FDA to unleash nationwide SWAT raids on vaping stores? Huge regulatory assault now imminent

Friday, May 06, 2016 by: J. D. Heyes
Tags: vaping, FDA, SWAT raids

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(NaturalNews) The Food and Drug Administration's massive regulations covering tobacco and smoking should have been enough to satisfy the agency, but no – when Americans began turning to what many believe is a safer alternative, e-cigarettes, the little Stalins at the agency just couldn't leave well enough alone.

In a recently released statement, the FDA claims it is acting on behalf of Americans' public health safety, noting:

Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration finalized a rule extending its authority to all tobacco products, including e-cigarettes, cigars, hookah tobacco and pipe tobacco, among others. This historic rule helps implement the bipartisan Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act of 2009 and allows the FDA to improve public health and protect future generations from the dangers of tobacco use through a variety of steps, including restricting the sale of these tobacco products to minors nationwide.

[As an aside, this is what makes Congress' complaints about federal agency overreach so empty and hypocritical – as the FDA states, the agency was free to develop and implement this rule after being given the authority to do so in the 2009 law, rather than Congress setting the rules and parameters for e-cig use. But I digress.]

If you weren't aware that there was an "epidemic" of e-cigarette and pipe tobacco sales to minors, don't worry – you're not alone. Only the FDA seems to think so.

Nanny State to the rescue

"We have more to do to help protect Americans from the dangers of tobacco and nicotine, especially our youth. As cigarette smoking among those under 18 has fallen, the use of other nicotine products, including e-cigarettes, has taken a drastic leap. All of this is creating a new generation of Americans who are at risk of addiction," said HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell. "Today's announcement is an important step in the fight for a tobacco-free generation – it will help us catch up with changes in the marketplace, put into place rules that protect our kids and give adults information they need to make informed decisions."

[More hypocrisy: As part of the FDA's new rules, anyone wishing to purchase covered tobacco products must produce a photo ID – but does this exclude illegal immigrants, or is it only when they go to vote that you know, it's considered "racist," "unfair" and "bigoted"?]

As USA Today reported further, the new FDA actions erect a labyrinth of regulatory controls that will, naturally, make it much more difficult and expensive for companies to bring otherwise legal products to the market:

The Tobacco Control Act of 2009 sets Feb. 15, 2007, as the latest date by which all tobacco products would have to have to be grandfathered in. Mitch Zeller, head of the FDA's Center for Tobacco Products, has said publicly that he couldn't choose a later date, although industry officials disagree.

That means nearly every e-cigarette on the market — and every different flavor and nicotine level — would require a separate application for federal approval. Each application could cost $1 million or more, says Jeff Stier, an e-cigarette advocate with the National Center for Public Policy Research and industry officials.

What "land of the free"?

Stores that sell these products have just three months to comply, while the companies that make them have two years to come up with their $1-per-product applications.

But the authoritarianism of the Left doesn't stop there. Leave it to Gov. Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown of California and the Democrat-run legislature to weigh in with – wait for it – new bans on vaping in the same public places where smoking is banned, although vaping was supposed to greatly reduce the dangers of second-hand cigarette smoke.

The Daily Sheeple poses the question, is this new rule now going to result in FDA raids of e-cigarette and other tobacco dealers? After all, it's one of at least 40 unelected, bureaucratic agencies with heavily armed SWAT units.

Face it, Americans – any and all personal behavior decisions are soon going to be made by an all-powerful central bureaucracy in D.C., because us lowly subjects are too stupid to make such decisions for ourselves. Still think we live in the "land of the free"?

Sources:

DailySheeple.com

FDA.gov

USAToday.com

LATimes.com

PopSci.com

Science.NaturalNews.com