What’s with all this hubbub about smoking in a Herman Cain video? Have you seen the video? It features Mark Block, Herman Cain’s Chief of Staff smoking while talking to the American people. The blogs and mainstream media have been awash with outrage over the inappropriateness of Block’s conduct. Have we progressed so far down the political correctness road that a smoker smoking in a campaign video is off-limits?
In 2008 nearly everyone in America knew that Barack Obama smoked, and even though the White House and the First Lady have said that Obama has quit, many believe he’s just become more judicious about his smoking habit. Obama’s smoking habit got very little play in the 2008 campaign. So why is the treatment received by Block so different than what was served up for Obama?
There is no one in America, other than a few tobacco companies, that would encourage smoking, nor does anyone believe that smoking isn’t a major health concern. Do smokers need to hide in closets to keep their habit a secret? Block wasn’t playing Joe Camel promoting smoking; it’s just something he does. Block said in an interview with Fox News that he was told, “Let Mark be Mark.” Mark Block smokes, and while appealing to the public he was being himself…a smoker.
In America we no longer allow tobacco or hard liquor commercials on television. We’ve become indifferent to our government making decisions for us and we don’t even flinch when they force us to act as they see fit. The Federal Trade Commission and the Food and Drug Administration no longer encourage us to make healthier or safer decisions, they make them for us. In the process people who drink, smoke or make poor food choices are villainized. Rather than providing us the raw facts and letting us choose for ourselves, they are willing to take whatever steps are necessary to make it difficult or impossible, all the while stigmatizing those behaviors that don’t fit their measure of appropriateness.
Mark Block is now a victim of victimization. Block smokes, like it or lump it. Herman Cain could have easily required Block make his video sans the cigarette, but chose to allow Block to be himself and not adhere to some societal government sanctioned model of the good citizen. Revolutions have been fought over governments trying to control the activities of their citizens, and in America, as long as you’re not breaking the law, or infringing upon another’s rights, you are free to speak and act as you see fit. Whatever happened to the left-wings pleas for a more tolerant society?
Thomas Jefferson is credited with saying, “The government you elect is government you deserve.”
If you choose to allow government to regulate behavior and worse yet you carry their water by espousing a negative view based on the government’s anti-behavior methods, you are nothing more than a tool of the ruling elite. Mark Block is not some moron unaware that his smoking habit may take years off his life; he is a bright man, mature and capable of weighing the pros and cons of his own deeds. Just because he chooses to indulge in an activity you find offensive doesn’t give you the right to ridicule or judge him. Block is acting legally and whether you deem it foolish or not, get off the guy’s back. For the love of God, get a life!
When you roll up to the drive-thru window at Burger King, in some not-too-distant future, and are told, “I’m sorry, you’ll have to get the vegetarian Whopper cause you’re over your monthly fat allowance,” remember you supported the government choosing for others and now you’re one of them, you disgusting meat eater!