Smoking bans don't play in Peoria

Smoking Ban Won't Play in Peoria!

March 19th’s Peoria Journal-Star ran a story that will have repercussions for smoking bans throughout the world! Illinois State Prosecutors ad-mitted that since their law “does not put any onus on the bar employee or bar owner to prohibit smoking," they could not file a formal charge against a bar that failed to discipline smoking customers.
While this ruling applies just to the Illinois law, it can't fail to be heard in their neighboring state of Iowa, in the troubled bars of nearby Ohio where health investigators have refused to order customers to stop smoking because "We can't make them stop. We're not police.", on the bar-theater stages of Minnesota where desperate taverns have resorted to staging "smoking plays" in which every smoker is a thespian, and anywhere around the world where governments have tried to indenture employees to act as Junior G-Men without badges.
Bartenders themselves can be fined for smoking on duty, and a bar can be fined if they fail to display "No Smoking" signs or if they provide fire-safety devices (ashtrays) for customers, but it has now been made crystal clear that the days of "Undercover Secret Smoking Police" in Illinois are over. And whether the state has the guts to enforce an ashtray ban that might leave them liable for fire deaths and damages seems unlikely.
The days of Illinois' smoking customers universally being grabbed by the scruff of the neck and tossed to the gutter are over. Spring Valley's Family Tavern, bartender Karla Carrington, and Peoria legal eagle Dan O'Day have fired a puff of smoke into the air that will be seen around the world! Wherever else bans may have played in the past, they flopped big time when they tried to take center stage in Peoria and they’re flopping even bigger time on the stages of bars all across Minnesota!
Michael J. McFaddenAuthor of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"http://www.thetruthisalie.com/
Visit & Support http://FreedomToAct.com
and the Tavern League of Minnesota!