Smoking in France a thing of the past?

[NirvanaMan]

Originally Posted by Scrooge McSam

Fearmongering

With so many of our industrialized nations offering universal health care, the world should be rife with examples you could cite.

Please do.

Well, not necessarily. We have become a culture of entitlement. "I want what I am owed" is heard time and time again. Our court systems are filled with frivolous cases. People win multi-million dollar settlements (at least initially) for spilling coffee on themselves. This is not the case with many other countries, including those that currently offer some flavour of government health care.

It would take the combination of universal health care along with a society that supports and embraces the idea that common sense is non-existent for the hypothesis proposed by sceagles to come true. The sliding slope argument is a fair one that has often been proven to be a valid theorem time and time again throughout history. Simply dismissing it as "fearmongering" is a bit silly in my opinion.

[Scrooge McSam]

Originally Posted by NirvanaMan

We have become a culture of entitlement.

Have we? I'm not so convinced. I see us as more "little guy vs big guy", with the level of justice received directly in proportion to one's ability to pay for legal representation. That is, of course, a gross oversimplification but I think it gets the point across. There are some little guys gaming the system, to be sure. Your "welfare queens", as coined by Mr. Reagan, would be an example. They disgust me. On the other side are our corporations, flush with cash, who practically write their own legislation. They disgust me.

Originally Posted by NirvanaMan

Our court systems are filled with frivolous cases. People win multi-million dollar settlements (at least initially) for spilling coffee on themselves. This is not the case with many other countries, including those that currently offer some flavour of government health care.

I would need to read more before engaging you on that point. I do find it hard to believe that the US is the only place one would find a frivolous lawsuit.

Originally Posted by NirvanaMan

It would take the combination of universal health care along with a society that supports and embraces the idea that common sense is non-existent for the hypothesis proposed by sceagles to come true.

Does our society embrace the idea that common sense is non-existant?

Originally Posted by NirvanaMan

Simply dismissing it as "fearmongering" is a bit silly in my opinion.

That's OK, no offense taken. As you and I frequently find ourselves on opposing sides of these kinds of arguments, it just means the world is still spinning.

The challenge still remains... I haven't seen this activity that scaeagles refers to. If you, or anyone else has, please enlighten me.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Scrooge McSam

I would need to read more before engaging you on that point. I do find it hard to believe that the US is the only place one would find a frivolous lawsuit.

No, the U.S. isn't the only place where they happen. But the U.S. system is particularly conducive to frivolous suits in some ways. It is much more common in the rest of the world to be on the English Rule system where the loser of a civil suit to have to pay the legal fees of the winner. The American Rule (each side paying its own legal expenses regardless of outcome) is somewhat anomalous in the world. I believe it is still the case that the only major country in the world on the American Rule system is Japan and they charge court filing fees as a proportion of the claimed damages.

The English Rule removes the incentive for a defendant to settle simply because it would be cheaper than going to court (even if they're in the right). It also removes the incentive for lawyers to take fringe cases on contingency knowing that it only takes a certain percentage settling out of court (for the above reason) to come out in the black on the whole endeavor.

Massive class action suits are also more difficult to form in most other countries and caps on punitive damages are more common as well.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Scrooge McSam

With so many of our industrialized nations offering universal health care, the world should be rife with examples you could cite.

Not exactly on point, but in the slippery slope direction:

Here is a man who was denied a work visa in New Zealand because he was overweight and a potential burden to their national health care program. He lost went and then was allowed in. Presumably Samoans are not allowed to move there.

[Scrooge McSam]

Originally Posted by Alex

Not exactly on point, but in the slippery slope direction

Good find! Thank you

[Stan4dSteph]

Originally Posted by Alex

Not exactly on point, but in the slippery slope direction:

Here is a man who was denied a work visa in New Zealand because he was overweight and a potential burden to their national health care program. He lost went and then was allowed in. Presumably Samoans are not allowed to move there.

NZ has a pretty complex immigration system and you get points based on all kinds of criteria. You have to undergo a medical exam. I'm not too shocked at this. It's another one of those things, "can't get a visa? Go find a job somewhere else."

I believe there's a whole different set of restrictions regarding Pacific Islanders.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

Older study, but there have certainly been linkages made between cell phone usage and brain cancer.

Perhaps more studies will show that people in the immediate vacinity of those using cell phones are at risk as well. And there are issues with bee colonies and cell phones, which could lead to world wide crop problems.

Look into it and you'll find that pretty much all large studies find zero correlation between brain tumors and cell phones though small and generally poorly designed studies occasionally pop up. But yes, it could still bear out.

The bees and cell phone stories was a press misunderstanding of a small unrelated study that somehow quickly became internet gospel (how shocking for science reporting). It was quickly debunked with the authors of the study themselves going to great lengths try and repair the misconception.

[Kevy Baby]

Anything to reduce the surplus population is good.

[Morrigoon]

I could see allowing a situation where bars could apply for a special smoking permit, have to pay extra for the privilege (to keep EVERY bar from doing it), and thus be allowed to become "smoker's bars".

But beyond that... as paranoid as I am of government interference in our lives I am happy to allow them to ban smoking.

[alphabassettgrrl]

Helmet laws impact the general public because we pay the costs of their hospital stays and rehab if they can be rehabbed. It's only secondarily about the deaths- as noted, a tragedy, but one that affects only that family. The public health care cost affects all of us. I'm not sure how I feel about helmet laws, though when hubby and I lived in a non-helmet-law state, we still wore helmets.

Cig smoke is more affecting to others around the smoker. Without smoke bans, as has been noted, there's really no public place to escape the smoke. Restaurants have "non smoking" sections, but you're not really away from it. If people smoke everywhere, how can a person escape it? Even by avoiding bars and restaurants and movie theaters, people still smoked in the grocery store, right? People smoke everywhere if allowed. That's the important element for me- the fact that if smokers are allowed free reign, a nonsmoker cannot avoid being exposed.

I disagree that smoking is required for any culture. Maybe it's a part of how they think of themselves, but culture changes. They can still be French. It's a lifestyle involving much more than just cigs.