In response to the July 11 editorial "Local Control: If the State Won't Act, the County Should Ban Smoke":

It surprises me that the Post-Gazette refuses to allow facts to stand in the way of its tirades against smokers.

Myron Cope is a retired sportscaster.

You were presented with scientific fact, gift-wrapped in a letter from Marc J. Schneiderman, M.D., who stated that, although he does not recommend use of tobacco, the largest study to date has shown no significant relationship between secondhand smoke and cancer -- or, I think it logically follows, between secondhand smoke and any disease of the PG's choice. For all I know, the PG fears smokers will cause an outbreak of beriberi or mad cow disease.

Anyhow, within days of Dr. Schneiderman's letter, there followed (with no mention of the study he cited) your latest demand that smokers be banished by law from all public workplaces.

Don't you like that broad study because it was conducted in Europe? Not Iraq or within the confines of Steubenville -- Europe. Does not your editorial writer recognize Europe? It's a continent.

At any rate, you are now trying to support your preconceived notions by citing blatherings from the surgeon general whose opinions -- without a shred of fact -- were spread across your front page.

The U.S. surgeon general carries a highfalutin title but performs no surgery of an official nature -- not even an appendectomy. However, a few surgeons general got into self-promoting.

In 1964 Luther Terry made himself mildly known by smacking smokers. Eighteen years passed before pointy-bearded C. Everett Koop (there's a handle!) remembered Terry's gig and used it to get on the speech circuit.

Now, 24 years later, you fall back on the current surgeon general's nonfindings and your usual variety of statistics that invariably are round numbers. As journalists, do you never smell a rat in round numbers?

At any rate, you then publish an essay under -- in large print -- the names Paulraj Samuel, M.D., and Amber Samuel, M.D., who pronounce the surgeon general "the highest-ranking public health official in our country."

They cite the surgeon general's report as the last word and tell us of Pittsburgh's beauty canceled out by their being consumed by "what health hazards lurk in a nearby puff of smoke." There goes Mount Washington!

In any case, it is important, when speaking of studies to know who commissioned them. The recipients of these grants know who -- and usually deliver the grantor's desired result, else they'll never get another grant.

Also, never mind the PG's tireless references to the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, et al. Bureaucracies all. Get cousin Louie a job over there writing press releases citing "studies" and round figures on secondhand smoke.

Smokers, head for your basements! The health Nazis, who never let fact stand in their way, are after us as never before in their ignominious past.