You've probably already heard about this, and I'm sure it's no surprise to you that it infuriated me.  The city of Omaha, Nebraska has publicly urged its citizens to call 911 if they see someone smoking in a public place.

Obviously, they hopped on the senseless, self-absorbed, do-gooder bandwagon and recently adopted a citywide smoking ban.  This is no surprise, as several cities across the nation are adopting this anti-citizen, anti-business legislation, mainly to cater to special interests and to help their politicians make names for themselves over cause-du-jour issues.

I had already heard about this, but wanted to get more information before I said anything about it.  So, I just saw the two politicians -- Jim Suttle and Franklin Thompson -- trying to explain themselves on Tucker Carlson's show on MSNBC.  I will send them this post as an email, although if they don't care what their own citizens and businesses think, they'll probably just laugh at what we think.

On the show, these two lunkheads rationalized their urging people to call 911 when they see smokers by saying that their system can handle the extra calls.  They also stated that there have only been about a dozen calls since this has been enacted, so it's no big deal.  As usual, the politicans don't get it -- the volume of calls is beside the point. 

What they are doing is fueling the fire of the demonization of half its citizens, publicly turning smokers into criminals on par with murderers and rapists in the eyes of the public.  This is what they want, obviously, although they said the "real" calls to 911 regarding personal safety are given first priority.  Again, they miss the point -- you are telling your citizens that smelling cigarette smoke in a public place is an actual personal emergency, and the perpetrators are violent criminals.

Think they don't have an agenda?  When Carlson said "I personally don't care for smoking," Thompson chimed in "Good!"  They seemed taken aback when Carlson also said, to his credit, "I personally think smoking should be allowed in bars.  It isn't your bar, it's the business owner's bar."  They had no answer to that one that I recall.  For what it's worth, Jim Suttle is the real bad guy here.  He's the one who introduced the legislation, and he seemed to be the focus of the interview.  Franklin Thompson just seemed to me to be the politician along for the ride, trying to get publicity for himself.  He actually said he was against the 911 thing at first, then later changed his mind.  He also seemed to raise his eyebrows at some of the nonsense Tuttle was spewing out of his bald old piehole.

OK, so they said they don't believe public smoking is on par with murder and rape, which is easy to say, but I'll go a step further.  Is it on par with a downed power line? Teenagers disturbing the peace?  A fender-bender accident in rush hour traffic?  A rabid possum in the neighborhood?  No, no, no, and no.  Yet these are all reasons that people call 911.  Any sensible person would say that someone smoking in a public place isn't even on par with these minor incidents, yet these politicians believe it is. 

Tuttle even had the audacity to say, regarding the ban itself, "We used to look at this as a medical issue, with a medical solution.....Then we realized it's not that, it's a political issue that needed a political solution."  He publicly admitted that the ban has nothing to do with public health or safety, that it was only political.  Case in point:  when Carlson said "Thanks for coming on", at which point the guest is supposed to say "Thanks for having me on, Tucker," Tuttle prattled on with "Why, thank you Tucker for having us, and thank you for your interest in Omaha."  After which Thompson grinned and pointed at the camera and chirped, "MSNBC!"

These people don't care about you, Omaha.  They certainly don't care about the personal freedom of any other American citizen or business owner.  They're in this for themselves, and to bring attention to their soulless little city.  But I'll say loudly and proudly, "DON'T GO TO OMAHA".  Wait, it's Omaha.  Nobody goes there anyway.  Which is why they started this whole thing in the first place.

Portions of this will be sent to jsuttle@ci.omaha.ne.us , and fthompson@ci.omaha.ne.us.