How will New Yorkers celebrate the 34th annual Great American Smokeout? By smoking of course. |NYDN|
Performing his human ashtray stunt on Saturday, magician Richie Magic suppressed his urge to vomit long enough to break the little known world record for “orally extinguishing, chewing and expelling” 200 cigarettes. The cancer stick-chomping magician proudly proclaimed, “Kids told me it was so disgusting that they’d never smoke. I couldn’t be happier.” |NYDN|
As some type of inspiration to others, a cigarette-smoking magician will close out his 40-year habit by stubbing out 200 cancer sticks in his mouth. Richie Magic will perform the human ashtray feat outside his Queens magic shop tomorrow night. After recently setting an unenviable record for “stuffing 20 lit cigarettes in his mouth in 29 seconds,” the 53-year-old former corrections officer has spent weeks training for his new publicity stunt. This month Magic has eaten more than 2,000 cigarettes, which he admits is disgusting. |NYDN|
Photo by Noonan/NYDN
The country often credited with fomenting some of the earliest forms of democracy is taking a turn for the fascist as Greece announced a comprehensive ban on smoking in basically all public places and even in vehicles starting July 1st. But in a nation where 40% of the population is addicted to nicotine and “defying the authorities is a national sport,” it’s easier said than done. So, officials are instituting a heavy 500 euro ($700) penalty on smoke-inhaling lawbreakers caught defying the ban and businesses that repeatedly flaunt the law could “risk losing licenses.” |BBC|
New York City has some of the toughest anti-smoking laws in the country, banning people from lighting up at work and many public places. Although the laws have helped clear the air, a new study from the city’s health department suggests they’re not enough to protect non-smokers from cancer-causing clouds. The study found 57 percent of non-smoking New Yorkers tested positive for cotinine, a non-harmful nicotine byproduct indicative of secondhand smoke exposure, significantly higher than the 45 percent national average. Read more »
A federal judge has ruled that New York City can sue cigarette stores located on a Long Island Indian reservation for allegedly selling lots of untaxed cigarettes and therefore screwing the city out of their cut. |Newsday|
A NYC couple with Muslim sounding names were arrested for trying to cheat the state out of its cut on cigarette sales after custom officials “intercepted some 15 cartons of untaxed cigarettes from Karachi, Pakistan, addressed to the couple’s Queens home.” Authorities then found 700 cartons of cigarettes, many with forged tax stamps. |Newsday|
In Japan, there’s cigarette vending machines that ID would be purchasers using face recognition technology. However, the system has a major basic flaw: it can be easily cheated by those not of legal age. After kids learned how to beat the nicotine machines by simply holding up magazine covers, now there’s another defect that allows them to just place Japanese money in front of the device: “The portraits of Hideyo Noguchi and Yukichi Fukuzawa printed on the 1,000-yen and 10,000-yen bills can be used to trick the high-tech machines, according to a new report.” |PinkTentacles|
Frantic nicotine ingesting smokers made record numbers of calls to the city’s 311 info line following the severe cigarette tax hike in June: “More than 2,700 New Yorkers called for help quitting smoking in the week that started on June 2, compared with about 850 in the same period in 2007, the city’s health department announced. In addition to the 2,700 callers, about 1,600 smokers received free nicotine patches on June 3 at events held across the five boroughs. On that day, the state tax on cigarettes rose by $1.25 a pack — to $2.75 from $1.50.” |CityRoom|
Fear mongering politician, Rep. Peter King (R-LI), hyped up the arrest of two dozen Arab cigarette smugglers, floating a theory about a link to terrorism: “If this money is going overseas, and this money is going to Hezbollah and Hamas . . . we’re talking about life and death, we’re talking about a very serious terror issue.” |NYP|
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