Power Crazed Regulators Target E-Cigarette Industry

One of Ronald Reagan’s best quotes was “Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it”.  That’s never been more true than it is now where a power mad political ruling class wants not only to spy on Americans, limit Constitutional rights and give itself preferential treatments not available to average citizens but reacts hysterically to any new technology.   That’s evident in governments that have tried to ban or regulate the use of Google Glass before it even hits the market.

And now these regulators have come for e-cigarettes.  The entire justification for any type of regulation of electronic cigarettes is highly dubious–it looks like smoking and is used as a substitute for traditional cigarette smoking so, the boneheaded politicians surmise, it should be regulated the same way.    In many jurisdictions anti-smoking laws have been extended to cover e-cigs meaning that their use is prohibited anywhere that smoking is prohibited.  Now keep in mind that the rationale that was used to sell the public on smoking bans was the negative health impact of secondhand smoke (which itself was based on very spurious science).  That rationale doesn’t exist with e-cigs–which produce only water vapor–but the utter lack of any logical similarity or legitimate health impact isn’t enough to stop the lifestyle police.

There’s also a lot of hypocrisy implicit in the efforts to regulate e-cig sales and use.  For years we’ve been told that cigarette smoking is the absolute worst thing in the world and that smokers should stop at all costs.  Now the marketplace has provided a popular, affordable and effective smoking cessation device.  Assuming that all of the anti smoking hysteria of the past few decades was true and that its proponents were sincere in their interest in ‘public health’ the anti-tobacco scolds should be *encouraging* the use of e-cigs.   Guess again–not that they have much in the way of justification for the anti e-cig hysteria.  They’re upset that they *look* too much like traditional cigarettes and, of course, the go-to refuge of the argumentatively bankrupt, they’re concerned about ‘the children’.  The reality?  They just like to regulate and control the lives of millions of Americans simply because they can.