[Preechr]

Personally and seriously... more or less... I would have to say that there are different sorts of addictions, and the birth defects associated with addictive substances such as crack WAY overshadow whatever might come from any residual effects of smoking tobacco while pregnant.

That being said, I feel that doing anything that might jeopardize the health of an expected baby is morally repugnant, smoking tobacco included. I don't see it as complicated an issue as goat does, however, though I can see many more layers of complexity being involved than he has so far mentioned.

As Kahl is alluding, you have to factor in for the long-term effect on all Americans when you start splitting hairs with restricting liberties. If you can't smoke when your pregnant, then you shouldn't drive when you are depressed and you shouldn't answer the phone when you've had a few cocktails. Does the health of a baby somehow make a crime more criminal? What about the dozen or so lives we could save by stopping a moron with a deathwish from driving around looking for a fuel truck or the hundreds of pensioners we could protect by discouraging a would be phone-scammer?

I work with kids with birth defects every day. I know that some of the moms and dads I help are directly responsible for the problems their kids have. You want to talk about complicated situations? Is it better for a child to live with or without his natural parents when their crack addiction caused his CP? Even when it is known that this cause and effect exists, the laws we have now will place that child back in those hands within six months of birth, generally.

And you want to talk about tobacco?

When I see people debating such mamby-pamby crap as public smoking, and yes, even whatever should we do about moms that smoke, all I see is perfectly useful intelligence wasted. While you guys are fretting yourselves to death over nothing, not only are millions of children in Africa failing to survive the AIDS/Machete gauntlet they are born into, little children in your own backyards are suffering due to much bigger mistakes that, unfortunately, have no impact on the air quality at your local juice bars.

[/highhorse]