RE: Chris W / AC "Live And Let Die"
Live & Let Die AC -
"1. They mustn't inflict harmful or toxic by-products on other people (including their children)
2. They mut never get healthcare priority over people who aren't hell bent on self destruction
3. Smokers caught with non-duty-paid cigarettes should lose their NHS entitlement as they're ripping off everyone else
4. I shouldn't have to kiss them / be breathed on by them"
Does 1 also apply to automobiles? Airplanes? Manufacturing? All these produce much more harmful / toxic by-products on other people. And you can't just stand upwind of them.
Does 2 also apply to alcoholics and drug addicts? How about people who contracted HIV/AIDS through people hell-bent on self destruction by having sex? How about people who crossed the road thinking that car would slow down for them? Or who went and climbed a mountain, then needed helicopter rescue because they didn't bother to check the weather before they went? People using mobile phones? Eating beef? They're all asking for it, right?
3. Fine, as long as you apply the same logic to people who pirate music/movies/software, sneak into concerts etc cos they're all ripping off everyone else. Contractors? Yeah, they probably use some creative accounting. Strike them off too.
4. I don't want to kiss you either.
At £5.50 for 20 Marlboros at the moment, a 20-a-day smoker sees £3.18 of every pack go straight to the Treasury (22% retail price, plus £108.65 / thousand cigarettes), totalling £23.66 per week, not allowing for smoking more on a Saturday night. That's an extra c£1,250 tax a year more than a non-smoker. And a conservative estimate.
(PS how any "beer swilling fat gits" on Jobseeker's Allowance of £59.15 a week can afford to smoke in meaningful amounts - let alone drink - is beyond me)