Keene City Council Voting for Prohibition – Photo by Vincent Freeman
Several councilors spoke with the majority using the spectre of children using nicotine and how dangerous and addictive the chemical is to justify voting in favor of moving ahead with writing the ban, ignoring all the historic evidence of the failure of prohibition. One councilor, Mitch Greenwald, even voted with the majority despite bizarrely acknowledging in his remarks that prohibition hasn’t worked.
Prohibition is a tactic based on aggressive force against peaceful people that has created terrible unintended consequences each time in history it’s been tried. This time won’t be any different. The council will push legal sales outside the city limits and encourage police to harass even more young people than ever before. Tickets will be written just like they are constantly for underage alcohol possession. The tickets will obediently be paid, and the person who got caught will try to be more careful and not be discovered in the future. Oh, and black market sales to 18-20 year olds will expand in Keene.
You can watch the whole, ugly council discussion and vote here:
It was refreshing to see a couple of politicians stand up against the insanity, including both of Ward 4’s councilors, Margaret Rice and Bob Sutherland who not only voted against crafting the ban, but spoke against it. Rice eloquently said, in her speech to the council:
“It’s not my role to tell somebody what they can and cannot do with their own body, provided that they’re not harming anybody else.”
Sadly, not only does the supermajority of the council think it’s their role, but they’re willing to use violence to get people to behave how they want. Statism is sick and immoral.
Next, the city staff will write the ordinance and then return it to the council’s MSFI committee for another public hearing, where at that point the politicians will argue over just what the ban should say. It’s gonna get worse from here. Unless we can get more libertarians to move to Keene as part of the NH Freedom Migration or somehow stop it from the state level by removing the authority of towns to craft more restricting regulations.
Stay tuned here to Free Keene for the latest on this expansion of the failed War on Drugs.
Great write up. I’m going to have to watch the video now.
Smoking and it’s terrible consequences have been proved to cause cancer not only to the smoker but the secondhand smoke to the public. The council did the right thing by banning the sale and use of cigarettes to people under the age of 21. The council has just saved more lives, and helped to divert an unnecessary and disgusting habit. Smoking is being more restricted as time goes on. Soon smoking will hopefully be almost phased out in communities.
Jacks my sweets, not a single life will be saved by this resolution. That’s because nicotine replacement products don’t harm a person’s health in the same way that cigarettes do. It’s curious to me that someone with your level of professional pedigree seems so completely incapable of grasping this simple fact. You weren’t ranked at the bottom of your class by any chance, now where you pookie bear?
Lets not be too hard on jacks. While he may not be saying it he clearly has a mental illness. What I’m amazed at is they let people like him out of the hospital.
Jacks: You do realize that a law passed does not equal a life saved. For that you actually have to convince those doing the deed to stop and it has to be something that will kill them. What they are doing here is undermining themselves by creating more people who understand that the state is something to be disregarded.
I don’t think we’ve been very hard on Jacks at all, kk. He is a grown man, isn’t he? And besides, considering what he and his heroes have in mind for everyone else within their reach, pointing out that his lofty ambition to save everyone from themselves is both ill-conceived and harmful is a comparable kindness, don’t you think?
I’m at 8:32 where shes ….says.. the argument “drinkin is 21 so this should too” Because “if you fight and die for this country” … that means the drinking age is 21 so this should too then if you fight and die for this country its ok with me because ……yadayada yad ayada … so obvio im won over by that
i dont know if id ever wanna be a city councilor… I probably have no worries . regarding that. So many of them seem like such bloviating stuffed shirts that are full of themselves … and like the sound of their own mouths. lol I’d just wanna not sit next to them … (if i was) and see if i could be sitting in the audience instead and just raise my hand and say “fuck you,fuck all you people, fuck you!” an then sit i guess …manwaring seemed like she was sleepwalking through it..idkw the new lady rice voted the… Read more »
thats my bloviating opinion
Drac: Are you sure he’s an adult? Whatever that means. He’s behavior sure seems to fit in more with that of a young child. But maybe that’s just the nanny state’s doing.
I’m absolutely certain he is, kk.
Oh, and Jacks isn’t just an overwhelming busybody either, kk. He’s heavy-handed in his beliefs as well. He’d throw all his rivals into prison if he could. Thankfully, Jacks has absolutely no courage or charisma, so the closest he’ll ever get to any real power is through the ballot box. A completely useless tool for him here. He lives far, far away from NH, as you know.
Lets not be too hard on jacks. While he may not be saying it he clearly has a mental illness. What I’m amazed at is they let people like him out of the hospital. 8 ball pool