this is the US and we don't do that kind of thing here.

GWB and Assoc have burned this phrase out in my brain.

I refuse to live in a world without cheese.

There are fat free cheeses out there that can be lived with. El Presidente makes a fat free Feta which is quite tasty. Shredded fat free shredded mozerella is decent enough if you don't expect it to taste much like mozerella, and think of it as an exotic white cheese. Shredded fat free cheddar actually tastes rather like cheddar. Lastly if you use the cheese slices (which I do sometimes for sandwiches and such) Lucerne fat free cheddar (available in Safeway) tastes no worse than any other packaged cheese slice. In general fat free cheese work well in sauces.

how much does obesity strain our health resources?

Amen to that. And I say that as someone who is considered obese by health professionals. And also pays higher insurance premiums due to my weight.

There's actually some evidence that smokers have less effect on public spending because of the whole dying early thing. I'm afraid I cheer on every no-smoking legislation, because cigarette smoke sets off the asthma and coughing, and it's worse every year. It would be different if you could really keep the smoke from smoking areas in the smoking area, but if you're smoking, I'm smoking. I know it's very very hard to quit; my father smoked while on oxygen.

Alcohol is heavily taxed on the federal and state level.

Yet we're not taxing sour cream and bacon disproportionately. (And I'm not saying we should, just that the logic would follow.)

I understand the basic logic of this, but someone choosing to eat sour cream and/or bacon does not send me to the ground, unable to breath. Nor does it keep me out of social events and concert halls. Smoking does. MY eventual (and terrifyingly likely) medical costs will be shared by society. That isn't my choice, believe me. And this affliction, which will probably be my cod was precipiatated by both my parents smoking...or so I'm told.

My mother, from whom I'd been seperated for 27 years, quit smoking the day I came back into her life. 6 years later, she died anyway, leaving behind astronomical medical and disability costs that she could not pay. Who ended up covering those costs?

They should tax skydiving and... young idiots who ride their motorcycles at more than 100 mph on the freeway without helmets....

I went no on the cigarette tax as well. More gut reaction than anything else, but it just seemed like too much of a burden on the users, not any on the producers, and too ambigious as to what happened to the money.

Also? I am profoundly opposed to strapping GPS locators to the ankles of sex offenders for the rest of theirs lives (Prop 83).

Yeah, it was confusing because the PRO arguments made it sound like the GPS locators were a big new thing, except authorities can already use them; it's just that the prop would make them permanent, which, like you said...kind of weirds me out, especially in cases where people who aren't so much "sex offenders" would have to register as such. Plus, the opposition points out that this same thing has failed to work in other states, which is as sound an argument as any.

And I say that as someone who is considered obese by health professionals. And also pays higher insurance premiums due to my weight.

What? You're not obese. That's dumb.

Shredded fat free shredded mozerella is decent enough if you don't expect it to taste much like mozerella, and think of it as an exotic white cheese.

This works well in recipes and sandwiches and stuff to add a bit of creaminess. The fat free cheddar grosses me out, though.

The non-smoking laws around here have encouraged me to go to restaurants that I never would have gone to before, because I couldn't breathe when I was there.