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Nonsmoker burning about long arm of the law and loss of freedoms

Erik Thorsteinson, Breckenridge

I am not a smoker. I actually despise smoking around me as I think it is dirty, smelly and bad for your health. But this iron-fisted approach to a smoking ban is absurd.

I reviewed the latest story on the proposed Breckenridge smoking ban (SDN, Jan. 28) and I have to say I am a bit embarrassed.

It seems that we are leaping far ahead of the rest of the country with the Gestapo-like tactics that have popped up since 9-11.



This comment really sent it over the top for me personally:

“… Whether smoking would be allowed in private offices to which the public has access Š The council decided that, for now, it would include such offices in the ban.”



So, if I am an accountant who works by myself in my own office with nobody else, and I am the leaseholder, or even owner of the property, I cannot legally smoke in my own office.

And this is because the public comes in from time to time. Absurd. Even if the ruling is “only when the public is present,” it is absurd.

And they are considering ski lift lines? Sure I don’t like the guy sitting on the lift, or standing in the line next to me lighting up.

But isn’t that a bit extreme. If Breckenridge Ski Resort does a marketing study and it determines that being a smoke-free establishment will increase business, or if the owners just decide they want to be smoke free, then it should have that right; but to have the government demand that it becomes a smoke-free establishment is crazy.

We are turning into the Soviet bloc, slowly but surely. People want their issues addressed and catered to and want a law to enforce their ideas.

Before we know it we will be monitored and tracked and fined every single way possible. This is already happening and growing at great speed.

This is pathetic, people. This is a free country. If you don’t like someone smoking in his or her own office, simply go to someone else in a smoke-free office.

If you don’t like a smoky bar, go to another one that is smoke free or has a smoke-free room.

It should be up to the business owners to decide the policies of their establishments, and hence the profit margins or losses that go along with it.

It should not be a government agent showing up with a gun issuing tickets and collecting revenue.


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