Pennsylvania & FDA: Pushing Vapers to Smoking...

(As I predicted in my submission to the FDA of August 14, 2014...  The FDA is making smoking the "best" option when science has shown it is, in fact, the most dangerous...)

We recently received an email (note the underlined section):

"Hello ma'am, 

My name is ------. I have been a customer at your store for about a year. ... To support this store. Example I paid 10 dollars more just to have the XXXXXX when I could have got it cheaper online for 24 dollars. 

But my point is this. This store is the only one in the area. Including XXXXX, YYYYY and ZZZZZ don't carry XXXXXXXX vape oil. I have patiently waited for it to be restocked at the store. 

...

I do not like any other vape oil I have tried all of the others. ... But this is the only one I like. 

I have gone back to smoking cigarettes because I can not get the XXXXXXX oil. 

Please bring it back in. 

...

Thank you 
-------"

So this person has made the choice to smoke because federal and state regulations and taxes are restricting the market for vaping products which offers them, according to science, healthier choices.

The the end result of the Pennsylvania 40% tax on wholesale vaping products is to drive this poor person to either A) smoke "combustion" tobacco products or B) become a criminal in Pennsylvania for not paying the "use" tax on vaping products (much like buying cigarettes on-line).

(We had to pay 40% on our inventory in stock as of 10/1/2016 and 40% on everything thereafter.)

Of course, if we the shop keepers thought that we might still be in business after 2018 we might wish to put more money into our store (thanks, FDA).

SO the state of Pennsylvania and the US government are, by taxing us out of business (and believe me there used to be many shops in the areas X, Y and Z indicated above), promoting smoking of burning tobacco.

Vaping is not a gateway (new research here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vaping-less-harmful-than-smoking-1.3943418).

It simply stops people from inhaling burning tar which is the real problem with combustion tobacco.

Think also of all the other companies from insurance, deliver, cleaning, power, water, boro services, etc. etc. being strangled by these regulations and taxes.

Like a fool I will probably put more money into the vape shops as I know there are many more like this person.

I, personally, and helping people not to smoke.

Not Pennsylvania, not Governor Tom Wolfe, not the FDA...

Me.

With my own money.

P.S. The PA tax is backfiring - more than one hundred shops closed and revenue substantially below projections (including taxes on plain cigarettes)...

Vaping: Safer than a Vaccine?

Oops! Someone forgot to tell Dr. Daniel Neides that he should just "take one for the team" and tow the big pharma line in vaccine land.  Seems Dr. Daniel doesn't want to be "injected with mercury" for some reason, nor does he want to be injected with "formaldehyde," a known carcinogen.

Who can blame him?

While the odd Smallpox or Polio vaccine is good prevention today's big pharma vaccine "band wagon" with dozens and dozens of duplicates was outed again much to chagrin of the Cleveland Clinic.

Some of my previous thoughts on this subject:

http://lwgat.blogspot.com/2013/01/flu-shots-useless-by-rigorous.html

http://lwgat.blogspot.com/2013/02/mother-may-i-have-flu-shot.html

http://lwgat.blogspot.com/2012/03/vaccinating-our-way-to-poor-health.html

http://lwgat.blogspot.com/2012/01/magical-medical-thinking-might-be.html

So these posts were written prior to my deep involvement in vaping.  If nothing else vaping has taught me that killing people for profit is utmost in the mind of big pharma and our government.

(Search this blog for "vaping" or "nicotine.")

Clearly, at least in the rest of the world, vaping is seen as a top THR (Tobacco Harm Reduction) tool.
Is it perfectly safe?

Of course not.

However, at least according to my previous research vaccines routinely kill a hundred or so people per year (see this).

Not so vaping.

Yes, I know that Smallpox killed millions in its day and eradicating it is a good thing even if some die in the process.

But that's not what people are vaccinated for today.

Dear Vladimir Putin...

Dear Vladimir Putin -

I have recently reviewed a variety of articles here in the US (WSJ, LA Times, Washington Post) that identify Russia as the source of "election hacking."

The details are identified in this US government document: "Background to “Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections”: The Analytic Process and Cyber Incident Attribution"

Among other interesting things we find this paragraph on page #3: "The Kremlin’s principal international propaganda outlet RT (formerly Russia Today) has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks. RT’s editor-in-chief visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in August 2013, where they discussed renewing his broadcast contract with RT, according to Russian and Western media. Russian media subsequently announced that RT had become "the only Russian media company" to partner with WikiLeaks and had received access to "new leaks of secret information." RT routinely gives Assange sympathetic coverage and provides him a platform to denounce the United States."

Russia Today, hmmm, I had only heard of propaganda agencies like Tass back in the 1970's Soviet Union.

I figured I'd better catch up and see what sort of things are available at "Russia Today."

There I found this article interviewing John McAfee of cyber security fame.

McAfee describes this US government document on "Assessing Russian Activities..." to be "... utter nonsense" and "... “Russian hacking” narrative is either “propaganda intended to incite the American people, to anger toward Russia for some reason, or our intelligence community is so ignorant and naïve that they should all be replaced.”"

Well, hmmm.  I suppose he's entitled to his own opinion though one imagines he's got some background in this subject.

But what was really, really interesting, Mr. Putin, was not all of this hoopla concerning how you had, perhaps personally, hacked into the US election.

No, instead I saw, down at the bottom of the McAfee article, a small ad (here is most of the page at the link above):

This was the ad that caught my eye:

Now this is a rather specialized, targeted ad that really only would appear on a web page I was looking at, no doubt through some click-based ad system.

Yet there it is - being served up by Russia Today servers right to my very browser!

You see, Mr. Putin, that I work on sophisticated robots which make use of type of unusual laser equipment sold at laserglow.com.

I specifically recall this website because a co-worker and I were discussing this very website yesterday.  I had discovered this web site by googling, (yes, from www.google.com) during the Christmas break.  I had worked hard to find this site, very hard.  Its not easy to describe what these lasers do.

I had never, ever seen this site before and have not accessed it since our work conversation the other day.

Yet here on Russia Today is an ad for it (the results of my work googling).

My, my, what a remarkable coincidence!  I wonder where Russia Today found out about my very secret robot work?

Perhaps, dare I say, Google (or Alphabet or whatever they call themselves...)

I can hear you and your comrades chuckling across the many timezones...

I mere coincidence, I thought, indeed.

But in writing this post I visited tass.com out of curiosity.  Not something I had ever done though I am sure in the past decade or two I probably had googled "tass" once or twice for some other post or work.

And what, you might ask, did I find there?

This:

The interesting part is the "toptal.com" ad.  A place which has my resume.  A place I have conducted business.

Somehow, as if by magic, here it is appearing plastered across the headlines of tass.com.

Vladimir, your Russian people are so clever!

Why I bet you are purchasing click results from companies like Google and passing them off "US Election" influence!

How clever you Russians are!

(But I did see the link on the right side of Russia Today for twitter.com, facebook.com and so forth - that's really sort of a give-away.  I bet you found out that Hillary was putting her charity funds into her own pocket by reading the NY Times.)

Those dower folks at Tass mere showed my links to recent robotic camera searches for work and a web site that sells antiquated musical equipment I often search.)

I wonder if someone should tell the folks at these US Intelligence agencies that its really Google and the NY Times betraying Hillary?

I wonder if someone should explain that Google sells information about top searches and personal search data to countries such as Russia?

No, that would confuse them.

Well Vladimir, thank you for your interest in my blog.

Sincerely,

The Lone Wolf

P.S.  I am forwarding a copy of this to Mr. Trump.  I am sure you both be able to laugh over this at your next meeting.

Enchanted Things: Candles and Soap from E-Liquids

Candles, soap and nicotine "Death Stars" from Enchanted Thing

Here in Pennsylvania the state Constitution requires that taxes be uniformly enforced (from this):

Article VIII

TAXATION AND FINANCE

Uniformity of Taxation

"All taxes shall be uniform, upon the same class of subjects, within the territorial limits of the authority levying the tax, and shall be levied and collected under general laws."

I am not a lawyer but from what I am able to read about this it requires that, within the flexible bounds of what the state legislature might do all taxes should be applied the same.  Now there is a lot to consider but in general it would appear to mean if I have a tax one wholesale gasoline, for example, or I have a tax on beverage components such as sugar, I must uniformly apply that tax.

So I believe, for example, this means that everyone that buys gas from a wholesale distributor pays the the same PA tax regardless of their intended use.  You can't for example, have some stores selling gas that is not taxed and some that are.  If you did, the tax would not be "uniform."

So, for example, this appears often in the context of property taxes (see this, page #3 right, underline mine):

371 Taxation
371 III Property Taxes
371 III(B) Laws and Regulation
371 III(B)4 Constitutional Regulation and Restrictions
Concerning Equality and Uniformity
371k2134 Classification of Subjects, and Uniformity as to Subjects of Same Class
371k2135 k. In General. Most Cited Cases
While reasonable and practical classifications in tax legislation are justifiable and often permissible, when a method or formula for computing a tax will, in its operation or effect, produce arbitrary, unjust, or unreasonably discriminatory results, the Uniformity Clause of the State Constitution is violated. Const. Art. 8, § 1.

So let's think about vaping and vape shops.  Walmart and amazon sell flashlight battery chargers, e.g., 18650 chargers, and e-liquid and e-cigarettes but as near as we can tell they do not pay a 40% tax on the battery chargers.

Our vape shop sells the same is at least at this point is required to pay taxes on these items.

Now I believe that its likely that things like USB chargers, cables, etc. will become exempt so long as they are not "marked for vaping" according to what we have heard from PA Revenue representatives.

This is part of the lawsuit brought by Kingdom Vapor (see this).

But what about e-liquid and nicotine?

Well, if USB cables are exempt the why isn't every USB cable exempt?  After all they are used for many, many things besides vaping.

To this end I have engaged a group to create soaps and candles that use e-liquids both with nicotine (NGL - see below) and without nicotine as perfuming agents.  (I fully expect the wrath of the FDA on this but once these items are sold, and only commercially, not to consumers, the cat is, as they say, out of the revenue bag...)

Specifically we have a line of e-liquid called "Mystic Wolf."  Very soon we will be selling soap and candles that make use of these e-liquid flavors for the purpose of fragrance, i.e., to make the soap and candles smell nice.

Similarly we are using some of the Next Generation Labs (NGL) synthetic nicotine in these same products.  Next Generation claims their products are not subject to the new FDA vaping "deeming regulations:"

“Not all nicotine-free e-liquids (NFLs) are subject to the deeming rule. Assuming an NFL is not made or derived from tobacco, it is subject to the rule only if it meets the definition of a ‘component or part’ —that is, if it is ‘intended or reasonably expected’ either…(1) To alter or affect [a] tobacco product’s performance, composition, constituents, or characteristics; or (2) To be used with or for the human consumption of a tobacco product; and is not an accessory.”

Which would mean the soap and candles are not tobacco products in any way, shape or form.

(But just for fun we have created some using our nicotine e-liquids as well as NGL nicotine.  Clearly these are not tobacco products... so if they are not tobacco products what are they?)

By selling these products we can factually claim that the e-liquids are not used for vaping alone and are in fact general purpose products with multiple uses as soap, candles, and so on.

(Additional uses might include baking products, candy, etc. for example.)

Now no one wants anyone to be harmed by these products so rather than sell them to consumers these products will be sold marked as "Not for Human Consumption" products to, surprise, other vape shops.

This will establish a PA sales tax chain of events clearly making e-liquid equivalent to the VG or PG you might purchase in Walmart for making, you guessed it, candles and soap.

We hope that those reading this blog will create other uses for what are currently "vaping only" products and sell these products to others (of course preventing anyone from harming themselves with whatever they make).

Idea: Sell flashlight adapters for mods.

Of course we have documented all of this in detail (though obviously anyone involved in vaping can do this on their own with little or no effort).

We specified that all of the nicotine products contain about 50ng (nanograms) of nicotine, roughly the amount contained in one, large, ripe tomato.

Candles and soap supplied by

https://www.facebook.com/enchantedthing

http://enchantedthing.com/

https://www.etsy.com/shop/enchantedthing

If you'd like your own e-liquids converted to fragrances please contact "Enchanted Thing."