First Smoking, Then Alcohol

I've long been a critic of smoking bans, warning that once the neo-Prohibitionists stamp out cigarettes, they will turn their attention to alcohol. In the UK, a recent study found that Social Smoking has been rising. Most respondents said they only smoke while drinking with other people. Typical anti-smoking piece, really, until I stumbled across an interesting sentence.

Stuck in the middle of the article this innocuous sentence: "Drinking therefore enabled them to 'binge smoke,' while also distancing them from this behaviour, so helping to maintain their 'non-smoker' persona."

The neo-Prohibitionists will likely seize on this.  "Alcohol causes people to smoke. When they smoke they get cancer and die. Logically, therefore alcohol causes you to get cancer and die."

When they start saying this, remember, I told you so.