A breath of fresh air

Rep. Dave Hunt, Oregon House Majority Leader, tonight had an interesting observation after the unanimous passage of the fire-safe cigarette legislation by the Oregon House.

Again, it passed unanimously in the 60 member chamber, where Democrats hold only a 31 to 29 majority over Republicans. Everybody, it seems, was for this law that requires tobacco companies to stop putting additives in cigarettes that keep them burning ... burning in couches, burning in beds, burning in bar stools ... where they smolder until the fabric catches fire and kills people.

The interesting observation by Rep. Hunt was that this legislation, that apparently everybody favors, has been out there for about 10 years. But if everybody was in favor of it, why did it take 10 years to vote on it?

Because the Republicans, when they were both in the majority and had their hands in the pocket of big tobacco, kept it from coming up for a vote. It was killed by then-Speaker of the House Karen Minnis, or then-Majority Leader Wayne Scott, or then- committee Chairman Alan Brown.

Note: Those were only the last of the usual suspects. Ten years. Five sessions of Oregon’s biennial legislature. There were others who stuffed this important legislation. Those were only the last.

It would be interesting to know how many people died in that 10 years, how many might have lived if those politicians responsible had not kept such an obviously good idea from coming to a vote.