo Alto. "The taxes we pay already are astonishing. I feel like our freedoms are being taken away one by one."

Silicon Valley Congresswoman Anna Eshoo says one fact trumps all others. "Smoking is a killer, and we know that," Eshoo says. "It's just as simple as that; it's just as profound as that."

New tobacco legislation co-sponsored by Eshoo, which gives the FDA sweeping new powers to regulate the tobacco industry, overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives on July 30. The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act allows for strict new regulation of tobacco products.

If it is signed into law, cigarette manufacturers will no longer be allowed to label products as "lights" or "ultralights." They must disclose the amount of all additives. Flavored and clove cigarettes would be banned. Any new type of cigarette would have to be given pre-market approval before being sold. And all outdoor tobacco advertising would have to be in black and white.

And lest there remain any lingering confusion about the painful, hideous and premature death that waits to befall smokers, current warning labels could be replaced with graphic images of tumors and mouth sores.

http://www.metroactive.com/metro/09.03.08/news-0836.html