People keep mistakenly referring to the regulatory issue as if it were a criminalization issue.
Eg, KDMickey, just above you said: "It's probable that we will lose this round and we will all become 'criminals'".
And goobenet, you just said: "they'll be outlawed, the tech will go underground, and be treated like pot, or it'll be legalized and taxed to death".
Well, that's simply not the issue, and it really confounds things and makes it worse to present it like that!
When the FDA claims ecigs are illegal to market, they mean just that - that it's a civil legal issue/fight over whether they can be advertised and sold in the US. They do not, and never could, claim that they are or will be illegal in the penal law context like controlled substances, such as ....... or ....... Nicotine is not a controlled substance, and it could never be criminalized without at the same time instantly criminalizing cigarettes as well, and we all know that is just not ever going to happen in the US!
So please people, be aware that if we loose this round it means we'd be looking to source our ecigs (or maybe just the liquid) from outside the US, but it doesn't mean we'd be "criminals" for possessing or using them!
You make some good points here yvilla. I don't think the members here should be fretting either, especially not for the use of the ecig. Perhaps the FDA will try and make an example out of one of the huge distributors soon and block large imports, but there will always be suppliers willing to take the risk to market and import after a ban. Controlled substances like phentermine, xanex, adderall, steroids, etc are still illegally sold in volume through all sorts of ways so to think these are going away completely anytime soon is a bit far fetched.