This morning, you can still walk into a “coffee shop” in Amsterdam and smoke a huge joint of cannabis for breakfast. You just will not be able to mix any tobacco with your cannabis. That is because the new Dutch ban on smoking tobacco in bars affects even that most Dutch of institutions: the “coffee shop” that legally serves cannabis. Pot is still permitted but cigarettes are out. Weird as this may sound, the rule is perfectly Dutch. The Netherlands is not the permissive society that foreigners imagine.

Rather, it is a nanny state, with a quirky nanny. The Dutch nanny lets you smoke dope and visit prostitutes and have teenage sex (homosexual if you prefer) as long as you do it while she stands over you wearing antiseptic gloves. Then, when you are finished, she will tax you for it.