Warning: This Post Contains Strong Language

Hey, remember that smoking ban everyone was all up in arms about for a while? Well, yeah, it looks like it’s not gonna matter at all! The Pennsylvania Senate yesterday pretty much decided the state is going to have a smoking ban, but there will be tons of exemptions. Oh, and it overrides all local laws, so Philadelphians will indeed be free to smoke in parts of casinos.

The bill’s exemptions are for restaurants where food makes up less than 25 percent of sales, cigar bars (probably the most sensible exemption), a quarter of casino floor areas and, of course, “charitable fund-raisers where cigars are sold.”

This was quite a reasonable debate, of course, with the head of the ACS in Pennsylvania saying legislators were murdering thousands of people while legislators decided to come out against the bill with strong words.

Sen. Jim Ferlo, D-Allegheny, called the exemptions “disgusting gobbledygook,” and Sen. Anthony Williams, D-Philadelphia, said the changes were like “a pig in lipstick” being billed as a beauty queen.

Yes, that’ll show ‘em.

Senate acts to curb Phila. smoking ban [Inquirer]
Weaker Pa. version would override city’s smoking law [Metro]