A 'note' of caution.

(Appologies for the formatting in these posts. Portugese Blogger is difficult)

An excellent idea has been doing rounds in the blogosphere recently. Promoted by, amongst
others, Dick Puddlecote and Leg-Iron is the idea that we smokers should stamp all
our banknotes with the words, "Handled by Smokers".

We've all heard the tale that most paper money contains a trace of cocaine. Cocaine is so
widely used and a lot of users snort the stuff off a bank note, so the theory could well
be a possibility. True or not, what is important is that people beleive it.

The "Handled by Smokers" idea is a play on the cocaine theme. If banknotes can be tainted
with drugs, they can also be tainted with third hand smoke, a substance much more dangerous.

It's simple yet ingenious in it's possibilities for wreaking hovoc amongst the
righteous anti-smokers.

They really will beleive anything these days. Convince them that money is tainted by third
hand smoke (not a dificult task) and you will have them refusing cash in shops, barring
their kids from handling money and eventually, calling for something to be done.

And that's where I see this hilarious prank going tits up.

There is nothing modern governments want more than a cashless society.

Cash is the last remaining "bearer bond". If you remove cash from the equation you are
only left with electronic means of money transfers and payments.

Electronic payments can be easily tracked and easily taxed where applicable.

Lets say you come and fix my car for thirty quid as a favour. If I pay you in cash it's
yours. If I pay you electronically, the government can take their twenty five percent.

In a truly cashless society we would all have to have little card readers to give and take
payment. The government would not even have to bill us for tax, they could just take it
automatically when we elecronically exchange money.

It wouldn't only mean total tax compliance, it would also be a perfect system to trace
every citizen.

Even if you were totally innocent, your cash card could put you at the scene of a serious
crime, subjecting to to the inevitable DNA test and police interrogation.

The governemnt wants this. As freedom loving people, we do not.

I mused on the possibilities of a cashless socielty long before I began blogging. Back in
those days I imagined the means the government would use would be drugs, money laundering
and possibly tax evasion.

These are powerful tools at the governments disposal but it would still be quite hard to
convince a population to dispense with cash and go electronic.

What they really need is for the population to ask for it.

They managed to get us to ask for ID cards and DNA databases, but those were based on
terrorism and crime. It would be difficult to ensure electronic cash through the same means.

Can we scare the population enough with "Handled by Smokers"? I don't doubt it.

Be careful what you wish for.....