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| • | "Fran Lebowitz has emerged as the leader of New York's most-oppressed, least-organized minority - smokers. The social satirist took on Mayor Bloomberg and his Draconian new propsals to ban smoking from all bars, restaurants, public parks and beaches, Wednesday on NY1's 'Inside City Hall.' 'It's absurd. It's childish. It's peevesh . . . pious . . . anti-urban . . . anti-democratic . . . and hypocritical,' Lebowitz told host Andrew Kirtzman. 'And I don't believe the data on second-hand smoke anyway. I'm 51 years old, and I have never known anyone who died from sitting next to someone smoking in a restaurant.' Lebowitz ranted that whether she smokes or not - and where - is 'none of Bloomberg's business.' She added that the billionaire mayor had a 'poor understanding of democracy' and criticized his paternalistic behavior: 'Mayor Bloomberg is acting like my father . . . If he is my father, I hope I am in the will.' Also targeted by Lebowitz was the mayor's proud claim that 47 percent fewer cigarettes are being sold in the city since he raised taxes and propelled the price of a pack of smokes to $7. Lebowitz countered, 'It's just that 50 percent fewer people are buying their cigarettes in New York. We're New Yorkers! We know how to find things cheap.' According to Kirtzman, 'There's the big anti-smoking brigade, but there hasn't been a visible leader representing the smokers. Fran volunteered to do just that. She was on fire.' Among Lebowitz's other bon mots: 'If you believe secondhand smoke kills you, you should ban cars, because what's lethal in smoke is carbon monoxide. Take a look outside. What do you think that is, cigarette smoke? That's from cars'", New York Post, Page Six gossip column, Aug. 16, '02 |