Sullum, a senior editor at the libertarian Reason magazine and himself a nonsmoker, is dead set against a federal ban on cigarettes and other tobacco products. He's also against their further regulation, not because he thinks smoking is a good idea, but because he thinks that, under the specious guise of science, a moral crusade of 19th century dimensions is operating on the eve of the 21st. People do not choose to be sick, but they do choose to engage in risky behavior. The choice implies that the behavior, unlike a viral or bacterial infection, has value. Elementary child psychology, not to mention your grandmother's home wisdom, will confirm that the fastest way to get a child to do something is to tell him not to do it.
Nobody smokes without some benefit to themselves.
Sullum is not a polemicist, and he is not encouraging anyone who reads his book to rush out for a pack of Camels. He wants Americans to make health decisions on their own and for themselves, and he wants an end to smoking hysteria, which, as he vividly demonstrates, has come and gone at different times in history without any lasting result. Peter Kurth lives in Burlington, Vt. He is a regular contributor to Salon. All rights reserved.