Reasonable people

Here is a Guardian editorial I can applaud:

A smoking ban is [an] issue that pits the public good against the liberty of the individual. The public good case for a ban is strong - and we support it. A ban would curb an activity which kills the people who do it or at least damages their health. Not only that, it kills or damages the health of non-smokers exposed to it too. A ban in public places will restrict not just exposure to smoking but also the opportunity and, to some extent, the pressure to smoke. All of this is good, especially in restricting the temptations for young people. The benefits to individual and public health of a ban are not in dispute, as the experience in other jurisdictions has overwhelmingly shown.

Yet it is disingenuous to pretend that there is not a question of individual liberty at stake here. People who smoke mostly enjoy smoking and, within the limits of the law, they are at liberty to do so, even if others disapprove or think they should not. The proposed ban will not deny these citizens the right to smoke in private or in the open air. So the issue before ministers has been about where the borderline should be drawn between public and private and, in particular, about where it should be drawn in pubs, bars and clubs that do not serve food but in which many people have always smoked. That is an issue on which reasonable people can have different views. And it is also an issue on which there remains a case for a compromise, if one can be found.
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Labour is right to tighten restrictions. It is in tune with majority feeling and acting for the public good. But it is also surely reasonable to look at marginal ways of making a ban less provocative and, if possible, to act consensually.

Yes, 'an issue on which reasonable people can have different views'. There are one or two other issues like that. Well, actually, let's keep it just to one other issue - on which the main newspaper of British liberalism might have done itself some historical credit by recognizing that reasonable people (including liberals, people of the left) could have different views, and running its opinion pages accordingly. But it didn't, it didn't and it didn't.