Legislators have their own awful addictions

| Tuesday, May 06, 2008

Hank Reimers
Davenport

The recent state ban on public smoking has caused me to look back on my habit of 60 years. It has forced me to speculate how many innocent souls I may have unintentionally sent to their eternal reward prematurely. What number of orphans could I have possibly created by my selfish enjoyment of a cigarette? I pray to my God that the answer is none!

As I reflected on this, another thought entered my mind, not as justification for my actions because for those I accept full responsibility. If I, however, may have caused some of the above grief, what liability must our legislature assume by the exemption of casinos?

Are the employees of those establishments less worthy of protection from people like me than the employees of a restaurant or a tavern? Or does it have something to do with revenue? At least my habit has never been based on greed.

Even though the learned ladies and gentlemen in Des Moines would rather not admit it, state income was the only reason for not including the casinos. If the ban was truly altruistic, truly for the protection of non-smokers, why did the welfare of casino workers take second place to the almighty dollar? And to think that, for a while, I actually felt more than a twinge of guilt.