turning smokers into cash cows (and how to fight back)

I have been rolling my own on and off for a long time, since the 60's and while in college. About a decade or more ago I began to roll my own again. Years ago I made my own rolling machine with jumbo straws and then had been using the rotary-handle tube fillers and could roll packs very quickly and cheaply.

Since moving to Mexico almost six years ago they do not sell loose tobacco except some pipe blends. Cigarettes have been cheap until this year when they decided to raise the tax - probably to fund their drug war. Cigarettes are still chep by US and Canada standards, about $30us per carton = 10 packs = 200 cigarettes. That is a high price here though, so now some enterprising individuals come around the neighborhoods selling cigs for about $9us per carton of brands that I never heard of - and they are actually quite good - but come from India and Vietnam and such places. (BTW they sell these in Mexican pesos but I roughly converted the prices to US dollars).

There are tobaccos that grow wild in just about every place I've been in the US and Mexico. This wild tobacco is not the best smoke but it doesn't taste half bad and works. Some 20 years ago I switched from non-filter cigs to menthol. Not every place had menthols or menthol tobacco so I started buying menta (Spanish word for mint or menthol flavor) and douse my cigs with that. I am thinking about trying some homemade herbal blends with coltsfoot, mullein, perhaps a mix of wild tobacco, and other smokables then dousing them with menta as it seems that's what I'm more hooked on these days.

I love to smoke and don't care to give it up. If you're not a smoking addict you really don't understand and I really can't explain it to you.

reply to post by topherman420


hmmm I have peroxide kicking around, I'm gunna try that actually, seems like a good easy fix that is non-toxic (only mutagenic to cells I'll be rid of soon enough anyways).

reply to post by TheLastStand


I use the toothpaste with fluoride, Would never even think about trying out the bleach. I just brush my fingers and nails like I would my teeth, If you're lucky they'll whiten after on go.

reply to post by Erongaricuaro


Actually a friend of mine was experimenting one day and rolled a mint leaf duby. LOL. It didn't taste half bad. Maybe chuck some of that in to add a bit of a flavor? My fiancee smokes menthols so I have a subject who'll volunteer for this experiment.

Can you actually believe the trash canada is peddling off as smokes (you ever try a canadian smoke recently?) and for the price they ask? I would expect nothing but the best at the king's ransom they charge and yet generally even premium brands end up not even achieving mediocre quality. It's sad really. Guess you can't miss it if you didn't ever get to try it. This is why I think helping those mooches out there would be a good thing, some peope will get it, and ordering from the web is easy enough, a prepaid credit card and mailing address and they are all set.

I didn't actually really enjoy a smoke till last night. Though that burly on it's own is rough in a smoke, lol. The virginia too bland. Blend it just right and it's great stuff, very pleasant to smoke. I find myself having a habit of spitting when I smoke canadian smokes, but not with these.

Originally posted by Serizawa

Originally posted by James1982
I've completely switched to e-cigs now. I give zero dollars to the government or big tobacco. I spend less money, and I don't inhale nasty chemicals. Win-win situation!

The best part about smoking is lighting them up and flicking them out when your done, E-cig=FAIL.

Laying in bed dying of lung cancer = FAIL

To each their own, I'm not preaching or anything. Personally the feel of the smoke in your lungs is what I like about smoking, and the E-Cig delivers on that for me. Plus I'm spending less than 1/4th of what I used to buying normal cigarettes.

reply to post by TheLastStand


They have passed a bill to regulate E-cigs, but who knows how they are going to do it. I'm sure they will find a way to tax it somehow, but it gets pretty complicated.

You can buy the vaporizer by itself, with no nicotine, so I don't know how they can tax what is basically an electronic device.

They could tax the juice, but that's not too straightforward either. You can get zero nicotine juice, all the way up to 38mg nicotine juice. Then you can get just basic nicotine extract that goes all the way up to 100mg strength. So if they just have a flat tax on any juice containing nicotine, then people will just buy the really strong stuff and cut it down with more glycerin and flavoring, which will cause a lot of revenue loss. The most logical way to me seems like taxing based on how much nicotine is in it. A flat tax per mg would cover everything pretty well. Then again, you can always buy nic juice from China, have them tear the label off, and call it glycerin, and be tax free. Overall trying to tax ecigs just seems like its destined for failure, there would be so many easy ways around it.

The thing that's more upsetting about the tax isn't the money itself, but the purpose. There is a lot of speculation on the big tobacco companies getting into e-cigs. Several of the big ecig makers have reported large sales to various tobacco companies, making it seem like they are testing them out and planning to reverse engineer them, and make their own.

My idea is the tobacco companies are pushing for ecig regulation, so that all the small retailers that make their own juice, and small manufacturers would be put out of business because they can't afford the price of licensing of whatever else the FDA has planned. Thus paving the way for big tobacco to release their own version, with very little competition left.

Time will tell, though.

Canada On October 1, 2005, Canada became the first country to implement a nationwide cigarette fire safety standard. The law requires that all cigarettes manufactured in or imported into Canada must burn their full length no more than 25% of the time when tested using ASTM International method E2187-04: Standard Test Method for Measuring the Ignition Strength of Cigarettes. The law is based on the New York State legislation. Each year in Canada, fires started by smokers' materials kill approximately 70 people and cause 300 injuries, according to a study conducted by the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs.[26]

Some useful information taken from here.....

In fact, in canada this chemical is mandated, so what I would really like to know that, as well as view the msds of that, as well I would like to know why it's worth poisoning the 25% of canadians that smoke (millions of people), for a measly 70 deaths and 300 injuries?

How about native smokes which of their brands has this chemical?

I"m gunna go have a coffee... thinking about that though, soon they will tax the coffee for whichever excuse they come up with that it's not healthy. This is what government does, we should draw the line at the point where all things in nature are FREE OF CHARGE and made plentifully by the people, and that is what our school's ought to be teaching people to do. To look after themselves and then to serve the community, not the other way around (serve the community first then have the community maybe serve you your own survival back).