When I was a boy, smoking was cool. Actors and athletes smoked. So did everyone's parents. We had a smoking court at high school. Heck, my family doctor smoked during an exam.

Then people started to understand how bad smoking was. Studies validated the fears. Smoking was far more dangerous than anyone realized. The government made tobacco companies put warnings on cigarette packs and stop advertising on TV.

Smoking is still more popular than health advocates want. But studies and warnings and statistics validate the danger and people can make up their own mind if they choose to light up. However, second hand smoke is proving to be as dangerous as a two pack a day habit and over the last 20 years most workplaces have banned smoking.

The glaring exception has been restaurants and especially bars. Most smokers and business owners fought any ban by claiming smokers have the right to smoke while they eat and drink. Ironically, in most of those places you can't get an underdone hamburger.

But recently, local governments have started to include eating establishments in the laws, protecting people who work in those places, too. When major cities like Chicago, Austin, and San Francisco enacted laws prohibiting smoking in all work areas, they noticed an increase in business in the last refuge of the smoker, bars and restaurants. It seems non smokers will more than replace the smokers who stop eating out.

As usual, much of South Carolina proudly lags behind the rest of the country where personal health is involved. While Columbia and Richland County have outlawed smoking in public places, including restaurants and bars, the city of Irmo has rejected such laws, and Lexington County is trying to ignore the idea and hope it will go away.

A few food and drink business owners are at least honest about their motives. They are afraid smokers will go away if they aren't allowed to smoke while they eat, and bars and such will lose revenue. Many others defend smoking as a right, an example of freedom.

If we were talking about any other poison or dangerous substance there wouldn't even be a discussion. Ever heard a building owner talking about his rights when told he has to replace asbestos? How about someone with HIV or hepatitis demanding to be allowed to serve food as an occupation? In our current hysteria over Swine Flu, has an infected salesman demanded to be allowed to mingle with the public because he might lose money if quarantined?

Of course not. Yet smoking accounts for more deaths each year than all these scary things combined. It seems very simple to decide. Constant exposure to cigarette smoke causes numerous health problems. People who work for a living shouldn't be forced to breathe this stuff eight hours a day. And in every other workplace, this is a law.

Yet, people who wait tables, tend bar, and sing in such places aren't included in all such laws. The question is simple. Do we poison workers so smokers can light up at their table or not? Nothing else matters in this argument. Nothing.