The U.S. military is the organization in which social experimenters are most likely to set out trial balloons for future experiments along Main Street America. The latest military trial is a proposed mandatory smoking ban among everyone serving in the military.
Oh, there's a logic to the proposed behavioral modification -- and it''s a pretty dramatic argument as published in last week's Army Times. Fact is, smoking is deadly, the Institute of Medicine reports:
After deploying to Iraq or Afghanistan, smokers return home only to face a startling statistic: About half of them will eventually die from a smoking-related illness, according to the Institute of Medicine report. They face cancer, stroke, heart disease, emphysema and diabetes.
“These troops are essentially putting their lives at risk twice: once in service to their country and once in service to tobacco,” wrote Stuart Bondurant, chair of the committee. “Tobacco is a long-term engagement — it kills slowly and insidiously.”
Expect the same reasoning to accompany socialized medicine and a national smoking ban. It's the perfect extension of Illinois' already in place statewide public smoking ban. Before you know it, the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" rule will be in effect and the persistent chain smoking American Commander-in-Chief will need to be the first to swear off the smokes -- this time for good.
When I was in Vietnam the #1 killer was not smoking, nor guns, it was alcohol. Just as here in th US, drunk driving, gun accidents while drunk, and similar alcohol related deaths were the biggest killer.
LIFESTYLE is life and death, healthcare needs and costs. Alcohol, drugs, promiscuity, smoking are all major societal problems, not to mention gluttony.
Some lifestyle choices affect only the life of the person making the choice. Some lifestyle choices such as drunk driving impact the innocent.
When taxpayers are forced to pay for other's lifestyle choice mistakes, ie healthcare, then everyone's lifestyle choice becomes the business of everyone else.
Thus economic policy drives social policy.
Posted by: spintreebob | Monday, July 13, 2009 at 07:45 AM
Your points are well made, Spin, and it's easy to see why misguided compassion ends up backfiring and often kicking into gear a sense of control and limiting individual liberties, for good or for bad. Personal responsibility is foundational for freedom. This current atmosphere of saving others from themselves will end up curtailing all our freedoms in one way or another.
Posted by: IR | Monday, July 13, 2009 at 08:02 AM
An easy solution to the smoking problem would be to allow people to smoke, but if they have lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema or COPD...they have to pay for those particular health problems out of their own pockets. I.E. no medicare coverage. If they know the dangers and continue to smoke, why should the public pay for the indiscretions of the individuals? This would not be curtailing freedoms and would lead to personal responsibility.
Unfortunately, just like every other easy solution, the government would then expand the non-coverage ideas. If you are obese, you must have been eating too much. Therefore, the government will not pay for your heart disease, diabetes, back problems, etc.
Slippery-slope, here we come.
Posted by: MD in Southern Illinois | Monday, July 13, 2009 at 11:21 AM
MD
It would seem that the opposite is the slippery slope.
Why not have personal responsibility in every personal lifestyle choice?
Why not have freedom in every personal lifestyle choice?
The only issue of interest to the goverment is when one person or group forces their lifestyle choice on others. Thus parents and government both impose lifestyle choice restrictions on minors.
But in what other realm is it correct to treat adults as minors in need of personal lifestyle control?
Posted by: spintreebob | Monday, July 13, 2009 at 12:08 PM