This is exactly one of the points I made to my city councilperson and the various state legislators I mailed and emailed regarding the ban.
My original point was, and still is, this: I suspect 99% of smoking ban proponents will never stoop low enough to patronize 99% of the bars affected by the ban. I'll bet my paycheck that virtually NO ban proponents will ever deign to set foot in Adrians or the Cardinal Bar or any of the working class establishments in NE. The ban is about elitists being able to listen to "jazz" at their whim without having to shower when they got home. The bars that will struggle to survive.....well, that's just tough luck. I believe many smoking ban proponents wanted their trendy jazzy-spots to be smoke free for their own selfish interests, but packaged it as a "public health" measure. Incredibly disingenous.
One of the inherent qualities of the ban was a subtle elitism espoused by its proponents. Smoking is, for the most part, a habit of the lower SES classes. Not only did ban proponents know what was better for people, but in the adoption of the ban an implicit patronization was occuring through the "legal" protection of these less informed individuals to protect them from themselves.
I'm not quite as cynical as Mr. Thompson, but almost. The ban was unreasonable, and it will further alienate the young and working class (as I wrote on this list in May of last year) from what remains of the liberal establishment. I certainly won't be voting against anyone based solely on the smoking ban - there are more important issues - but others may. Watch out, DFLers.
Mike Jensvold Ward 10
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