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SHAKY EVIDENCE, OR YELLOW ARROGANCE?

This is the only logical conclusion I am able to come up with when considering what happened.

During your prudently separate interview with CFRB AM 1010, I could hear your statements while I was linked on the phone. Unfortunately more important information came up about the General Motors labour dispute settlement, and I did not have the opportunity to reply immediately. At the time of re-broadcasting that talk show, I was contacted by the radio station, and I was told that the show was cancelled because the issue was already "dated"... This seems very strange to us, since the smoking issue is never outdated.

We will not engage in further speculations at the moment. At any rate, your behaviour has already proven my point.

You said that you "don't not have time to answer to any crackpot in the country, otherwise you would be busy all day." I feel better already, since from that I deduce that there must be a lot of crackpots like me disagreeing with you and your organization!

It is so true that when one hear one of you anti-smoking zealots, one has heard them all. Therefore, since we don't have much time to waste with crackpots like you either, what follows is in point form.

• One of your battle horses is the U.S. EPA study (Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking, Lung Cancer and Other Disorders -1993) This is one of the most questioned studies by the scientific community that ever existed. It is one inch short of being called the politically corrupted study of the century (see for example Stephen Millroy, Wall Street Journal), yet provincial and federal governments take it at face value, basing political decisions on it, and interfering with the liberty of people. And why are we Canadians basing public policy on a controversial U.S. government study in the first place?

• At any rate, to stay with the U.S., the Congressional Research Service (CRS Report) from The Library of Congress issued November 14,1995 concludes that there is no proof, from the studies done, that ETS can cause lung cancer.

• Still staying with the U.S., and to give you an idea of how dangerous second hand smoke is, the Airline Cabin Environment Study performed for the U.S. Dept. of Transport in 1989 (Report No. DOT-P-15-89-5), properly "buried" by the Clinton Administration and ignored by the media, has proven that a person sitting in the non-smoking section of an airplane carrier that allows smoking, must fly about 48,600 hours (51/2 years) to inhale the equivalent of one cigarette! Cosmic radiation accounts for 40 times more lung cancer danger than ETS according to that study. Perhaps you want to ban the stars! Just in our site we display over 50 reputable studies, many of them disagreeing with your statements, and no one was funded by the tobacco companies. More studies are available, and will be posted soon on our web site.

• You mentioned the World Health Organization's concern about secondhand smoke. What you forgot to mention is that the WHO is more than 80% controlled by the United States, and we all know the position of the current U.S. Administration on smoking.

• Smokers are the largest minority in this country, and they are valid contributors to society. They have nothing to be ashamed of, or feel guilty about. Therefore they deserve to be accommodated in restaurants, trains, airplanes, and at the workplace. Regardless of all "for and against" evidence, smoking is a personal choice by six million people in this country, accommodation is easy to attain in most cases, and it must be implemented. If this persecution does not end, we foresee that the social tension will increase to very undesirable consequences.

• Europe is successfully following the path of accommodation: in most european countries, laws for the accommodation of smokers have been passed or proposed. According to these laws, it is mandatory to set aside a percentage of any public place that is proportional to the smoking population in the area. This protects the rights of both smokers, and nonsmokers, avoiding social conflict, and unnecessary attention to the issue -- especially by teenagers -- who are the first ones to be stimulated by prohibition. It seems to us that in those countries science has not yet become a tool for public opinion engineering, and political manipulation.

• The countries with the highest number of smokers, but the lowest air emission problems have much higher life expectancy than countries with the fewest smokers, but the most severe emission problems, like Canada and United States.

• You have stated that the number of smokers in California has "dramatically" decreased since the local anti-tobacco promotion has started. Once again, this is incorrect. The number of smokers in the State has actually increased by 3.5 percent, and there is an even sharper increase among teenagers.

• About your statement that we are linked in any way to the tobacco companies, this is absolutely false. Our constituency is made by people who are against all-out municipal smoking bans, and other unreasonable infringements on smokers' rights. Our group has grown to about 75 members and supporters in the short 1 1/2 months we have been on the Internet, and it is growing every day. Six core people have been donating time and resources. Among the people cooperating with us are scientists and mathematicians, journalists, philosophers, researchers, engineers, even physicians, as well as lay people who are sick and tired of this persecution, instigated by people like you. We therefore demand an apology for your insolent allegations.
  By the way, what is your salary, Mr. Mahood? $80,000, 100,000, or 120,000? Is the truth in the middle? And who pays for this, the taxpayers, by any chance? We would like to hear an answer about that, and don't worry, you don't have to talk to us, you may issue a press release!

• You have criticized CFRB AM 1010 for giving me air time without checking out our/my credentials. Before criticizing the few media who are still trying to do their job without worrying about "political correctness", wash your own dirty clothes at home. I have been working in the environmental industry for the last 17 years, I am well experienced in measuring pollution and pollutants, and by means of the patented technologies I have developed through my work, I have removed from the air of this country more tonnage of lung-damaging materials than you can ever possibly achieve with your stupid crusade.

• For your education, in Vancouver's Lower Mainland alone, in 1995 we had 324,000 metric tonnes of the same substances constituting secondhand smoking dumped in the atmosphere (see Province of B.C. Technical Review of the AirCare Program: Year Three -- September 1994 to August 1995). These figures apply to every major city in the country. Another 30,000-40,000 tonnes/year comes from airplanes emissions in the same area. This does not include energy production, other industrial and private pollution, etc. This means that total pollution per capita approaches 2 pounds a day. Smokers contribute to pollution at the per capita rate of about 100 milligrams per day, assuming that none of the polluting substances is retained by the body. The United States that you mention with such a mouthful spit out in the air more than 60 million tons of pollutants a year from automotive emissions alone, bringing the planet to the edge of environmental disaster, and you are talking about secondhand smoking!
  And please do not make a greater fool of yourself by saying that this is irrelevant, "because people do not go around with tailpipes in their mouths" (another old antismoking gear). They don't have to, they just have to breathe, and get lung cancer!

I stand by for your apologies.

Sincerely,

Gian Turci,
President