nisakiman

Well, I lived on New Delhi station roof for a while in '67, so I can kind of empathise.

It's all to do with what's happening in your life at the time. Do we actually need to be judgmental? Can we not leave the guy to get on with what he wants to do? Ok, it may not be your choice, but so what? At the end of the day, how this guy chooses to live his life is up to him. Who are we to say whether it's right or wrong?

Father-in-law's best friend presided over our wedding. Nice guy, very friendly, very helpful. Turned out he was the head honcho of the Ubon BiB (now retired). I remember remarking to my wife that he was a useful person to have as a friend of the family.

I can't see a problem with having policemen as friends. Choose your friends as you always would, regardless of their job.

Without a shadow of a doubt if my wife got even a sniff of the existence of a mia noi (or gik) in my life, I would wake up one morning minus some extremities that are very dear to me.

What are you going to do, race them down the Chao Phraya for charity?

They used to do that with plastic ducks in the village I used to drink in in the UK. Only the river there was not quite as wide as Chao Phraya, at about 2 metres....

Have you tried looking for manufacturers or importers on the internet? I'd guess most of the cheap dolls come from China, but someone must import them.

About 7 - 8 years ago I had an affair with a very lovely Thai woman of about 40. She was also a teacher, never married, and quite comfortably-off. She'd bought her own house (teachers apparently get favourable deals on mortgages) and was lonely for male company. Positively rampant, in fact.

So why was she still single, you ask?

Simply that her mother had died when she was young, her father had retired fairly early from the police force due to ill health, and she was an only child. Ergo, her role in life was that of her father's carer, and even if I had offered to marry her ( I didn't ) she would probably have refused, as her responsibility lay with her father until he died. He was a cantankerous old bugger, too.

Poor kid. By the time he pops his clogs she'll probably be well past her sell-by date.

So the reason your friend is stunning and yet unmarried at 41 could quite easily be for similar reasons. Not many men want to take on infirm and awkward old people as part of the deal.

Who is probably funded indirectly by the tobacco companies just the same as the pharma companies fund the studies that claim their drugs are safe - the whole thing is a big con to increase their profits!! The FDA is infiltrated by lobbyists for big pharma to get their drugs approved and keep natural remedies (which are far safer and normally better, by the way) out!!

No, the US Surgeon General is funded indirectly by the pharmaceutical companies, as are the vast majority of anti-tobacco charities and lobbying groups (well, they are registered as charities, but only a fraction of their income is derived from public donation. The vast bulk of their money comes from government and Big Pharma).

In the USA the Robert Johnson Foundation (an offshoot and major shareholder of the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical empire) alone between 1993 and 2007 donated $446,000,000 to anti-tobacco lobbying groups, with a view to maximising worldwide sales of their Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) patches and gums - now a multi-billion dollar industry. http://tctactics.org/index.php/Pharma

Three of the largest pharmaceutical companies, "Glaxo Wellcome, Novartis Consumer Health and Pharmacia & Upjohn, all manufacturers of treatment products for tobacco dependence" are now funding the World Health Organisation (WHO) and supporting the FCTC (Framework Convention on Tobacco Control), http://www.who.int/inf-pr-1999/en/pr99-04.html - an international pogrom to make life difficult for smokers, and thus drive up sales of NRT; (Which, by the way, has a success rate as low as 0.8%.)

The nicotine addiction fallacy, rather than helping science progress, creates barriers to further scientific research on tobacco. In Professor Robert Molimard's words:

(...) having arbitrarily decided that nicotine alone explains tobacco dependence and having it engrained in the minds of doctors, the authorities and the public, any research on the other possible factors of this dependency is now excluded in advance and a vast new market is made available for commercial exploitation by the pharmaceutical industry

The concept of "second-hand smoke" is a construct of the Tobacco Control Industry, and all the "proof" of the danger is down to cherry-picked statistics and junk science. The "millions" who are killed by SHS are just virtual, hypothetical numbers, dreamed up by a fanatical anti-smoking lobby. There are no actual dead bodies. For all these "millions" dying worldwide, there exists NOT ONE death certificate showing SHS as the cause of death. Nor one pathologists report suggesting that exposure to SHS was the cause of death.

As Herr Joseph Goebbels said:

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

Just one more reason not to go back to OZ,.. the quintessential Nanny State.

Too strict, too much government control, wayyyy overtaxed, exorbitant cost of living, feminist rule, and insane property prices.

With no end in sight.

Where's Peter Lalor and the Eureka Stockade men when they're needed most?

Too right! This is just one more nail in the coffin.

I can't believe what I see happening there. An unending stream of petty legislation curtailing people's freedoms.

And it used to be such a great country.

A "can do" country.

A "to hell with authority, I'll do it my way" country.

Now they are ruled by intellectual pygmies in 'Public Health' and are scared of their own shadows. (Because it it they, the nannying tyrants in 'Public Health' who have lobbied for this reduction in duty free - and most of the other individuality-destroying petty rules and regulations.)

How the mighty have fallen. Such a shame.

Last time I went there (twelve years ago) I was so appalled with what I found that I swore I'd never set foot in the place again. And I lived there most of the 70s, and loved it. I have two (Australian) sons and three grandchildren there, too. Such a shame.

One can only hope that the Aussies will wake up to what's happening and tar and feather all these little tinpot dictators who are trying to turn the place into a nation of identikit drones.

once youve been here a while your tummy tends to get used to a bit of bacteria,,lol,

we get all our food fresh, from the mkts,

jake

That is not true. I've been here 5 years and always have issues with the food and subsequent stomach problems and I'm a very picky eater. The g/f's brother is 35 and always has to be careful what he eats. He is Thai and has lived here all his life. He won't eat food prepared in roadside stalls, in fact he eats very little Thai food and never eats chiles.

That's probably why he, and you, have problems.

You build up a resistance to many of the less virulent bacteria in food - if you allow your body to do so. I've always eaten food from roadside stalls, from when I was in Afghanistan and the Indian subcontinent in the 60s to Thailand these days. Sure, I get the occasional case of the squits, but nothing serious, and not often. And your g/f's brother is missing a trick if he doesn't eat chillies - they are a natural internal disinfectant. He'd probably have far fewer problems if he ate chillies the way most Thais do.

So the US wants to use Thai airbases to overfly Thailand to do "climate studies".

So far in this thread, I've seen no mention of chemtrails. Personally, I'm undecided about the various theories floating around, but the evidence is quite strong that America has been trying to play God with the weather by seeding the skies with various chemicals in an attempt to influence the climate.

Is this perhaps an extension of that?

You come across as a right plonker, as my wife would say - learned from English TV, along with so many other British slang expressions and words from such as "Fools and Horses" and "Porridge", and me and my family. When we lived in Malta she also picked up Maltese slang from our friends, and Italian from watching their movies on Italian TV (all Maltese used to watch Italian rather than local TV).

As Quietman said, you and a few others are buggering up a funny thread with your snide bargirl remarks.

What a Wally!

Mate, don't get wound up by these fools and their ilk. They married bargirls but need to post here to try and deny the fact...

Fair comment HD, but really I don't care one bit whether someone marries a bargirl or a hi-so - there's good and bad amongst every group; including TV!

But there are some people who like to diss bargirls at every opportunity, even if the topic has bugger-all to do with them.

Dimmer than a Toc H bulb, some of these dipsticks - there you are, another couple of slang pieces.

Have to agree with that.

Before I met and married my wife (who, for the record, is an accountant, and has never been involved in the bar scene), I dallied with many a bargirl in LOS and Cambodia, and I have to say that many (not all) were absolute gems. They are people, people for whom life has not been particularly easy, but they display a great sense of humour and make a lot of guys happy.

Being a bargirl provides a means to support family in a way working on a farm never will. They do what they have to. I have no problem with girls who choose to earn money in this way, I'm only sorry that there are no alternatives available to them.

Don't put them down. They provide a great service to many, and in doing so keep the wolf from the door of their parents house. They are not inherently bad people.

I have to say that if America's idea of bringing peace to the world is invading Iraq, bombing Afghanistan, funding and supplying rebels in Libya and Syria etc, it makes me quite glad that they haven't decided on a policy of aggression and destabilisation. Heaven forbid what the global political landscape would look like if that were the case.

Who knows, perhaps Thailand's concept of world peace dovetails nicely with that of the US...

Yes, my wife has picked up a few of the fruitier Anglo-Saxon colloquialisms from me, but she does realise when they are not appropriate, thankfully!

I'll never forget a time I was on holiday in Phuket about 12 years ago. I was staying in town, and had rented a jeep. One day I was on my way out of town, and on the spur of the moment decided to stop for a quick beer at a cafe I spotted. I sat at the bar, and asked the for a beer in my rudimentary Thai, only to be answered in a torrent of broad Glaswegian liberally peppered with the F-word!

Ha! I almost fell off my stool! He was a real character, this guy. He'd lived and worked in Glasgow for years, apparently, hence the heavily accented English. I'm sure there are members of TV who live in Phuket who have come across the guy. Is he still there? I think it was his own bar.

"Rajamangala will temporarily turn into a racing venue where 50,000 fans can watch cars reaching speeds between 200 and 300kph."

you might want to check that again

What's wrong with that?

I don't think that the course within the stadium will be long enough to reach speeds of 300km/h and safely slow down again to get around the corner. I'm just guessing, though, since I've never been in that stadium.

Maybe they will bank the corners like at Brooklands in the 20s / 30s. It was pretty hairy stuff, apparently! Not for the faint-hearted. They didn't need to slow down at all for the corners there - a sort of built-in wall of death.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooklands

An addict is someone what is psychologically or even physically unable to control their urge for a certain substance or activity, and thus his functionality as a person is impaired. A recreational user can go on with his life as normal.

It's one of the tragedies of these "Drug Wars", putting everyone in the same bag in terms of punishment and alienation.

I have friends who smoke marijuana regularly, they are perfectly able persons, even brilliant individuals who could have their lives ruined for the benefit of politicians claiming to be tough on drugs. That's really all there is to it, the drug wars have not solved the problem, it's only gotten worse, but it has proven to be a good political tool to obtain and accrue power.

A perceptive post, and mostly correct. The only point I would take issue with is that in fact some addicts, although dependent on their drug of choice, can live quite normal and productive lives. I think this only really applies to opium and its derivatives, as amphetamines take a much more serious physical and mental toll.

I travelled for some time in the late 60s in Afghanistan and the Hindu Kush (NW Frontier), and in that time, I encountered many who had been lifetime opium addicts. The opium, however, was cheap and readily available, and the habitual use of it attracted only minor opprobrium from the more upright members of their society. They lived full and productive lives, had families and children who they supported, and generally were no different from most others apart from their propensity to indulge in the dreamstate that opium induces. The only problem would be if the supply was either restricted or expensive. That's when the trouble begins, and is the only real reason that it becomes a problem.

I've posted elsewhere on TV about how stupid, self-defeating, damaging and unwinnable the "war on drugs" is and has been, so I won't repeat it all here. Suffice to say that the only way out of the current problems with drugs worldwide is to legalise everything and bring it under the control of some sort of body who could then dispense quality controlled drugs at the real market price, educate (not with exaggerated scare stories, but with real facts) people about the negative aspects of using drugs, and to offer de-tox and rehabilitation courses to those who want them. Coercing people into breaking a habit rarely works. It has to come from the person involved. They have to want to stop using whatever it is.

Of course, as things stand, that's just a pipe-dream. There is far too much money involved in the "war on drugs" on both sides of the fence. It's the same principle as the fact that the Pharmaceutical industry will never find a cure for cancer. There's just too much money in prolonging cancer sufferer's lives. Finding a cure would be tantamount to shooting yourself through the head. So a cure will never be found; there's just no profit in it. Likewise, the drugs war will never end. Too many people depend for their livelihood on it. Too many crooked politicians have got their fingers in the pie. Too many businesses supply the hardware involved.

So <deleted> the casualties, the lives destroyed. They are just collateral damage. Expendable. Plenty more where they came from. The gravy train must be kept rolling, that's the main thing. Keep the scare stories in the press; keep the proles baying for the blood of the dealers (although they are only supplying a demand - they didn't create it), and keep the show on the road.

A drug free Thailand? Pah! Cynical fantasy.

In my experience it tends to be the low-cost budget carriers who are really stringent on baggage weight. Flew BKK - ATH with the wife a few years ago, we had 30 kg each. Gulf allowance was 23 Kg, but the guy at check-in didn't bat an eyelid. Also, to my great surprise, when we checked in for the internal flight with Olympic airways (baggage limit 15 Kg) they didn't bother about it either.

Last year, my daughter flew back to UK from here in Greece with Easyjet, and was 5 Kg over. They wanted £72 extra! Thieves and scoundrels!

When I was at school way back when, one of my buddies was ambidextrous. Interestingly, he used his right hand to write when we were taking dictation, as he could write fast but rather scruffily with his right, but for work that was to be presented he would use his left, with which he wrote neatly but more slowly. Also interesting is that his style of writing was completely different with each hand. I've often wondered what a graphologist would make of him.

I don't know what your moral stance is on downloading, but I know where you can download just about every BBC, National Geographic and Discovery documentary that's ever been made. PM me if you want to know more.

Let me say 25 years working for an airline(s) starting as a Sales/Station Manager I can tell you who gets upgraded......NO ONE unless you are top tier (gold, silver), sure the odd adhoc UG happens for pax who were dis-serviced or in a serious oversell situation. The days of we're on our honeymoon, I love this airline, it's my birthday, I'm so pretty please please please or begging are gone. Now I will say folks without seat assignment are on the top of the list after loyal customers are taken care of (please don't risk it based on the OP's dream) The ground agent handling firms are not permitted to courtesy upgrade.

Without getting into this deeply on a DM list even OA (other airline) employees will be upgraded before a revenue passenger -it's life

In terms of meals, they ARE as close to the true number of pax onboard, if there is an INVOL/UG that meal was slotted for crew on most airlines. So the carrier will not upgrade and take away from their own. More meals are certainly catered based on historical data but that is monitored very closely.

In terms of "First Class Pax" "Business Class Pax" pay the airlines bill, that is circa 1998, every bum in a seat pays the bills there are metrics for each cabin, chew on this a 747 BKK-LHR with 359 pax will consume 1000 barrels of fuel an A380 with 509 pax will consume 1200 barrels-airlines are now experts with yield management. Not only point to point LHR-BKK is cheaper than BKK-LHR it is because of interline feed, cargo, agent vs direct et al......... many factors happen behind the scenes.

If you want to fly Business class or First Class it is actually very simple

-Pay

-Become Loyal

-Use your points

-Work for an airline

If you manage to snag an upgrade more power, next you'll be asking the produce manager to discount tomatoes at your local Sainsburys

I'm sure what you say is largely true, however, the one time I did get an upgrade was on the Athens - Bahrain leg of an ATH - BKK flight, and it happened because my luggage had been transferred direct from my internal flight (Aegean must have an agreement with Gulf Air - or had, I should say, as Gulf don't do Athens any more), and so I was waiting at check-in with only hand luggage. At the back of a long queue. The ground crew chap came over and asked (in Greek) if that was all the luggage I had. My Greek is ok, so I answered him in Greek explaining why I had only hand luggage. He told me not to wait in the queue, but to go check in at the business class desk. As I walked over to it, he just shouted "upgrade" to the girl, and upgrade is what I got. I don't fly that often, so have no loyalty cards or air miles, I'd bought the cheapest seat I could find on the Gulf website, and the guy who authorised the upgrade was the guy organising the check-in lines, so that rather flies in the face of the criteria you've laid out for upgrades. This was about five or six years ago.

I use a Nespresso machine here (in Greece). The machine cost € 145 (but there's a cheaper model at about € 85) and the pods I buy online cost € 4 or € 4.50 a pack of ten, depending on the blend. If I order them online on a Monday, I will have them on the following Wednesday, latest, sometimes within 24 hrs, and I live on an island. It's a bit expensive compared to buying a half-kilo pack and making it another way, and there are other systems (Tassino? Don't remember the name) that are a bit cheaper and you can find in the supermarket, but the reason I went for the Nespresso is that they have a big range of blends (16, I think, includind a couple of decaf blends), and it makes a truly genuine cup of espresso, crema and all.

I would imagine the pods should be a comparable price in Thailand, maybe 25 baht each?

Whether it's expensive or not really depends on how much coffee you drink! The wife and I don't often drink more than one or two cups a day, so it's not a big deal in the greater scheme of things.

You buy a screwdriver, it rounds off, as its too soft

Buy... Stanley, Snap-on or Facom

You buy a hammer and the handle breaks off the head.

Buy... Stanley or Estwing

The tube of Silicon sealant is dry half way down the tube.

Buy... Sony brand

Power tools are dead in a very short time.

Buy.... Bosch, De-Walt, Ryobi or Makita, It really all comes down to the quality of equipment you purchase, and of course how you use and look after them.

Major stores (Tesco as an example) only give a 7 day "guarantee" so they must know its crap.

They have a 7 day "return" policy as standard, but the manufacturers warranty usually extends beyond that, make sure receipt and warranty card are stamped at time of purchase.

Furniture de-laminates and warps in a few months and looks terrible.

Buy..... hardwood furniture or keep the laminated stuff dry and out of the sun.

Desk chairs with castors, the legs always break as they are cheap plastic.

Buy .... Chairs with cast aluminium legs or go on a diet.

Anything with a chrome type finish becomes rusty scrap in weeks.

Buy ... Solid Stainless fittings.

Spend the money and stop being a cheap CharlieH

This is very true, especially where tools are concerned. As a professional, I always spend a lot of money on tools. I just repaced my Estwing hammer after 25 years of use - and not because the old one has had it, just the leather handle is getting a bit loose. The new Estwing cost me £50 (a lot of money for a hammer, really) from Screwfix UK, but it will see me into my grave. Likewise power tools. I'm still using Bosch pro, AEG, Makita and Elu power tools I bought in the eighties.

A lot of posters seem to think that if it's made in China, it's garbage, but that's not true. If you buy Ryobi these days, chances are it will have been made in China. However, Ryobi oversee production and quality control, so what you get is as good as if it was made in Japan. They have a reputation to think about, and a good reputation is hard won and easily lost. So Chinese stuff is ok as long as it has a reputable name behind it. I think you'll probably find that a lot of big name stuff is made there now - Apple, Blackberry, Nokia etc have moved a lot of their production there I believe.

whats wierd to you is ok to them and vise versa... hubby works for a glatt kosher restaraunt. he is not allowed to cook the eggs, cookt the rice or fry the meat. he can make sushi. he cannot light the fire for the wok, but can do the stir fry. he is also the shabbas goy (lookthat one up) for the restaraunt. it drives him to distraction taht he cant just go and crack a few eggs in a bowl and whip them up and then make the omelot for the sushi he makes. (u can only crack one egg at a time n the bowl to check for a blood dot. if there is one, then the egg is thrown out.therefore if u have a bunch of eggs in same bowl, are all thrown out.)... as a thai, he thinks we are a bunch of religious nutcases (forbidden! to turn on lights on saturday, or drive, cant eat milk in coffee at meat meal, no shrimp calamari etc... all the tasty stuff... no sex for two weeks during and after menstruation, and sleeping in separate beds... men dont hand things to women cause they mgiht be menstruating.... all parsley, rice, beans etc must be hand searched for insects, stones, etc before cooking,. house must have double sets of utensils marked with red, blue or yellow (meat milk parve).... at week old, baby's weewee is snipped.

personally, i would go for a ghost house in my garden, lucky numbers, and no hair cuts on wednesdays in lieu of all that mumbojumbo we have here....

i forgot: men cant light candles on friday, women cannot bless wine. women cannot open wine for men (during menstruation, so better just not do it at all), ...

and scientists, doctors, and politicians believe in this stuff... primitive or not... so really, its not just thailand. its what is wierd to YOU.

(along with fathers, sons and holy ghosts) (no offense)

bina

israel

You're absolutely right, of course, bina. Just about all religions have oddball taboos and bizarre customs. Not to mention the beliefs...

Makes me glad to be atheist...

Was watching fares from around beginning of June to fly to Germany for my daughters wedding in December, prices were under 30,000 with aeroflot, then Airfrance had a sale and the prices were around 32000, in the end booked Aeroflot as noticed that the prices were increasing, cost me more than I wanted it to but:

BKK to DUS

return via CDG to BKK

with Aeroflot

The Russians do not have one of the better air safety records. It really does not matter how much you saved, if you do not make it to your destination.

Flew LHR - BKK ret. with Aeroflot about eleven or twelve years ago, cattle class (or prawn class, as my wife calls it).

The London - Moscow leg was ok, fairly new plane, ok service, but the Moscow - Bangkok leg was atrocious. Landing at Don Muang was one of the most frightening experiences of my life. The plane seemed to come in sideways and then kind of bounced down the runway! On the return, I boarded the ageing Jumbo with some trepidation, and my worst fears were realised. The aisle carpet was like the carpet you sometimes find at the bar in an old pub - sticky and threadbare. The seats were so worn that the fabric was gone in places and the foam was hanging out, and at the sides where the recliner mechanism was, the plastic covers were broken and jagged. The food and cabin service pretty well matched the rest of the plane - absolutely dire. They may well have improved since then, but I for one will never fly with them again.

I flew ATH - BKK ret. with Gulf a few times, and was quite impressed with both price and service, but they've stopped flying to Athens, so I'm going to have to find another alternative next time.

A while ago I wanted to get a haircut.

I was told that hairdressers are not open today, it was a Wednesday or Thursday, supposedly bad luck or something.

I did not ask any more, just rolled my eyes.

Yes, my wife refuses to cut my hair with the clippers (I keep it short and simple) on a Wednesday. Bad luck, apparently.

It's not even that she's uneducated, either - she's a qualified accountant - but ghosts are real and I'm not allowed to work on New Year's Day and so on.

I've given up arguing.

Oh, as an addendum, you might find this interesting:

http://www.formindep.org/Le-mythe-de-l-addiction-a-la.html (The myth of addiction to nicotine)

It's in French, but if your French isn't up to it you can always use Google Translate. You'll get the gist of it.

Anyone believing such a thing is beyond help.

And yes, in Kata, when I ask where a given individual is, the response is he died of lung cancer. Another at the hospital, smoking too much. Two of my neighbours in Canada died recently of lung cancer. Smokers.

My cousin finally quit after finding it nealrly impossible to breathe. Emphysema. A friend of mine the same.

I suggest you read on Anthony Robbins on the subject.

And it might just be that you are showing your level of education by posting such rubbish studies...

I gather, from the way you keep on harping on about it, that you have a university education.

If so, I would suggest that it was wasted on you.

University is supposed to inculcate a mind that seeks elucidation, a mind that that questions everything. You, however, seem to have accepted without question what you've read in the "Daily Rag", and swallowed it hook, line and sinker. You've not even noticed the anomalies in the propaganda being broadcast by the mass media. You claim that people are dying all around you of lung cancer, yet the rates of lung cancer are:

"From 2005-2009, the median age at diagnosis for cancer of the lung and bronchus was 70 years of age³. Approximately 0.0% were diagnosed under age 20; 0.2% between 20 and 34; 1.5% between 35 and 44; 8.8% between 45 and 54; 21.3% between 55 and 64; 31.3% between 65 and 74; 28.3% between 75 and 84; and 8.4% 85+ years of age.

The age-adjusted incidence rate was 62.6 per 100,000 men and women per year. These rates are based on cases diagnosed in 2005-2009 from 18 SEER geographic areas."

http://seer.cancer.gov/statfacts/html/lungb.html

So either, as I said, you are an extraordinarily unusual individual, or you are telling porkies.

Likewise COPD is unusual.

And to go back to the anomalies that you seem not to have noticed, smoking prevalence in the USA in 1980 was 33.2%, and deaths from COPD ran at 14.9 per 100,000.

In 2007, smoking prevalence in USA had dropped to 20.8%, however, COPD deaths had climbed to 39.7 per 100,000.

http://www.lung.org/finding-cures/our-research/trend-reports/copd-trend-report.pdf

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0762370.html

That is just one example (of very many) that any properly educated, inquiring mind should have picked up on.

Which is why, if you actually look around on the internet, you will find that the people who are shouting loudest about the lies and calumny (being brought to bear by the tobacco control zealots) are all educated to masters or doctors level. And they have not been so easily seduced by the siren calls of the self-righteous puritans who would dictate to us how we live.

The "experts", of whom you seem to be in awe, are often as not nothing of the sort. In many cases their professorships are honorary, given because they are singing the party line. Of those that really are experts, they are faced with the choice of either going along with the junk science or losing their jobs / funding. For example: Pulmonologist, president of the Necker Research Institute in Paris, France. Professor Even appeared in what the French newspaper Le Parisien called "a shocking interview" on the day of his retirement, May 31. 2010. He said the French smoking ban was built on a lie about the risk of passive smoking:

- Why did you not speak up earlier?

“The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.”

(Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler; 1925)

And don't anyone quote Godwin's law to me. The anti-smoking laws are based on the concept of physicalism, or to give it it's proper name, eugenics. Conceived in pre-war California and then enthusiastically adopted and expanded upon by the Nazis. Unsurprisingly, Hitler was a manic anti-smoker.