How often do you get the chance to strike a blow for democracy, support your hobby, and win cigars? Well, step right up. Here’s your opportunity.

But before we get to the contest, I must confess that I had been trying to come up with a giveaway idea ever since I received a two-cigar “Blogger Edition” pack of the new Montecristo New York Connoisseur Edition (review here). I was also thinking about trying once again to generate more support for legislation barring the Food & Drug Administration from regulating premium handmade cigars when—voilà!—I realized could shamelessly combine the two.

If you’re a regular Stogie Guys reader, you know we’re big supporters of this bill. Passage would be a landmark event. And we need everyone to join the effort.

So, how does this contest tie in? Well, it begins with the assumption that Stogie Guys readers are honorable folks because we’ll take your word that you did what needs to be done before you enter. And what do you need to do? Simply contact your representative and/or senators to urge support of the legislation in their chamber and leave a comment here. If both your senators and your representative have signed on (currently possible only in Florida), just note that in your comment. If you’ve already appealed to your elected officials, write that in your comment.

For those who haven’t acted, here are links to make it easy. If you don’t know your representative, go here. You’ll also find a link to the rep’s website that includes contact info. Then, to find out whether he or she is a cosponsor of the bill, known as HR1639, click on Thomas. Go to “Legislation in Current Congress” in the middle of the page, highlight the “Bill Number” button, type HR1639 in the window, and click SEARCH. On the new page, click Cosponsors. If your rep’s name isn’t there, you need to get in touch.

My strong preference would be for you to compose your own email or postal letter, or call the office rather than sign a petition or use a form letter urging support for HR1639. Your own words have much more impact. Again, though, how you do it is up to you. You can find more on the bills by searching Stogie Guys and checking in at Cigar Rights of America.

For the Senate, it’s pretty straightforward. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) introduced the bill (S1461) and his GOP counterpart, Marco Rubio, is a cosponsor. The only others signed on are Democrat Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Republican Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania. You’ll find senators by state with contact information here.

When you’re done, leave a comment. We’ll keep it open for a week and then randomly select a winner of the two Montecristo New York Connoisseur Edition cigars. Please enter only once. Be sure to include your email address in the appropriate field so we can contact you if you win. And if you’re interested, here’s the fine print.

Good luck. This is one contest where we can all be winners.

-George E

photo credit: Stogie Guys

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We’re taking New Years Eve and New Years Day off to ring in 2012. Naturally, we’ll be doing so with a few cigars, and we hope you do the same. We’ll return on Monday, January 2. If that’s too long to wait, you can follow us on our official Twitter feed, on Facebook, or you can sign up for our free email newsletter. Happy New Year!

-The Stogie Guys

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From all of us at StogieGuys.com, we want to wish you a joyous, safe, and cigar-filled Christmas. We’re taking December 24-27 off to spend time with our families, but we’ll be right back here on Wednesday with more reviews, news, interviews, commentaries, and tips from the world of cigars.

Until then, you can follow us on our official Twitter feed, on Facebook, or you can sign up for our free email newsletter.

-The Stogie Guys

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StogieGuys.com will be taking November 24 and 25 off to enjoy that most American of holidays: Thanksgiving. (We will return on Saturday for our regularly scheduled coverage of the world of cigars.) Known for food, family, friends, and football, Thanksgiving is a perfect time to enjoy a fine smoke. Have a safe and happy holiday; we look forward to seeing you again soon.

-The Stogie Guys

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Today presents a perfect opportunity to kick back, relax, and enjoy a fine stogie or two. We at StogieGuys.com are taking our own advice, interrupting our daily coverage of cigar news, reviews, commentaries, and tips to do what we do best—savor the pleasure that is premium tobacco. After all, you wouldn’t want us to be hypocritical, would you?

So happy Labor Day. We’ll resume our musings on the world of cigars tomorrow.

-The Stogie Guys

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Fall means one thing to us: football. And since football goes so well with cigars, we thought we’d have a little fun by combining the two…and giving away a ton of cigars in the process.

That’s why we’re pleased to announce the Stogie Guys NFL Pick’Em Challenge. Each week you can try to pick the winner of each game, and we’ll be rewarding the best contestants with cigars.

To join, click here. Enter group number 24973 and the top secret password: “stogie.” At the end of each week during the regular season, the contestant with the most correct picks will receive a six-pack of cigars. And we’ll be lining up an even bigger prize for the grand champion at the end of the season.

We’re limited to 100 entries, so please only register once until we’re at capacity. Anyone who submits multiple entries will be kicked out to make room for others. Ties will be broken by using the Yahoo tiebreaker system and, as an added challenge, all picks are against the spread. (Fine print here.)

Good luck!

-The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Stogie Guys

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We’re pleased to announce a new contributor to StogieGuys.com: Mark Carlos McGinty, author of the award-winning novel The Cigar Maker. “Mark M” adds unique expertise to our site, focusing on the rich history of the cigar industry and examining the intricacies of the cigar industry today.

Regular readers will recall that Mark has contributed to the site a few times already. In May, he wrote an article on the complex legal issues that will arise when the Cuban embargo finally ends. More recently, he wrote about the history of the Cuesta-Rey brand and the two revolutionaries who started it in the 1890s. (Both articles are well worth reading, if you haven’t already seen them.) As Mark’s bio notes, cigars and Cuban culture run in his family:

Mark Carlos McGinty is a descendant of Cuban cigar makers and the award-winning author of The Cigar Maker. You can read an excerpt of his book here. His work has appeared in Maybourne Magazine, Cigar City Magazine, Yahoo! Entertainment, and La Gaceta. Mark grew up in Minnesota but spent a good part of his childhood with his Cuban relatives in West Tampa eating ropa vieja and Cuban sandwiches, drinking café con leche and fresh-squeezed orange juice from his grandfather’s tree. His great-aunt rolled cigars for Arturo Fuente so, of course, his favorite cigar is the Arturo Fuente Flor Fina 8-5-8.

Mark spent seven years writing The Cigar Maker, a time when he ate a lot of Cuban food and smoked way too many cigars. Most of those seven years were spent researching the history of Cuba, Tampa, and the cigar industry during the period of 1850–1910. A labor of love with dozens of family anecdotes woven into the story, The Cigar Maker was a finalist at the Indie Excellence Book Awards in 2011, won the Bronze Medal at the Independent Publisher Awards, and was a finalist for ForeWord Magazine’s 2010 Book of the Year. Visit the book’s official website to learn more: www.TheCigarMaker.net.

Mark’s first novel, Elvis and the Blue Moon Conspiracy (Beaver’s Pond Press, 2003), won an Eric Hoffer Book Award Honorable Mention for General Fiction. He graduated from Stetson University in DeLand, Florida, and obtained his master’s degree from Xavier University in Cincinnati. Mark lives in Minneapolis with his wife and daughter and pays close attention to the Minnesota Twins, a subject that could one day warrant its own book.

Please welcome Mark to the site in the comments below. And as a bonus, we’ll select one commenter to win a signed copy of The Cigar Maker.

-The Stogie Guys

photo credit: Stogie Guys

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All of us at StogieGuys.com would like to wish you a very happy Fourth of July. America’s 235th birthday is a wonderful occasion to spend time with friends and family. So we’ve decided to take our own advice and barbecue, see some fireworks, and smoke more than our share of celebratory cigars. We’ll return to our coverage of the world of cigars tomorrow. Until then, have a safe, relaxing holiday.

-The Stogie Guys

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All of us at StogieGuys.com would like to wish you a very happy Memorial Day. Aside from remembering the brave men and women who have fought and died for our country, we’re taking the day off to barbeque, relax, and smoke a few cigars. We suggest you do the same.

-The Stogie Guys

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After five years of publishing daily, my colleagues and I would like to welcome loyal readers and first-time visitors alike to the new and improved Stogie Guys. We hope you like what you see.

This cleaner look and improved functionality is the result of months of research, soliciting feedback, and trial and error. Many thanks to those of you who took the time to provide us with comments and constructive criticism along the way.

Let me first say that, as far as content and format are concerned, not a lot has changed. It was never our intention to completely deviate from the format that has worked well since May 2006.

So, going forward, we will continue to publish daily, offering such regularly occurring features as full reviews, tips, Quick Smokes, commentaries, interviews, and Friday Samplers. We aim to keep our readers informed about the most pressing threats to cigar rights, be they taxes, smoking bans, or regulations. And, even though we may provide occasional video content where appropriate, we have no plans to abandon the written word as our medium of choice.

Aside from the new logo and enhanced color scheme, there are a number of other features that we’d like to draw your attention to. For one, we have gone to great lengths to make the hundreds of articles we have published over the years more accessible. This includes upgraded search capabilities, courtesy of Google. It also includes better organization of our Reviews Archive and the introduction of Cigar University, which organizes our tips into 100-level, 200-level, 300-level, and 400-level “classes.”

We have also improved our comments system, launched a “Question of the Month” poll feature, and made it easier to view our articles by author.

Many of the other new features are pretty self-explanatory, so please feel free to explore away. Just keep in mind that, over the coming weeks, we’re bound to discover bugs, inconsistencies, or other problems, and we’ll be making changes as necessary. And we’ve got additional improvements planned over the coming months. Your patience is appreciated.

So is your feedback. Without you, we wouldn’t have been able to build the new StogieGuys.com—a solid foundation for the next five years and beyond.

-Patrick A & Patrick S

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