As the image on the right suggests, Atlantic City’s Council has finally done the right thing by unanimously passing a law that bans smoking in casinos (except for specially enclosed, ventilated lounges, with no gambling, where smokers can puff their hearts and lungs out without killing innocent people).
When the bill goes into effect in October, casino patrons and employees alike in Jersey will be able to go about their work and play without having to worry about choking to death.
This begs a simple question: Are members of the Pennsylvania Legislature a bunch of cowards, or do they just get a kick out of allowing innocent people to die?
A similar smoking ban is stuck in the legislature here in the Keystone State, but what’s taking lawmakers so long to do the right thing by passing it and sending it to the governor? Could it be that the tobacco lobby is as powerful and frightening as the National Rifle Association, which won’t let state lawmakers pass meaningful gun-control legislation?
Pennsylvania lawmakers certainly knew how to act with all deliberate speed when they passed their ill-fated, illegal, infamous middle-of-the-night pay raise three years ago. That act, of course, was a loser and was quickly repealed following a very healthy revolt by voters, but a total ban on smoking in public places in Pennsylvania — no ifs, no ands, no butts, no loopholes — is generations overdue.
When lawmakers finally get around to meeting their obligation to the citizens, there will be no losers. The little old lady from Mayfair will be able to go to Philly Park and gamble her time away without inhaling other people’s fatal garbage. Until then, just hold your breath. ••
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