No matter what the definition of “pursuit”, it doesn’t help your argument.  Both definitions are detrimental to your argument, which ever way you look at it.  “Pursuing game” in the happiness context means “seeking happiness” and in the “pursuing a career” sense it would mean “engaged in happiness”.  The differnce between “seeking happiness” and “engaged in happiness” is a nuance and the distinction is not relevant to this discussion anyway since it doesn’t help you either way.  Either way, the outcome is the same.

Furthermore, the “pursuit of happiness” is not from any sort of law, anyway.  It is from the Declaration of Independence, which holds no legal authority except to memorialize the colonists’ break with Great Britain.  Nothing in there has the effect of a consitutional guarantee, law passed by Congress, judicial precedent, executive order, ratified treaty, etc.  Thus your reference to a “right” to “pursue happiness” is NOT properly applied because you assert it as though it is codified in some manner beyond its actual scope.  I’m not saying it is a completely irrelevant document–just that the Declaration of Independence must be used in a manner more like the Federalist papers or the Anti-Federalist Papers, which themselves are not the law of the land, and certainly neither is the Declaration of Independence.  You can argue this all you want but, as John Adams said, “facts are stubborn things”.

One purpose, among others, for the founding of this country was for inalienable right to “the pursuit of happiness” (not a Constitutionally guaranteed right) but this is not the law of the land, as you pretend it is. 

You yourself eliminated the health risks argument and averred that you are an oddity (both by directly stating it and by describing how you took an exam which sounds similar in nature to an SAT in a gas mask to shield you from evil smokers in the room–thats just plainly unbelievable and I haven’t quite decided yet whether you are a lunatic, a liar, or both.

Therefore the sole authority you use is this “pursuit of happiness”.  Your argument falls apart when you disqualify this sole authority upon which you base the premise of banning OUTDOOR smoking.

But smokers, please just accept that tobacco smoke – and particularly stale tobacco – STINKS. You probably don’t realise it because your senses are dulled, but if you ever quit – and can smell again – you will be shocked. 7 years on, I still apologise to some friends for stinking of smoke back in the day.

Obama doesn’t have a “plan for a nationwide smoking ban” … don’t link to someone’s blog comments about what they think they heard or know about “Obama’s plan” … if you’re gonna play a journalist on the Internet, then act like one and use verifiable source documents.

Now, with that behind us, three simple points: (a) I agree, the whole issue pisses me off; private establishments should be free to set their own rules and customers and employees can come or go as they wish, (b) what Obama said on 9/26/2007 was that he would prefer local rules but would support a federal law if the local efforts were inadequate, (c) you’re implying that the plan he doesn’t have would include a ban on outdoor smoking; there is NO reason to believe this or isn’t the case

I’ll be voting for Obama anyway; the nicotine nazi thing is not going to be stopped by McCain, Obama (both of whom have been smokers) or anyone else … it’s even becoming a pain in the ass to have a smoke in China, where ten years ago you could do more or less whatever the hell you wanted, so long it wasn’t critical of “the party”

Here’s a link to the transcript of the debate where he made the comments:
http://www.cfr.org/publication/14313/

I used the term “hypersensitive” sarcastically because Mr. Miniter called me that, and his sheer insensitivity angered me, not because I believe I am an “oddity”. I believe I am far from the only one who is made ill by second hand smoke (cf., Jill D’s post). That I am made ill is nowhere part of my argument, only a counter to those who claim there is no harm in smoking. Your smoke *does* annoy me, however, and here I am not only not an oddity, I am in the majority! When you annoy the majority sufficiently you constitute a public nuisance. There have always been laws requiring that public nuisances be abated even if (especially if) the people causing the problem deny that it is one.

I wore the gas mask because I was required to pass a standardized written test as a condition of employment. It was given only a few times a year in places chosen by the examiners. People were allowed to smoke cigarettes in the examination room. Once the test started we could not leave, except for a break every hour before a new section was issued. We were all nervous (our jobs were on the line). Nervous smokers chain smoke. The air was unbreathable. An hour of that and I would have been blind with pain and totally unable to think or answer test questions. How considerate of you to call that “stupid”.

*I* am being selfish? You want to pleasure yourself at my expense and *I* am selfish? That attitude is precisely why we have to resort to the law to require YOU to be a better person (as opposed to a sadist).

Your right to swing your fist ends at my nose. So does your right to smoke.

Lets establish another important definition crucial to or understanding of the subject matter:

Oddity: an odd person, thing, event, or trait i.e. Bill N.

The “pursuit of happiness” means precisely what it says. You cannot substitute the word “practice” for “pursuit”. They mean totally different things. As an avowed proponent of the second ammendment, I am surprised that you would stoop to such charlattanism as changing the meaning of words like others have done to the “right to bear arms”. Pursuit means that everyone should be afforded the opportunity to attain happiness, or restated that the government should not hinder one’s ability to pursue happiness. Its very different from what you say. You have a right to a climate or environment within which yuo CAN attain happiness–the government is not obligated to make you happy.

Nevertheless, by your own confession, you are a hypersensitive oddity (…I am just hypersensitive.”) For increased clarity, what you said is equivalent to saying “just I am hypersensitive” which means that it is only you that is hypersensitive. “Hypersensitive” itself means that you are abnormally, to an extreme, sensitive. So just you are abnormally, to an extreme, senstive to smoke. You also don’t believe that second-hand smoke poses the risk of cancer as the second-hand smoke ninnies claim (”I am not afraid of getting cancer because of your smoke.”) Granted these circumstances stated in your very own words, you are being extremely selfish in demanding I, who is very normal, live in the bubble because you are the oddity who is invonveniences by my pursuit of happiness (which, evidently, is not as important as yours).

Unless you were undergoing fire-fighter training or military training, I have no idea why in the world you would need to sit in a gas mask for an hour in a smoke filled room–especially when you are hypersensitive to smoke. It sounds like a stupid thing to involve one’s self with smoke given your abnormality. If I’m an abnormal person allergic to bee stings, I don’t go and grab numerous bees with my fingers and self sting myself as you appear to be doing by sitting in smoke. And if I’m an oddity allergic to bee stings, I don’t proclaim that we need to do a genocide of the bees just for my own individual benefit as an oddity of the world. However, I am not the oddity and you actually are one, and as an oddity of the world, you are trying to pretend you are normal and that you are entitled to happiness under the consitution, rather than a pursuit of it, all of which are wrong and extremely selfish.

And if you were an honest person, you would take a hard look at yourself and change yourself to be a better person rather than the bitter disingenuous person you are.