Vanilla, Kauai Kolada and Twista lime. Flavored cigarettes and clove cigarettes will no longer be sold in the United States after September. The ban does not include menthols or flavored cigars...for now.

The ban is part of a new law signed by President Obama in June. Called the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, the law gives the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco. However, the agency can't ban tobacco and nicotine outright.

Starting at the end of the month, flavored cigarettes and clove cigarettes will be illegal in this country. The FDA says those products attract and appeal to children and teenagers. The new ban is 'sparking' mixed emotions among residents.

"I think it's ridiculous. That's not fair. That's like banning light cigarettes. People smoke light cigarettes. I mean, clove cigarettes, just because it's a different flavor or a different taste it's still a cigarette. Every cigarette is harmful to you," says Kaleigh Kincaid, opposes new ban.

"Anything we can do to stop any young person from wanting to even touch those things is wonderful. It's one less pack of cigarettes off the street but more than that, it's stopping this horrible habit,"says Molly Bennett, supports new ban.

Clove cigarettes represent less than 1% of cigarettes sold in the United States, yet sales bring in about $140 million
a year.

http://www.abc3340.com/news/stories/0909/660893.html

I looked up the actual bill too and it doesn't mention shisha, that's only in an article. This is good news.

I'm also okay with the fact that light cigarettes are being banned. Now I don't have to worry about some shittty gas station telling me, "Sorry, we only have lights."

And the area where I live has like six different Indian reservations around it. I've always been able to buy tax free cigarettes at these places and I heard that they will still be able to sell cloves. I'm not sure if this is true though.

Congress Passes Historic Tobacco Bill
By JIM ABRAMS, AP
posted: 96 DAYS 5 HOURS AGOPrintShareText SizeAAAWASHINGTON (June 12) - No more "light" cigarettes or candy-flavored smokes. Bigger, scarier warning labels. Fewer ads featuring sexy young smokers.
Historic anti-smoking legislation sped to final congressional passage on Friday — after a bitter fight lasting nearly a half-century — and lawmakers and the White House quickly declared it would save the lives of thousands of smokers of all ages. Even more important, they said, the measure could keep countless young people from starting in the first place.
President Barack Obama, admittedly still struggling with his own nicotine habit, saluted passage of the bill, which he will soon sign. He said, "For over a decade, leaders of both parties have fought to prevent tobacco companies from marketing their products to children and provide the public with the information they need to understand what a dangerous habit this is."
Specifically, the measure for the first time will give the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate what goes into tobacco products, demand changes or elimination of toxic substances and block the introduction of new products.
Will it matter as much as supporters say? Smokers lighting up outside Washington offices had mixed reactions.
Government researcher Reginald Little, 47, who said he swiped his first cigarette from his grandfather at age 15, thought regulation was needed "because you don't know exactly what's in it."
But Becky Cook, a 22-year-old program analyst, said that, while she supported limits on ads aimed at children, "I already know it's bad for me, so I don't think knowing how much is really in one cigarette is really going to make a difference."
And nonsmokers?
Yan Meek, 42, a finance analyst from Jacksonville, Fla., who was visiting the nation's capital with her 8-year-old son, Jesse, doesn't smoke and suggested the legislation would lead to "too much government control over personal lives, personal choices."
Lionel Richardson, 26, an electrical engineer visiting from Huger, S.C., is a a nonsmoker, too, but called the legislation a good thing. "It's a drug," he said, and "the FDA plays a big part in what drugs are sold." As for restricting advertisements, he said, "They make it sexy so kids think it's the cool thing to do."
The thousand health and consumer groups that endorsed the bill say that, combined with other anti-smoking efforts, it can significantly reduce the 400,000 deaths and $100 billion in health care costs attributed every year to smoking in the U.S.
Under the legislation:
— Cigarette packages will have warning labels that cover 50 percent of the front and rear. The word "warning" must be included in capital letters.
— Any remaining tobacco-related sponsorships of sports and entertainment events will be banned, as will giveaways of non-tobacco items with the purchase of a tobacco product. A federal ban will be imposed on all outdoor tobacco advertising within 1,000 feet of schools and playgrounds.
— Point-of-sale advertising will be limited to adults-only facilities, and remaining vending machines will disappear except in places restricted to adults. Retailers who sell to minors will be subject to federal enforcement and penalties.
— Smokers, particularly the younger crowd, will find they can no longer buy cigarettes sweetened by candy flavors or any herb or spices such as strawberry, grape, orange, clove, cinnamon or vanilla. Cigarettes advertised as "light" or "mild," giving the impression that they aren't as harmful to health, will no longer be found on store shelves.
With an estimated 3,500 young people smoking their first cigarette each day, the ban on flavorings alone could have significant health benefits, said Dr. Adam Goldstein, director of the University of North Carolina Tobacco Prevention and Evaluation Program.
In the longer run, aggressive FDA efforts to reduce nicotine content — the bill prohibits an outright ban on nicotine or cigarettes — could "stimulate as dramatic a change in the product as anything we've seen in the last 50 years."
He said it was not inconceivable that adult smokers, now more than 20 percent of the population, could be reduced to less than 5 percent in 20 years.
Other factors that could cut into tobacco use include the sharp rise in prices — Congress earlier this year approved a 62-cent a pack increase in the federal cigarette tax to pay for a children's health program — and measures by the states to ban smoking in public places. Goldstein noted that even North Carolina, the nation's biggest tobacco grower, recently moved to ban smoking in public areas.
Paul Billings, vice president at the American Lung Association, agreed that pricing, education and laws are all needed to drive down smoking and reduce the health consequences. FDA regulation has been "a huge missing piece in the arsenal against tobacco," he said.
New FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg said the agency was ready to "roll up our sleeves" to meet its new obligations. "We really do feel, by being able to regulate tobacco and tobacco products, we can reduce the burden of disease, especially by preventing teen smoking."
The Senate passed the FDA bill on Thursday by a 79-17 vote and the House followed suit on Friday, with a 307-97 vote. Despite those one-sided tallies, the bill has been years in the making.
The FDA tried to exert authority over tobacco products in the 1990s, but the industry fought back and the Supreme Court in 2000 ruled, in a 5-4 decision, that the agency did not have regulatory powers over tobacco under then-existing law. Several efforts by lawmakers since then had fallen short, victims of industry lobbying and opposition from the Bush White House.
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., sponsor of the bill and chairman at a memorable 1994 hearing where tobacco industry executives denied that nicotine was addictive, relished the long-sought victory.
"I think we are today at the last gasp of the tobacco industry's efforts to protect their profits at the expense of the health and lives of the American people and to get children to take up this habit," he said.
Philip Morris USA, the nation's largest tobacco company, came out in support of the bill, saying it was behind tough but fair regulation. Its chief rivals were opposed, saying that FDA restrictions on new products would lock in Philip Morris' share of the market.
Costs of the new program will be paid for by a new user fee imposed on the industry. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that assessments could rise from $235 million in 2010 to $712 million in 2019.
There was some opposition from Republicans who questioned the ability of the FDA to handle tobacco regulation and criticized what they said was another Democratic-led intrusion of the federal government in private business. North Carolina Republican Howard Coble said the bill is unpopular in his state, with its 12,000 tobacco farmers. "Their fear is tobacco today, the family farm tomorrow."
—
Associated Press Writer Ann Sanner contributed to this report.
—
The bill is H.R. 1256.

(38) As the National Cancer Institute has found, many smokers mistakenly believe that ‘low tar’ and ‘light’ cigarettes cause fewer health problems than other cigarettes. As the National Cancer Institute has also found, mistaken beliefs about the health consequences of smoking ‘low tar’ and ‘light’ cigarettes can reduce the motivation to quit smoking entirely and thereby lead to disease and death.
(39) Recent studies have demonstrated that there has been no reduction in risk on a population-wide basis from ‘low tar’ and ‘light’ cigarettes, and such products may actually increase the risk of tobacco use.

They all want to make a difference? As long as it benefits themselves enormously, then yes. But for the sake of the people? Nope.

No one wants to be a savior or hero, they want to seem like one, all they want to do is save their own asses. And USA for example is going toward fascism (or already is).

Obama sucks ass and there is enough data to say that all his talk about hope and change was just one big pathetic show.

Btw, there's no data toward either side. He promised to try and give what he thought would help the country and that's what he's doing. What kind of statistics can you possibly have on something so oppinionated?

Maybe that is what he thinks he's doing, cause the data says something different .
All the info is out there, it's for the person him/herself to discover.

It seems you're taking my statement about hope and change too literally in some sense. It's not really something ''oppinionated''. He gives people sweet words and promises, fortunately, people don't want to hear only words all the time, they also want to see some action which could give those words more value and I don't see that kind of action that for example could help the people enormously and trust me, if he had the ''right'' brains and the ''right'' conscience, he could do that. But maybe that's just me thinking this.

Perhaps the future will tell us how USA will ''end''. Unfortunately, I don't see a bright light at the end of the dark tunnel yet, actually, I think it's getting darker and darker.

If you're viewing something like the economy though, the stock market is finally starting to go up (Look at DOW, especially)

I love how people throw around Obama's name like it's purely his fault. The fact is, the government gets paid and has too much money on their hands. They all want to 'make a difference.' It's true that there are current problems the government deals with... they should focus more on that, cut their salaries and hours (except in times of urgency). We don't need a government with officials who are all focused on making things better... every year, the bubble they're putting us in gets smaller and smaller. How are we going to breathe soon?

We need a government who mainly focuses on NOW like many other governments do, along with ancient civilizations. Everyone wants to be the savior and hero though, so.. that's the whole problem nowadays. That's why laws like this are passed, that's why we're going toward socialism and that is also why the government has no time to focus on the recession, school bullying (like today's article), or finding a way to start focusing on finding sources of profit in the USA (as opposed to relying on other countries). Or even small things like helping small businesses set off the ground (that offer quality, instead of the modern concept of empires, which is quantity) without being trampled by someone bigger.

And to blame this on Obama is retarded, the fact of the matter is, this would be passed with or without his approval. Over 2/3 of Congress approved of and voted for the bill. It was inevitable.



This is the logic behind the banning of "light" cigarettes.

What they just have to do is repackage them under a different name, just not imply that they're less harmful. For instance "Camel Airs" or some candy like that.

I just wanted to make note that people used george w. bush's name like that all the time, so why can't we use Obama's in such a way?

I truly believe that the policies Obama installs are, at the very least, meant to be helpful and fufill his promises in his mind.

Well, firslty, just because people did wrong before doesn't make it okay to do the same. So that question was just meant to be a pain in the ass, in my mind.

Second, there's an enormous difference between Obama and Bush (again, from where I'm sitting). Bush was a puppet, a lot of the people behind him were doing things that were purely selfish. I truly believe that the policies Obama installs are, at the very least, meant to be helpful and fufill his promises in his mind. But even if my opinion was wrong, two wrongs don't make a right. That's horrible justification and rationalization.

I love how people throw around Obama's name like it's purely his fault.

[assuming that was sarcasm] But you think it was okay when people did that to Bush, don't you?

Well, from where i'm sitting, Obama's the puppet, Bush generally did things right and made some good decisons in my opinion, Obama seems a little too fake, like the government is using his positive image to market their ideas.
Ex.- the government bans flvored cigarettes, this upsets many smokers,- but they put Obama's face on it and say "Obama is for this, why aren't you?" as you said before, they shouldn't use his name likes its all his fault, so i partly agree with you. But my question really was-"If we can't use Obama's name like that, then why was it okay for people to use Bush's name like that?"

And for all the people complaining, just switch to flavored cigars, they aren't affected by this bill.

See, same opinions. Everyone just seems to follow the media instead of deciding it before they choose to let themselves be biased and influenced by the media. I don't think it was good that people attacked Bush... I don't agree with him, personally though. Nor do I agree with Obama's actions, though I appreciate that he's trying at least. Regardless of what I think though, you're both attacking Obama now and sympathizing with Bush. You both think it's right to attack Obama and rationalize it by the crap Bush got. I don't agree, personally. They are also two completely different people, btw. >.>

If everyone is so against the president, it won't make things any better. It might just freak him out into making crappy choices, just like it influenced Bush, probably. But if you guys start this crap at the beginning of the term, it won't help. Just don't vote for him next time; vote for the next candidate that comes along.

I don't trust the media at all, i make my opinions based on what my parents taught me and with research i do on my own, i am not led by the media and i'm not attacking obama i'm just pointing out that his image is being used to promote government ideas, and in case you didn't know this, i detect a bit of obama sympathy in your last post- "i appreciate that he's (obama) trying at least" yet i did not hear that about bush, are you implying that he didn't try?

And Obama and bush have more in common than you might think, they have both done somthing that only 41 other people have done- held the office of president of the U.S.

No one's attacking Obama, they're attacking you because you're a bleeding heart democrat. At least someone like Melissa will admit she's classically liberal leaning (as am I), but you try to hide behind this "fair and balanced" bullshit in EVERY argument you do, essentially the rebuttal to FoxNews. You cannot deny that the Bush administration "tried", but somehow, you are attempting; he was criticized and crucified by the liberal media, and now Obama is attacking the basis of his campaign promise - social progression, reform and change (meaning we get to RETAIN social rights, not have them stripped away), and you say he's TRYING? Holy shit man, grow a pair, stand up for your beliefs, not for some public official that doesn't care about you whatsoever.

This is why you've annoyed me, ALWAYS - you have no idea what you're arguing for. You just... do. You yell and scream and fight for something you know NOTHING about. I support gay marriage. I support abortion. I support nationalizing medicine and reallocation of funds to the less wealthy. But every single argument I've ever had with you, you took the easy way out, arguing on a mono-partisan podium, never moving, REFUSING to see the alternative, even when you were defeated, you were a snob to the bitter end. You can be wrong, billyme, and you often are. This is why you will lose every single argument you will ever have, ever. You are unwilling to compromise, and your debates are stale - reiterating the same point over and over and over and over again doesn't make you clever.

This is probably why Obama is changing his entire basis - he doesn't want to be represented by the majority mental inepts that voted for him and know not of the issues. I hope someone smacks you with an economics textbook so you learn something applicable, you sad 15 year old pissant.

Not going to bother responding to White's post. He's an asshole online with no common sense and hypocritical (thinks he's right and calls me stubborn). Regardless, you're just a jerk and useless, so no point in responding past to say that I am defending my own beliefs. I just like to give others a chance, not that I'm fully democratic, but I can see enough to view that he's trying.



I don't know. I wasn't old enough to fully understand Bush from the beginning, though I had sympathy for the man since he took more crap than he deserved. But I do remember Obama and his campaign. The reason I have sympathy for him isn't just because of the crap he takes (all presidenal candidates do), but because all of his goals (implied or spoken) are a part of what he is. I can see that he feels those goals are for the common good and he tries to work toward them. I fully don't agree with the goals and I think they are a bunch of nonsense and hogwash, even if all presidental candidates have a bunch of stuff that will limit and destroy our freedoms, but I can have respect for the man (and sympathy, which I believe people are too inclined to forget unless there is fear of social perseceution).

I don't really care if I'm ignored in the slightest. You're all boring. FD and anima and ThyThouTrust are all gone, left with a cesspool of you lummoxes to rant about things you know nothing about. It used to be intellectual. It used to be a place where you could sit back and watch legitimate things happen. This place is terrible now, and it's people like you and billyme's fault. Or maybe it's a lack of the names prior, who knows. Regardless, it's sad to see the average intelligence quotient drop by 50 points by the removal of three members.

I hope you all rot in hell. Thanks for listening to my senior remembrance of days passed.

I don't really care if I'm ignored in the slightest. You're all boring. FD and anima and ThyThouTrust are all gone, left with a cesspool of you lummoxes to rant about things you know nothing about. It used to be intellectual. It used to be a place where you could sit back and watch legitimate things happen. This place is terrible now, and it's people like you and billyme's fault. Or maybe it's a lack of the names prior, who knows. Regardless, it's sad to see the average intelligence quotient drop by 50 points by the removal of three members.

I hope you all rot in hell. Thanks for listening to my senior remembrance of days passed.