I’ve been a fan of the “powered tobacco leaf” cigar since I read it on another thread. If a snuff company was willing to try such an outlandish thing it would keep our noses happy in the event this crap passes…but think of all the poor snuff that would be smoked in ignorance!
According to the new law, what is the definition of “cigar”. Have they defined it or do they merely assume the definition. Because unless it is defined or there is an official definition specifically stated by say the Tobacco and Fire arms agency, then I am presently enjoying a very nice tin of Toque fine cut cigar. And you will have to spend a whole lot of money in court somewhere to say that it is in fact not what I am enjoying at all. Imagine a court room. The lawyer for snus and snuff stands and holds up a cigar. What is this he asks? If they cannot tell or say with certainty then they cannot say or tell with certainty that what we are selling is in fact not the same thing. We win. The category of cigar is non-determined and thus non-exclusive. If they say, “It’s a cigar” Then our wily lawyer remove a pair of scissors from his brief case cuts the cigar in half and asks, “if I take this cigar and cut it in half to share with a friend, is it still a cigar? What if I quarter it, is it still a cigar then? Now he removes a Tobacco grinder from his brief case and grinds one of the cigar quarters into flake consistency asking, “ If I chop it up is it still a cigar? What if I grind it into fine powder?” Then he smiles and says, my simple question to the court is this: at what point did the cigar stop being a cigar and become something else? And what is the measurable quantifiable nature of that change? Now the definition of a cigar can’t be based on use or intended use, can it? Last I checked the main use of a cigar was taste and smell (not inhalation like a cigarette) Now this is important because, taste puts cigars clearly in the category of an oral tobacco while smell puts it clearly in the category of a nasal tobacco, which in turn brings us back to my question: when did the cigar cease being a cigar? Is the federal court about to make it law that you MUST SMOKE or your cigar is illegal? Is PACT then in reality a mandated backdoor smoking policy? Didn’t the major producers of smoking tobacco in this country support this bill? It is the burden of the law makers to define what they mean by the laws they pass. It is not the responsibility of the constituency to guess or fill in what they mean. Roderick, Tom, David and the rest- get me a labeling gun and some sticky paper and I will solve this whole ordeal in 15 minutes.
Clove cigarettes were re-labeled as clove cigars. They are the same damn thing.
There obviously isn’t even a clear legal distinction between a “cigar” and a “cigarette” in the US. After the cigarette tax hike of early 2009, I’ve noticed an explosion of new “little cigar” brands this year – most of them filtered and with paper wrappings. They are a hell of a lot cheaper than cigarettes, because they are clearly labelled as … cigars. I see packs of 20 of these retailing for as low as $1.50 per pack. Appearance-wise, they are the same diameter and length as a cigarette, and they use the same filters one would find in cigarettes. The only visual difference is that the papers are brown in appearance. I see: cigarettes are white; “cigars” are brown. Gee, it certainly seems that a lot of smokers have switched from cigarettes to “little cigars.” @Carol: A local tobacco shop recently set up an entire display that covers half a wall, proudly showcasing their extensive selection of “clove cigars”. The proprietor happily explained to me that it has become his best selling product: “More brands than ever, and so much cheaper than the clove cigarettes that are now banned!”
It has been a while since I read this, but the legal definition of a cigar is something like tobacco wrapped in tobacco (sometimes that wrapper is a piece of “homoginized tobacco”, that is a sheet of brown paper like material made with some powdered tobacco in the slurry. If you wrap the same tobacco in paper it becomes a cigarette.
S. 1147: PACT Act (as amended 11/19) (B) EXCEPTION.—The term ‘cigarette’ does not include a cigar (as defined in section 5702 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986)…" Here is that wonderful little definition (a) Cigar ‘‘Cigar’’ means any roll of tobacco wrapped in leaf tobacco or in any substance containing tobacco (other than any roll of tobacco which is a cigarette within the meaning of subsection http://www.taxalmanac.org/index.php/Internal\_Revenue\_Code:Sec.\_5702.\_Definitions This is really great news. The definition provided is absolutely and utterly worthless from a legislative stand point. Let’s apply this same definition to “cars” to illustrate. (a) Car ‘‘Car’’ means any motorized vehicle with 4 tires or any motorized vehicle (other than any motorized vehicle which is a Motorcycle within the meaning of subsection So my 18 wheeler is a car, my riding lawnmower is a car, my 4 wheeler, my 747 jet, my moped, Backhoe, my kids battery operated G.I. Joe toy, my….my…my Get the point? Relabel your product and make them enforce this definition.
@kjoerup yuo the resident lawyer? that was good one. same goes for Snifs good points and ideas int his thread. i have been so wrappe dup in the threat to the 1st and second ammendments i totally missed the ‘PACT’ thing. thanks for the heads up. another thing for me to fight! im running out of cardboard and sticks! and my sharpies are all but dried up!
So, then, if portioned snus came in, say, an “homogenized” tea bag wrapper material, of which the tea bag-like wrapping material contains a bit of tobacco introduced during the tea bag-like manufacturing process, that snus is no longer in fact “snus” but rather a “cigar.” Thank you, PACT Act semantic authorities! Seriously. One of the mail order snuff vendors should introduce NOW a “powdered tobacco cigar,” i.e. “a roll of tobacco wrapped in leaf tobacco or in any substance containing tobacco, or paper containing traces of tobacco substance.” Someone really needs to have this new cigar type out there as a pre-existing product prior to the passage of the PACT Act. I’d certainly buy these cigars. Besides, aren’t they even taxed at a lower rate than “smokeless tobacco”? What a bargain! 
Yes, it all goes to show the sheer lunacy of taxing “different” tobacco products at different rates – and it conclusively demonstrates that the system is set up that way solely to protect specific market interests. Note that nowhere in the PACT definition of “cigar” does it specify the intended use of the product in question. Is it a “cigar” only if one smokes it? According to PACT, that is immaterial. These gaping loopholes exist simply because Big Tobacco can’t have it both ways, much as they’d like to. It all goes to show what gullible, led-through-the-nose idiots the Congressional and state “representatives” are. Here in Texas, the state jacked up tobacco taxes on top of the federal ones that kicked in April 1, 2009. Once again, Philip Morris USA was there to “helpfully” assist the Texas Legislature with writing this bill. And Philip Morris made damn sure that “cigars” were excepted because they didn’t want tax hikes to affect the sales of their precious Black and Mild cigars –- the cheap crap they push relentlessly in impoverished, mainly African-American neighborhoods. Much as they did with the federal SCHIP, Philip Morris sold the Texas Legislature on the bogus idea that the new tax revenue would fund rural physicians that would in turn “help children.” Of course Philip Morris knew in advance what the reality of this was going to be: lower cigarette sales (hence, lower tax revenue collected by the state) and increased “cigar” sales (which have a much lower tax rate). End result: Philip Morris USA is now making more profit than ever, and the state is now collecting LESS tax revenue than they were before the tobacco tax laws were rewritten. Individual politicians may well have benefitted from whatever piss ant “perks” PM threw their way, but the people of the state were screwed by this. (Sadly, most will still vote for the same damn politicians once they open their lying snapping turtle lips again about “protecting the children against bin Laden’s secondhand smoke” or some such nonsense.)
I got an email back from my buddy Russ Feingold: Dear Mr. Ross, Thank you for contacting me regarding S. 1147, the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act (PACT). I appreciate hearing from you. As you may know, S. 1147 was introduced by Senator Herb Kohl (D-WI) on May 21, 2009. The bill was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee, of which I am a member, but has not yet been considered. The bill would allow for easier enforcement of criminal laws intended to prevent the smuggling of cigarettes. Companion legislation was introduced in the House of Representatives by Representative Anthony Weiner (D-NY) on March 23, 2009. The full House passed the bill by a vote of 397-11 on May 21, 2009. Thank you again for contacting me. I will keep your views in mind should the Senate Judiciary Committee, or the full Senate, consider this or similar legislation. For more information about my work on behalf of Wisconsin, you can subscribe to my monthly e-newsletter by visiting http://feingold.senate.gov/newsletter.cfm. I look forward to hearing from you in the future. === If he votes it down, I’m personally mailing him some of my ISOM Cohibas.
we could probably get the whole bill shot down with enough cuban cigars
You know what would be fun… Grind up some cubans into a good strong snuff, and bribe one of the senate workers to fill the senate snuffboxes with it.
those boxes are still there… --Anxious in CA.
I read that the snuff boxes in the Senate Chamber are still regularly filled. I wonder how they obtain the snuff? Through the mail? If I were a snuff vendor, I would immediately contact the Senate, volunteering to donate snuff in order to contribute to the upkeep of this venerable U.S. Senate tradition. Ha! By doing that, one may even be able to persuade some doting, tradition-bound Senator to insert into PACT an exception to the mailing of nasal snuff. It would certainly be worth a shot, anyway. Also, if snuff companies volunteered to do the same thing… Hint: write directly to the office of Senator Robert Byrd. He has taken a special interest in the Senate snuffboxes, and has even written a pamphlet on their history. He also has the seniority and power to insert exceptions into PACT.
I think poison should put added to the boxes, for those bastards!!! Lotzbeck perle
There really should be a clause in there about snuff. It’s not like we are avoiding the taxes by purchasing online…it’s really the only way.
anyone want to go on a snuff-mailing spree to our senators? well, everyone but ibild, that is… I’ll take care of Feingold with some Cheese & Bacon. Just a thought, we should probably make sure everything is WELL LABELED AS BEING SNUFF TOBACCO, otherwise we’ll see a lot of “suspicious powder” reports on CNN.
I believe that Roderick had sent them some snuff some time ago.
Really? Did Roderick ever receive a reply or acknowledgment of receipt? I have an unopened tin of Honey Bee that I received as a bonus from Nicotine Rush. I’m willing to pass it on to the Senate.
Maybe then it’s time to make our presence known. We shall call it… The D.C. Snuff Party.
It may be politically difficult to except snus, snuff, or pipe tobacco. No one, neither Democrat nor main-stream Republican wants to be seen as a supporter of cigarette or chew (tobacco) use. Rather, how the law is enforced may become the greater issue, similar to the dual standard of powdered and crack cocaine. As has already been shown, a company can make minor modifications and relabel cigarettes to attempt to circumvent regulation by taxation. When the assault weapons ban was put into force, the real focus was fully automatic firearms, and many workarounds that could have been closed on semi-automatic were left open. At the run up to that legislation, there was mass hysteria and assault weapons sales skyrocketed. With good money, you can legally buy a semi-automatic firearm today, more than eight years after a Democrat, Clinton, was elected. Likewise, even after the expiration of the assault weapons ban, you cannot legally buy a fully automatic gun without law enforcement restricted SWAT departmental credentials. The bottom line is that I hope that there will not be aggressive enforcement against non cigarette/RYO pipe tobacco and off-the-radar snuff. With respect to votes, the issue is already settled. When the 'conservative, Joe NRA House of Representatives vote is lop-sided, the discussion is over.