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'Cigar City' 

TAMPA - Hoping to escape labor issues, Vicente Martinez Ybor became the first Key West cigarmaker to move his operations to Tampa. . . .

That's part of the story visitors will see and hear at the $52 million Tampa Bay History Center, scheduled to open in December in the Channel District. The three-story building, under construction for nearly a year, will take visitors from the Tampa Bay area's prehistory through the arrival of the Spanish explorers, the Seminole Indian wars, Civil War, coming of the railroad and rise of the modern city.

Cuban, Spanish and Italian immigrants came to work in the cigar factories and related businesses, creating an unusual culture that continues to help define Tampa more than 120 years later.

They built their own clubhouses in Ybor City

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Bob Barr: Cigar with Al Gore, 48 ballots  

Bob Barr, the presidential candidate who can't get a seat in the fall debates - well, one of many minor party candidates who won't be invited - has found a forum of his own: The Colbert Report.

Barr will represent the Libertarians on the presidential ballot - "a political party that believes that it is my right as an American to varnish in an unventilated room,'' Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert explains in this interview.

Here, Barr tells of having a cigar with Al Gore.

"Different cigars... not one cigar,'' Colbert helps

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IMF pushes higher cigarette tax, scrapping of incentives 

THE INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND has urged the government to enact pending tax reform bills, warning that the recent move to exempt minimum wage earners from income tax and the cut in corporate income tax next year could erode revenue collections.

The government has made progress in terms of meeting tax collection targets in the first half, the IMF acknowledged. However, it said this would be unsustainable if no measures would be adopted to offset the impact of lower income tax collection. . . .

The IMF said Congress should pass bills seeking to lift unnecessary tax- and duty-free privileges granted to businesses and increasing excise taxes on cigarettes to maintain, if not accelerate, the growth in tax collection.

Without these measures, the IMF said the tax relief granted to individual and corporate taxpayers could easily slash half a percentage point from the country’s tax effort.

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• Indian cigarette tax bill action urged 

State Sen. Michael Nozzolio, R-Fayette, this week sent a letter to Gov. David Paterson seeking support for his bill that would force Native American businesses to pay state sales tax on cigarettes they now sell tax-free.

Nozzolio said Thursday the measure, if enacted, would raise about $400 million in new revenue for the state, which is in the throes of a budget crisis. It also would "level the playing field" for non-Indian businesses that already collect the tax, he said.

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Chart of the Day: Cigarette shipment decline continues 

Americans still burn through more than 300 billion cigarettes a year, though that is roughly 35% less than when the Surgeon General's report was issued in 1964, and 48% less than in 1981, when U.S. demand for cigarettes peaked. Goldman Sachs expects the number of smokes shipped by manufacturers will drop 3.5% this year and 3% next year.

Despite the slump in volume, Goldman Sachs actually expects cigarette makers to experience profit growth.

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'Bug Bomb' Cigarette Explosion Burns Man  

SAINT CLOUD, Fla. -- A man was airlifted with second-degree burns that he suffered during an explosion caused when he lit a cigarette after placing a "bug bomb" under a travel trailer, Saint Cloud authorities said.

The 55-year-old man was burned on his head, chest, neck and face in the explosion at about 11:10 p.m. Thursday night at his home, located at 901 Walnut in Mark Mobile Home Park.

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Statewide smoking ban soon taking effect in Pa. 

The clock is ticking down on Pennsylvania smokers who want to light up in many public spaces. A statewide smoking ban goes into effect in less than two weeks -- 90 days after it was signed by Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell.

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Cigarette, paint thinner start basement blaze  

A lit cigarette left by a container of paint thinner sparked a fire that destroyed part of a home at 6708 Sunfish Lake Ave. NE on Friday night.

No one was injured in the fire, which was reported just before 8 p.m. Township Fire Chief Jim Morris said the homeowner had been painting and had left paint brushes in some paint thinner, near the cigarette.

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Cot death warning for teen mums 

The children of young mothers are at much higher risk of cot death because their parent misses out on prevention advice, a charity has warned.

Sudden infant death is five times more common in the babies of teenage mothers compared with older mothers, according to national figures.

The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths said smoking was the key factor.

A Canadian study showed babies whose mothers smoked in pregnancy struggled to cope with minor breathing problems.

Across the UK, there was a modest fall in cot deaths - where a child dies suddenly and unexpectedly in its first year - from 355 in 2005 to 321 in 2006. . . .

However, the charity said the overall figures disguised a substantially bigger problem among teenagers.

In 2006, there were 58 deaths, a rate of 1.27 deaths for every 1,000 live births. Among the children of women aged over 35, the rate was just 0.23 per 1,000.

Chief executive Joyce Epstein said that key messages on smoking in pregnancy were not getting through: "It is totally unacceptable that the highest cot death rate occurs in the most disadvantaged groups.

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Tobacco harvest expected to be better than in 2007  

Weather conditions are proving to be better this summer than last year for area burley tobacco farmers.

"We had lots of rain early in the season," said Mason County Agriculture and Natural Resource Agent Bill Peterson.

Peterson said currently it is looking like this years crop will be "average," still an improvement over last year's crop which endured drought conditions.

Dr. William Bailey of the University of Kentucky College of Agriculture said, "There's been much improvement from last year."

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EDITORIAL: Smoking stats embarrassing 

The news came this week that Saskatchewan, for the third year in a row, has the highest rate of smokers in Canada at a high 24 per cent.

Shame on us. . . .

Even more disturbing is that Saskatchewan at 22 per cent, also has the highest percentage of youth (15 to 19 years) who smoke. The national average is 15.2 per cent.

Despite all the educational work of such agencies as the Canadian Cancer Society and the Heart and Stroke Foundation, the message obviously isn’t getting out there that smoking kills. . . .

Complacency is being blamed for lack of progress in reducing the number of people who smoke. Health agencies are correct in saying the provincial government has to do more, that it has to come up with a plan for continuous anti-smoking campaigns that will vividly highlight the health dangers of smoking.

The danger message on cigarette packages is no longer an adequate inducement to stop people from starting to smoke or encouraging them to quit.

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Eraserheads asked to make concert 'smoke-free' 

A tobacco control advocate group on Friday asked the Eraserheads to declare its reunion concert a "smoke-free" gig.

"We hope the concert will truly be smoke-free," said Dr. Maricar Limpin, executive director of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control Alliance Philippines (FCAP).

The call was made as FCAP claimed victory in the Philippine Morris Philippines Manufacturing decision to pullout from the reunion concert's sponsorship.

"Now, we will all be able to watch the concert without fear of being polluted by advertising ploys of deadly products," Limpin added.

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Fatal fire after drunk man fell asleep with cigarette 

A man who died in his blazing mobile home had more than six times the legal drink-drive alcohol limit in his blood, when he fell asleep with a lit cigarette in his hand.

An inquest held yesterday revealed that Ian Hotson, 55, died from extensive burns after the blaze at his home in Berkley Drive, Cranbourne Hall, Winkfield on November 23 last year.

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• Government Gets Hooked on Tobacco Tax Billions 

In HBO’s series “The Wire,” the charismatic thug Omar Little took a bullet to the brain while buying a pack of Newport cigarettes.

If Mr. Little had completed the transaction before falling dead to the grungy floor of a corner grocery, he would have paid 39 cents in federal taxes and a Maryland state tax of $2 per pack.

And those taxes are one reason a ban on menthol cigarettes is unlikely.

Mr. Little’s brand, Newport, is the leading menthol brand and the cigarette of choice among many African-Americans. . . .

The decision to exempt menthol from the flavoring ban may appear illogical until you dissect the economics of cigarettes and their impact on government. A growing reliance by the states and federal government on cigarette taxes — as well as a popular proposal to increase federal taxes by 61 cents to an even $1 per pack to finance the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, S-chip — provide a sort of insurance policy for the continued survival of menthol cigarettes. . . .

Unless menthol smokers switched to other types of cigarettes, a menthol ban would cut nearly a third of the tax revenues for states and federal governments. . . .

Mr. Orlowsky’s vehemence on the subject is not surprising. A ban on menthol could deliver a mortal blow to Lorillard, obviously a problem for its investors and employees, but, not quite so obviously, a problem for state governments.

Lorillard’s share of the tobacco settlement payments to states for last year was nearly $894 million. . . .

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STEIN: Obama’s Questionable Stimulus Plan  

I would argue that over the long term, oil companies' profits relative to sales are not above average for industrial or financial companies. But even if they were, why punish the owners of the oil companies, who are largely pension plans, group or individual, and individual investors? Why should we punish some American firefighters who own oil company stocks more than American firefighters who own drug company stocks or tobacco stocks? Why tax away the savings of some Americans because they happen to own a share in a company that supplies a totally legal, absolutely indispensable product like oil? I don't get that at all.

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