Question: Will President Obama be allowed to smoke in the Oval Office

[Seeking Serenity]

or will he have to take it out on the veranda?

Go, Obama! Buck the trend! It'll be your office! Smoke in there if you bloody well want to!

[flvegan]

1. Can you smoke in a federal building?

I can already hear the cries for impeachment from the Freeps. :eyes:

[Seeking Serenity]

2. He could issue an executive order permitting smoking in the presidential mansion.

Do it! Do it! Do it!

[flvegan]

3. But then everyone in the area will take their smoke breaks

while on the "tour of the White House". Anarchy will ensue, I'm tellin ya.

[Seeking Serenity]

4. All right, then. How about an executive order that states that smoking

in the executive mansion is permitted, but only if your courtesy title is "MR. PRESIDENT!"

[flvegan]

5. There you go.

Why don't we have jobs as Obama's advisers?

[Seeking Serenity]

6. I'm just sayin'.

:hi:

Just tell me where to send a CV. Of course, with me, that really shouldn't even be necessary.

[davsand]

7. Do YOU want to be the one telling him he can't have a smoke in his office?

Just sayin...



Laura

[Lincolngirl]

25. Good luck,

Even Richie Daley couldn't say no to the Grant Park Celebration here!

Light up Mr. President!

[curse of greyface]

8. It's also his home. (He might have to sneak upstairs.)

He should give Bill Clinton a call. I'm sure there are places one can sneak of to for a....smoke.

[Seeking Serenity]

10. Yeah, a smoke. Sure. That's the ticket.

/channeling Jon Lovitz as Tommy Flanagin, the pathological liar.

[AlCzervik]

9. he can just go outside like he most likely does now.

like we pretty much all do.

[Seeking Serenity]

11. What's the point of being president if you still have to go outside?

I should think that would be a perk of office.

"I'm fixin' to light up in here. If you don't like it, well, I guess I can always request a smaller budget for you."

[AlCzervik]

12. maybe he doesn't want the newly fumigated and cleaned oval office to stink?

i smoke but i don't in my house, i'm the only smoker that lives here.

[Seeking Serenity]

14. No, dude. I'm the president. It's Jan. 21, my first full day in office.

It's the dead of winter in Washington and colder'n a witch's thorax. I am not going outside for a smoke. I'm the president, for cryin' out loud.

[crispini]

17. LOL!

I heard he quit, anyway. :)

[tigereye]

24. I thought he had quit....

[Lucian]

13. I'm sure the Bushes smoked in the White House.

[Seeking Serenity]

15. And I had forgotten about Clinton and his cigars. (n/t)

[Alexander]

18. I've heard they go off into a private room for that. Presumably Obama will too.

Unless he's managed to kick the habit by then.

[Sebastian Doyle]

23. Chimpy probably smoked crack

Jenna & Tonic had a bong stashed in the Lincoln Bedroom.

[Rabrrrrrr]

16. I hope he gives up cigs and takes up the pipe, and smokes it in the Oval Office

We need to bring pipe smoking back into the mainstream.

But then, on the other hand, if we do, all the fucking yuppie scum who can never do anything on their own and just follow trends, will drive the price of pipe tobacco and good pipes up into the stratosphere, like the jackass shitbags did with cigars in the 90s, so maybe we shouldn't make pipe smoking popular again.

[Seeking Serenity]

20. A photo of Obama with a pipe would be cool.

But not one of those stupid Dr. Grabow things.

[LisaM]

19. I think he should get a cigarette holder like FDR's

and work from a wheelchair to carry the theme through to its completion. No halfway measures!

I DID hear that the Clintons made the White House nonsmoking, and that the Bushies changed that.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

21. I think he should set an example for his children and the rest of the country...

and quit.

[Seeking Serenity]

38. Phlbbllbtlt!

(DU really needs a Bronx cheer smiley)

[GoddessOfGuinness]

51. LOL

Sorry...There is no more avid anti-smoker than the former smoker. :hi:

[Seeking Serenity]

52. Which is why I vowed never to become one.

A former smoker, that is.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

53. My father did too...

even after his doctor told him it was time, and that his emphysema was going to get him if his heart didn't fail first.
I think he really did try fo awhile. He'd light up and breathe the second hand smoke instead of smoking the cigarette.

His philosophy was that he'd rather die doing what he enjoyed than live craving that pleasure without fulfillment.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

22. That is OUR House.

And it should be preserved, and it is illegal to smoke in federal Buildings. If he wants to smoke upstairs, that's his residence, but the rest of the building should be non smoking.
Duckie

[Seeking Serenity]

30. Why?

[astral]

26. He smokes?

:wow:

[jobycom]

27. Yeah, really, what?

I had heard he smoked when he was younger. He still does? Shame on him, if so.

[Seeking Serenity]

29. Shame? What shame? (n/t)

[jobycom]

34. The shame of being the most positive image in the world

yet setting the example of smoking.

[Seeking Serenity]

37. I don't see any shame there.

So he's a smoker. So is 25% of America. Big honkin' deal.

And I, for one, think he should light up anywhere in the WH he jolly well feels like (except in bed; that's a fire hazard). And to tell all of the anti-tobacco Nazis to go pound sand.

[jobycom]

44. You should.

Children should not be given such an example, and neither should adults, especially when we spend millions on convincing people not to smoke, and trillions on health care for smokers, and no telling what cost on the shattered lives caused by the premature and often painful lingering deaths of loved ones. Lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, heart disease, and just about every illness that afflicts this nation. Obama's smoking undermines all of that, sets a fatal example for youngsters, and doesn't do much for older Americans, either.

He should be ashamed if he still smokes.

[Seeking Serenity]

45. Tosh. We have never elected a true paragon of virtues as president

and we didn't start last week.

Frankly, I dismiss the argument that states that we have to have no vices ast all so as to not set a bad example for the children. And I really don't think children today are looking to a president (a member of the grown-up establishment world) for traits to emulate. They have thousands and more pop stars filling that role.

Tobacco use is legal in this country and Obama is of age. I say he should be open about it and let the "won't-someone-think-of-the-children" hand-wringers go be apoplectic by themselves off in a corner somewhere.

[jobycom]

47. We aren't talking about private moral vices, we're talking life and death.

Would you want a teacher to smoke in front of kindergartners? Sure, pop stars set worse examples, but no one thinks of them as paragons of anything. Part of why people follow them is to laugh at how dumb they are. Obama didn't run to be the biggest pop star in the country, he ran to make a positive difference, to make the world a better place. Teaching kids to smoke is counter to that. Giving them an excuse to smoke is counter to that. Tobacco use may be legal for adults, but it isn't for kids.

If Obama didn't want the responsibility he shouldn't have run, or at least he should have run on less of a hero platform. But he did. He held himself up as an example. Change, he said. Hope. Change. Positive change. Good. Then he has a responsibility to stop smoking. If he still does, that is.

[Seeking Serenity]

48. He has no such responsibility, to you or to me or to anyone.

Alcohol use may be legal for adults, but it isn't for kids. Shall we make sure he is a tea-totaler, too?

I swear, arguments like yours infuriate me. I hope the man does smoke, does it in public, if for no other reason than to annoy someone who makes those kinds of arguments.

Yeah, change, hope. The hope that he can be strong enough to change this neurotic, won't-someone-please-think-about-the-children quasi-puritanism this country has been engaged in for too many years.

[LynneSin]

32. He was suppose to quit. I'm sure Michelle will work on that one again

:D

[Roon]

46. I quit four years ago

It was one of the hardest things i have done.If i can quit,certainly Obama can quit.

[Seeking Serenity]

49. Suppose he doesn't want to?

Does he owe the electorate a duty to quit even if he didn't want to?

If so, from whence does that duty arise?

[Roon]

50. Well, that's 2/3s of the battle

You have to want to quit. I broke up with my ex and when he left he took his income with him of course. All of a sudden I couldn't afford cigarettes. I rolled my own for about 6 months but that is really harsh on your lungs.

So I joined a quitting smoking group that my clinic recommended. You get free nicotine patches and you go to group every week.

Going to group was key to me quitting smoking.

It was very painful though!

[mwooldri]

28. Smoke what exactly?

Not that he would but could a President do drugs and get away with it?

[sarge43]

31. Until he burns holes in priceless antiques.

A The West Wing flashback.

I heard he was trying to quit (Michelle's in his face) and was using the gum for the cravings.

[DU GrovelBot]

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[av8rdave]

35. I'm not Obama. But if I were...

I would have a designated, easy to reach outdoor place to smoke a cigarette. It's a good idea for a couple of reasons:

1. In that job, occasional breaks are a good thing...even if just 5 minutes for a cigarette.

2. You take away any criticism of exposing your family and/or staff to second hand smoke. You don't leave a lot of ammo for the right wing idiots to use.

[Ellen Forradalom]

36. he's gonna be freezing his butt off outside the front door

like everyone else :-)

[Deep13]

39. If Federal law prohibits smoking in government buildings...

...then as the chief law enforcement officer, he will be duty-bound to refrain from smoking there. If the law does not prohibit it or there is an exception for the WH, then it will be his judgment call. As someone who thinks the president-elect is worth a lot more to this country alive than dead of a heart attack, I hope he quits.

[Seeking Serenity]

40. I want him alive as much as anyone, but I also think it would be good

to have a smoker as president, open about it. Someone who could represent us.

[Deep13]

42. "Someone who could represent us."

Us? You don't actually define yourself by that habit do you?

[Seeking Serenity]

43. Not solely, no. But that is a sub-group of Americans to which I belong.

(edited to correct typo)

[rcrush]

41. They didnt let Bartlett smoke inside

He always snuck out and had one of his secret service guys give him a smoke.

[underpants]

54. I was just about to post the same thing

:bounce: