I have a couple new pieces out, one long and one short, both related to smoke. First, the long one. For Arc Digital, I wrote an in-depth feature on the future of tobacco. It covers a lot of ground, drawing on visits to Philip Morris’s research headquarters in Switzerland and the Snus and Matchsticks Museum in Stockholm. It also looks at FDA regulation in the United States, the fate of e-cigarettes, and the cultural dysfunction in professional tobacco control. An excerpt:

The future of tobacco is very much up for grabs. It’s a struggle over not just what kinds of tobacco and nicotine products people consume, but also who is allowed to produce and sell them. As the age of the cigarette comes to an end, corporations that spent the previous century merchandizing that deadly product are politically and financially well-positioned to seize the market for safer alternatives. Ironically, laws and regulations supported by anti-smoking groups have paved the way toward a future that may once again belong to Big Tobacco.

The shorter piece is about the wildfire smoke that’s currently blanketing Portland. We’ve had some of the most hazardous air in the world for the past week, so residents are being urged to avoid being outside as much as possible. But there’s one group that an archaic state law has put in harm’s way:

Parts of Oregon this week achieved the distinction of having the worst air quality in the world. Due to the wildfires, the air quality index rating for Portland exceeded 500, which is literally off the charts. (Anything over 150 is considered “unhealthy” and anything over 300 is “hazardous.”) The Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration has urged employers to shut down outdoor work activity when possible. Despite this, there’s still one group of workers needlessly spending their days outdoors: the station attendants who pump drivers’ gasoline because of Oregon’s ban on self-service fueling.