And Slaters Go Plop

If you agree that cigarette smoking is something we’d rather be rid of I may have a possible solution:

Set a cut-off date for everyone to register their desire to have the right to buy cigarettes, issue all registered people with a card and make it illegal to buy cigarettes without one.

You could make it irrespective of age just in case you’ve go someone currently underage who is addicted.

Some people who are looking for an excuse to stop smoking will take the opportunity to decline registration as an incentive. Some people who don’t (or rarely) smoke will register just in case they want to in the future.

There will be the inevitable black market for cigarettes but I would imagine it would be tiny compared to the drug market due to the fact that starting smoking is a fairly stomach-churning business with little ‘pleasure incentive’ to pay the inflated black market prices and break the law.

Within a generation or two I would imagine only a few hobby smokers would remain and once everyone who originally registered for the card has died (presumably early) you make it illegal to buy or sell cigarettes. So few people would actually want to take up smoking that you’d not even have to bother policing it.

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The “I’m not really a fascist disclaimer”:
I came up with this idea when I was a full-time smoker myself. I figured that whether I wanted to continue smoking, find an incentive to quit or, if I’d already quit, have an incentive to keep from smoking again it would be a win-win situation.

I have a couple of issues with New Zealand’s current democratic system. The first is that the party that ends up in power is the one that 60% of New Zealand voted against in alliance with a party that 95% of people can’t stand and the second is that you can only vote once every three years.

Actually, make that three issues: Someone who has a criminal record has the same weight of vote as someone who has been nominated for an award for services to the community.

I believe it’s largely down to the technology we are using. In the days when all the votes had to be collected and driven by horse to the nearest centre to be counted it made sense to keep elections to a minimum just to save time and money. These days we have the technology to let everyone vote on every issue when ever they want.

How much would it cost for every house and post office to have a set-top box that provides a voting channel? Less than one election? You wouldn’t need political parties then – you’d just need a couple of good debating teams (hired and fired just like any other company) to present the issues put forward by the public.

What about some kind of voter-weighting system where everyone starts off with 100 points and you gain points, to a limit, for things that may make you a better voter (education, community awards, respect) and lose points for the opposite. The amount of points you have determine how much influence you have when voting.

Is this practicable?