The Lake News Online   • Guest column: E-cigarettes: savior or
menace to society?    • It's winter, and the poor smokers are
stuck out in the cold again.     • email print     They shiver
on windy street-corners, taking long drags, the better to get
the nicotine in their systems quickly and get back inside. They
huddle in doorways - though lots of businesses don't allow that
anymore.     It's one of the many punishments we pile on
smokers. We scold them constantly and make them pay outrageously
high taxes. They've been exiled from the places where smoking
used to bring the greatest pleasure: cafes, bars and
restaurants. At UMass Amherst, students have to go off campus to
legally light up, and that can be a long walk. Even parks and
beaches are now smoke-free.     It's not that we're sadistic.
But their habit imposes huge public health costs. Their
secondhand smoke is a danger and an irritation to everyone else
in the office. They are a bad example for our kids. And they
smell like ashtrays.     Our punishment