Mr. Pruett, I have to agree with Ken and most other people against the proposed ban. It is a very big freedom issue. I can refrain from smoking in public places, but it should be a business owner's decision, not a government one. People are allowing the government more and more control over our lives every day.

We read stories of laws that would make spanking your child illegal. I lobbied against a law several years ago that would have made "causing your child emotional distress" illegal, which really boiled down to, if you yelled at your child/teenager, for any reason, and they got upset, you could lose your kids and go to jail for "abuse".

We as Americans must prevent our government from becoming 'too big', any issue that takes away the power of choice or freedom of any kind from the people should be examined thoroughly and protested if necessary. It is our job as Americans to do so.

On the smoking issue, businesses already have the choice of allowing or prohibiting it and the patrons have the choice of frequenting a business or going elsewhere. I don't believe anything else needs to be done by the government. Let the people decide.

http://www.rwjf.org/about/annualreportli...

Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, M.D., M.B.A.

President and Chief Executive Officer

An answer to your question: Where's the movement to get Twinkies taken off the shelves and what about coke?

Nancy Cummings/Opinion Page/12-5-07/ Quote-"In an ideal world there would be 100 percent voluntary compliance. But, because we do not live in an ideal world, policies are necessary". Those words sounded familiar and since you expressed concern about Twinkies and cokes: I thought you should be fore-warned. These people are well funded, organized, and know how to go about getting what they want. Especially if you don't agree with them! I would have thought from Germany in the 1930's, people would know better than to mess with social engineering. No matter how well intentioned, it's a slippery slope. There is now an entire generation that was raised with this type of mindset. They leave their critical thinking at the door and believe anything that has statistics attached to it. So, here are my three questions. Can you buy a twinke and coke at the local high school for lunch: if that's what you want? Is this foundation connected to the Johnson & Johnson Company that makes millions selling products to stop smoking? And as a reporter, can you get people to stop saying ban and policies, when they are talking about creating a LAW? Stop sugar coating it! Bans and policies can be ignored. A LAW carries punitive consequences.

Partial reprint of the

2006 Annual Report

We Will Reverse the Epidemic of Childhood Obesity

Unless we turn back the epidemic of obesity at its point of origin--among our children--our society will pay a terrible human and financial price for as far out into the future as we can see.

As a result, the United States is on the threshold of powerful and necessary social change propelled by our collective instinct to survive. This is not new to Americans. We've stood here before and we've changed before--and in ways that look like they will be sustained.

In 1965, 43 percent of us smoked cigarettes.17

Today only 20.9 percent of us light up.18

In 1982, drunk drivers killed about 22,000 people.

In 2005, the toll had fallen to just over 12,000.19

In 1983, only 24 percent of us used seatbelts.20

Today 82 percent of us buckle up.21

These statistics tell a story of radical transformations in individual behavior that were impossible to achieve without simultaneous policy, social and cultural change. The lives saved are countless and the misery avoided is incalculable, all because the country chose to change to survive.

Now it is time to do it again, and the stakes are even higher.

When David Satcher was Surgeon General, he said, "Overweight and obesity may soon cause as much preventable disease and death as cigarette smoking."22

A controversial prophesy, certainly, but one America cannot afford to ignore. The growing body of evidence is too powerful. Accordingly, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is taking action.

We believe the significant threat calls for a substantial investment that will help set the national agenda for change and will provoke significant increases in other private and public investment.

So the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation will spend $500 million over the next five years to help reverse the epidemic of childhood obesity.

We must be bold enough to expect permanent, sustainable results by 2015, with benefits to the population, health care and the economy extending deep into this century.

Our approach is direct, practical and strong:

* First, make the case--with solid research and objective evidence--for the problem, what works to roll it back and what doesn't. We will need as much effort on the community level as on the policy and industry level.

* Second, test and retest the best approaches, then widely install the most promising models as a firewall against the epidemic's further spread. A pile of bricks does not equal a wall. So, this will require that each of the most important approaches be integrated to have the full effect.

* Third, educate and motivate our leaders and invest in advocacy to foster change.

And build a resource base big enough to match the enormity of the problem. How will we know it is working? We'll know when the evidence tells us so. Next to adequate and sustained funding for programs that work, it is evidence we need more than anything else, evidence that establishes:

* How to get kids to eat well and physically move more;

* What school and family actions work best;

* That industry's interest in healthier lifestyles and eating habits is sincere and produces innovations that work; and

* That government "gets it," with realistic and responsive policies and budgets.

Our commitment is ambitious. With it comes risk and resistance. But it is a commitment the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation was invented to make. Our experience and the evidence command us to make it now. As we progress, it is essential that we understand the epidemic itself and its effect on each of us and on all of us.

I guess [that] I have four questions. Does any of this sound familiar?