Years ago when they were first talking of banning smoking in public places across the country, the CBS evening news interviewed some Europeans on the subject.  A man from England said it best, in my opinion, he said: "A government that bans smoking is indicative of a government that thinks that it's people are not smart enough to make their own decisions."
I'll never forget that.

Whenever my father would see any of my siblings smoking a cigarette, he'd mutter to himself, but loud enough for that sibling to hear, "I didn't think I'd raised any stupid children." It was more effective than any anti-smoking campaign anyone could have dreamed up. As far as I know, none of my siblings smoke to this day.

Hitler thought.

and Hitler was a vegetarian and loved his dogs. Thing is, no matter how evil any given MF is it does not make them completely evil, or stupid. OMG Hitler killed millions of people and he washed his hair! Therefor anyone who washes their hair must be evil!!! Hitler was the leader of the Germans, so all Germans must be evil. 

Extrapolating to a general population from a specific instance is damn lazy thinking. 

By some accounts Bush may have been directly or indirectly responsible for ~1,000,000 deaths... so can we now say Bush is evil enough to equate everything he says and does or is a member of as evil?

How about if we allow "reasonable accommodation" within the smoking ban.  The State is allowed to ban smoking but only if they install those little overhead heating lamps and a wind shelter for the smokers to stand in outside.  Why should I get pneumonia because some one who doesn't go to the bar doesn't want me to smoke at the bar.

Yeah, smoking is bad and blah blah blah, but my fucking ass gets cold standing outside to smoke when its yet another inhospitable winter day in Duluth, where was the consideration of my health and well being?

I have to say, I hate it when I pass a bunch of smokers on the sidewalk, just having to do that makes me cough and my eyes burn. My kid has allergies, and absolutely can't tolerate smoke, which makes me look even less kindly on smokers congregated on sidewalks blocking our way. I'm all for no-smoking in buildings for her sake, wish we could expand on it to include no smoking outside near buildings, as they do in some little town in California.

Hmmm, I totally support the "remove your damn whiny, ill-behaved children from this restaurant lest I stab a fork into their head" proposal.
If you bring me a petition, I'll totally be there to sign it! :D

My original post about Hitler had to do with Godwin's law, which had been mentioned earlier in the thread.  Godwin's law being that as the number of posts in a thread approaches infinity the odds of their being at least one reference to Hitler or Nazism approaches 1, ie 100%.  I was curious, applying the same standards if the subject matter in the original post, volatility of such would have a measurable effect on increasing the rate at which the odds of there being a H/N (Hitler/Nazi) comment, and if that could be quantified mathematically.  Then I was also pondering if there had been any H/N comments in the Homegrown video thread since it had reached 100 posts, I checked and with a quick find in my browser I discovered no such references, which I found interesting.

I was asking about the mention of Hitler at the very top of this thread. Sorry for not being clear about that. Also: second-hand smoke IS toxic, and a lot of it does not pass through a filter. Some of it IS filtered- by the smokers lungs.Maybe we can agree- "Lest you harm no one, do what thou wilt", or whatever.

Yeah,yeah, yeah, second hand smoke is bad.  How about smoke from candles, smoldering pizza ovens, Sterno cans, everything else in the world that gets hot and creates a vapor as a result.  I don't want to live in a bubble, and I certainly don't want to live forever.  And with the time I am here I would rather enjoy myself than live in constant fear of, oh, this may kill me.  I figured out a long time ago that the leading cause of death is birth, its a simple fact, your born, you die, its just a matter of when.  Smoking takes ten years off your life, big deal, they were the crappy years at the end anyway, good riddance as far as I am concerned, I wasn't planning on living that long anyway.

Hitler is probably the most influential man in the last 300 years.  I heard he got syph too.

What the U of Minn link above does not mention is that quantity of each of the 4000 chemicals that are found in cigarette smoke places them far below the established hazard limits, even in dense smoking environments. In order for those chemicals to surpass the currently allowable limits of exposure, in long term exposure limits, the room would have to be so smokey that the real health risk would be displacement of oxygen, not carcinogens. 

"Field studies of environmental tobacco smoke indicate that under normal conditions, the components in tobacco smoke are diluted below existing Permissible Exposure Levels (PELS.) as referenced in the Air Contaminant Standard (29 CFR 1910.1000)...It would be very rare to find a workplace with so much smoking that any individual PEL would be exceeded."
-Letter From Greg Watchman, Acting Ass't Sec'y, OSHA, To Leroy J Pletten, PHD, July 8, 1997 

and a chart showing several of these chemicals, and the number of cigarettes required to surpass the permissible exposure limits for an unventilated 100m3 room. 

http://www.nycclash.com/smoke_chart.html

So after reading this string of comments, I realize this has gone through the ringer and like most of these, ends up not even talking about the original intended topic, BUT..

I believe mr. dbrewing was referring to the post previous to this one, in regards to a smoke free Chester Park and having the comments option turned off, so no one could post their opinion on the subject. 
I do believe that mr. dbrewing is not alone in his concern of smoking be outlawed all together. First it's in government buildings, then public buildings, then outdoor public places (including public sidewalks and parks), with the possibility to continue the bans on to your own porch or living room. 

Whether you are a smoker or not, or whether you prefer these laws or not, you have to agree that with each new continuation of smoking bans/laws encroaches a future of government control over personal choices. 

Granted, if I was at the park (or any place) with my kid and someone was smoking too close for comfort, I'd ask for some consideration. If they didn't stop, I'd have to make the grown up decision to either walk away or kick some a**. Yet again, another use of the great freedom of being able to make my own decisions and procure my own destiny.