Reply #102: in some circumstances it may very well be the case

[Douglas Carpenter]

I'm an Asthmatic too. In spite of living next to a number of smokers over the years I can't recall any incident where a neighbors smoke caused a problem for me. But I have had an incident where the neighbors overly friendly cat triggered my asthma. I'm not prepared to ban people having cats because of some circumstances. People's televisions frequently become an irritant in apartment and condo complexes. But asking an authoritarian nanny state to ban televisions because some people are inconsiderate on how they use them would be going way too far. Many neighbors are disturbed because someone upstairs from them seems to walk too hard on the floor others have noisy children. I had a Filipino neighbor once who cooked fish with a lot of strong smells. Some neighbors were bothered by that and wanted the poor fellow evicted. Apartment living comes with a number of irritants. I don't think we need the government acting like morality police controlling peoples' personal lives. We can agree that in the best of all possible worlds, nobody would smoke and everyone would exercise and eat a balanced die avoiding heavy fats and excessive amounts of sodium. Perhaps there are those would claim that their neighbors other bad habits besides smoking is causing a disturbance and being a bad influence. But this business to me sounds like a liberal secular version of the religious right. They think they know whats best for everyone too. They don't think women should have abortions and that only married heterosexual couples should have sex. Sometimes I think the left creates its own version of the same concept. We have all heard the saying about how we want government to stay out of peoples' bedrooms and not to control peoples' bodies. I agree.