What's Up With... Banning Smoking in New York State Prisons

So the Pataki administration wants to ban smoking in New York state prisons by 2001. According to the New York Times, the plan applies to all 70,000 inmates as well as 30,000 state prison employees, and will be phased in gradually: "Inmates' smoking will be limited to housing units starting Jan. 1, 2000. No smoking will be allowed in day rooms and television rooms of medium- and minimum-security prisons, and maximum-security inmates will be allowed to smoke in cell blocks, galleries, and tiers. Starting July 1, inmates will only be able to smoke in their assigned sleeping areas, and starting Jan. 1, 2001, smoking will be prohibited inside all state prisons." Outside areas like exercise yards are exempt.

In explanation, the authorities cite the potential dangers of tobacco smoke in enclosed spaces. They will be offering-- patriarchal benificence!-- nicotine patches and stop-smoking programs.

OK, question: YOU GUYS WANT A FUCKING RIOT? Everybody knows that smoking is bad for you, but c'mon-- taking away one of the, like, two daily pleasures a poor inmate can look forward to self-administering? Can't inmates be allowed to focus on the smoking issue after they've, quote, settled their debt to society and perhaps cleared a little mindshare for some next steps in self-improvement?

To weigh in with your opinion on this, go straight to the message boards. (And do not collect $200.)

What's Up With... Our Own Attitude About Summer Movie Merchandising?

We suddenly realized last week how over those Virgin Atlantic/Austin Powers billboards we were-- you know, "Virgin Shaglantic." Our smile had already faded for the Austin Powers Heinekin ads, and the Austin Powers-Starbucks tie-in seemed stupid to start with. That's why, despite the relative success of the Austin Powers merchandising program as a piece business strategy-- you know, matching products and promotions to demographics and putting them in the market at the right time-- we were all set to write a nasty piece about how annoying movie tie-ins are.

Then, on Friday, our Inspect Gadge dolls arrived. Disney sent two over by messenger. We ripped open the box and immediately yanked the plastic watch serving as Inspector Gadget's belt from around his waist and stuck it on our wrist. With that slightly dangerous eagerness of kids on Christmas morning, we started twirling the propellers on his hat, and extending and unfolding his legs, one of which opens into a pair of pliers, the other of which contains an LED signaller light. We tugged and twisted the arms, and were delighted to find that one of them functions as a water gun! Giggling we ran to the sink, charged the gun, and went around the office attacking Platform co-workers.

The best feature: the front of Inspector Gadget's chest is a "secret communicator." It comes off and kinda flips open like a cell phone; you press the hidden red button and it goes "weee-ooo, weee-ooo," or "doodle-oodle-oot, doodle-oodle-oot," and stuff like that. We sure wish the talk-activated Samsung flip-phone we just bought were in the shape of a man's coat breast with shirt-and-tie.

The Gadget dolls-- excuse us, action figures-- provided us with at least three-and-a-half minutes of uncomplicated, care-free entertainment. They're part of a McDonald's promotion, in which you get a different chunk of the figure each week with the purchase of a Happy Meal, for eight weeks, until you have the whole thing. (The figures arrived with coupons for a McDonald's Quarter Pounder With Cheese, by the way.) We'd seen the trailer for Inspector Gadget and hadn't yet decided whether the film is a charming Jim Carry-meets-Tim Burton thing, or whether it's just plain weird. The former, we now suspect.

We're still basically neg on summer movie tie-in shit. The Tarzan and Phantom Menace stuff looks deeply lame. But if someone were to send us, say, a Wild Wild West giant mechanical tarantula, we'd probably be pretty happy-- at least for three-and-a-half minutes.