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Tobacco policy currently rests on two claims: tobacco advertising and promotion are the major reasons why young people begin to smoke; and young people are particularly sensitive to the price of cigarettes. From these two claims follow the central elements of tobacco policy, namely that all forms of tobacco advertising and promotion, including tobacco displays, should be banned, and tobacco should be heavily taxed in order to prevent or at least reduce under-age tobacco use.
Unfortunately, neither of these claims nor policies meets the standards of evidence-based policymaking. Both are, instead, products of advocacy-based 'research' carried out by anti-tobacco lobby groups. . . .
Considerable previous research has shown that plain packaging of cigarettes will do nothing to reduce youth smoking. A study from Canada's York University, which asked young people about what effect plain packaging would have on their smoking decisions, found that 90 percent of daily smokers said they would smoke more or the same if cigarettes were in plain packages.
What then of high taxes to discourage or prevent youth smoking?
The claim that high tobacco taxes will reduce smoking is an odd one since we have been taught that smoking is addictive. If smoking is addictive, logic dictates that smokers will be insensitive to price increases.
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How many readers noticed the full-page advertisement paid for by the Cato Institute urging Obama to halt the passing of the stimulus bill? This is a perfect example of how corporate America now controls the American people through the power of pen instead of the sword.
The Cato Institute is among the most powerful of the 500 right-wing think tanks. It believes in limited government, free markets, globalization and peaceful international relations. They denounced Bush and associates for the war in Iraq and their neocon ideas.
Their $24 million annual income is financed by Rupert Murdoch (Fox News), the tobacco industry, insurance and financial services, retirement accounts, oil, pharmeceuticals and media conglomerates.
Their main objective now is pushing for privatization of Social Security. . . .
The Cato Institute, working under a pseudonym, representing the tobacco companies, masqueraded as facts, a research paper that attempted to prove that smoking does not cause death. . . .
Democracies do not last because eventually the powerful gain control of the government. This has happened. As a result, our country cannot sustain itself any longer. Our national debt is 90 percent of the entire wealth of America. The middle class can no longer support both and rich and the poor. The Office of Budget and Management reports the $150 billion annual corporate subsidies and tax benefits for the rich eclipses the annual $130 billion for social aid.
The Cato Institute is perhaps correct. The tragedy is neither McCain, Obama or anyone else can put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
Two recent events underscore big problems with the way society tries to fight tobacco use.
First, a new Harvard study came out alleging that the tobacco industry manipulated menthol levels in cigarettes to hook young smokers in violation of the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement, which bans tobacco companies from targeting youths. And second, billionaires Michael R. Bloomberg and Bill Gates last week threw their support behind a new $500 million worldwide effort to stop smoking.
Whatever the tobacco companies may have done with menthol levels, the bigger scandal is how states have misspent the billions paid to them by the tobacco industry. And however well-intentioned, the Gates-Bloomberg effort, which involves the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, is likely to fail because the tobacco control programs that it will fund - featuring such things as higher taxes, smoking bans and advertising restrictions - have failed before. These multiple shortcomings point to the need for a new, more effective approach to handling, and funding, tobacco prevention. . . .
Ten years and $53 billion after the tobacco settlement windfall, there is precious little to show in terms of credible smoking prevention. It's time for Congress - and perhaps the president - to step in and demand that the states live up to their promise to use the settlement money for effective tobacco prevention. To ensure the settlement money has an impact, it needs to be diverted from projects unrelated to smoking and then placed into interventions that are based on what the best evidence shows are the real reasons kids start using cigarettes.
Until that happens, anti-tobacco efforts - whether funded by the states or by well-intentioned billionaires - will continue to amount to little more than blowing smoke.
--Patrick Basham teaches tobacco regulation at the Johns Hopkins University, directs the Democracy Institute and is a Cato Institute adjunct scholar.
But if history is any guide, most cigarettes sold will actually be trucked up from Virginia, or shipped in from China, by "butt-leggers" who can make over $1 million on each tractor-trailer load of smuggled smokes. The blunt fact, which politicians of both political parties are determined to ignore, is that high cigarette taxes in New York have led to a bloody, decades-long smuggling epidemic. . . .
As the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said in September 2002 of New York's cigarette smuggling, "Traditional organized crime is involved, terrorist groups are involved, and street gangs are involved." Rivalry among these groups has resulted in numerous shootings and homicides.
The connection to terrorism is no exaggeration. When New York police cracked another smuggling ring in 2005, they uncovered a multimillion dollar flow of funds from New York City to unknown individuals in the Middle East. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly gave voice to the obvious conclusion: Terrorists probably got the money. . . .
Politicians continue to use the health of smokers as their excuse for higher cigarette taxes. This view is myopic. As Gov. Wilson argued three decades ago, high cigarette taxes are bad public policy because of their effect on the rest of us. In the 1960s and '70s, organized crime exploited high cigarette taxes at our expense. Today we face an even deadlier adversary.
Mr. Fleenor is chief economist of the Tax Foundation and author of "Cigarette Taxes, Black Markets, and Crime: Lessons from New York's 50-Year Losing Battle" (Cato Institute, 2003).
They are deaths you can prevent if you just take the time. According to the Virginia Department of Fire Programs, 158 fires in Virginia were caused by smokers not putting their cigarettes out properly in 2007. Six people died because of those fires and 20 were hurt.
So far this year in Hampton Roads, a person has already lost their life in one of four fires cased by cigarettes. The most recent fire cause by a cigarette started Friday morning at a home in Norfolk.
"We'd love to have people stop smoking, but if they're going to smoke, do it the right way," says Jack Goldhorn, Norfolk Fire Public Information Officer.
The U.S. Fire Administration says smoking is the number one cause of preventable home fire deaths. In Virginia Beach, a woman died in a fire in February.
The Senate on Thursday rejected broad exemptions to a statewide smoking ban, and a key leader predicted lawmakers ultimately would approve a bill calling for smoke-free restaurants and bars.
The Senate voted 27-23 to insist that a sweeping ban on indoor smoking be maintained, turning down a House-passed effort that exempts bars and restaurants. The issue will likely go to a House-Senate conference committee where a compromise will be bargained.
"I don't believe there will be a general exemption for bars and restaurants," said Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs.
The House has voted both ways on the issue.
Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine recently announced that he'll renew his fight to ban smoking in all Virginia bars and restaurants. He defended this push by citing the dangers of secondhand smoke, saying, "The scientific evidence about the health risks associated with exposure to secondhand smoke is clear and convincing. Recognizing the negative health effects and high public costs of secondhand smoke, Virginia must act to protect the workers and consumers in its restaurants."
We're pleased the governor has such command of the epidemiologic literature. Usually, when politicians make such statements, they have little if any familiarity with the scientific research. Kaine should cite the empirical studies showing the health effects of bar and restaurant patrons' occasional exposure to environmental tobacco smoke. We're not aware of any such studies; even the much-cited recent surgeon general's report on secondhand smoke offered no statistical evidence of diminished health from occasional exposure. . . .
Liberal societies allow people to make decisions that others don't like. If some Virginians want to eat and drink in an establishment that allows smoking, and some workers want to work there, and some entrepreneur wants to finance that business, why does the governor think he should overrule them?
-- The writers are, respectively, a policy analyst and media manager at the Cato Institute.
The solution, as often happens, lies in the very technology that caused the problem in the first place. Instead of placing the onus on shippers to verify age, Maine should require the tobacco vendors selling their wares online to do so. How? By employing any of the myriad age-verification software available for just these purposes. Requiring online orders to be paid for with a credit card will also have the same effect (and the issue of a minor illicitly using a parent's card is akin to that of a minor using a fake ID at a store). Thus, the carriers should technically win here through the vehicle of "federal preemption" -- and thus enable technologies freely available in the market to solve the underlying problem instead of heavy-handed regulations (federal or state).
Smoking in the United States is already declining significantly - largely as a result of public awareness of its dangers, not higher taxes. The declining number of smokers makes cigarette tax revenue unstable . . .
SCHIP's advocates believe the program is critical to providing health care to children. That's debatable. But if Congress and the president decide to expand the program, they should not repeat the Wisconsin Legislature's mistakes and force smokers alone to bear the cost.
Higher tobacco taxes are unfair, unadvisable and unlikely to bring in enough money over time.
Thomas Firey is managing editor of the Cato Institute's magazine Regulation. Jacob Grier is a writer based in Arlington, Va.
According to anti-smoking groups, the current congressional attempt to give the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco is the most important piece of legislation since the surgeon general spoke out on the dangers of smoking 40 years ago. Surprisingly, however, it is not just the foes of big tobacco that support the proposed law, which was approved by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee last week.
Also firmly behind the bill is Philip Morris, the world's largest tobacco company. In fact, it played a pivotal role in writing the legislation, working with the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. What these strange bedfellows came up with is bad for competition in the tobacco industry and bad for public health. . . .
By assigning the FDA responsibility for all tobacco products, the new law also would relieve the industry of any liability for tobacco safety -- and pass it along to the government.
Few lawmakers seem to understand either the bill's origins or ramifications. But the Senate should send it back to the committee and start from scratch. Come up with a law that gives the FDA authority to regulate tobacco, but do so in a way that truly protects public health.
ACCORDING to anti-smoking groups, the current Congressional attempt to give the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco is the most important piece of legislation since the surgeon general spoke out on the dangers of smoking 40 years ago. Surprisingly, it is not just the foes of Big Tobacco that support the proposed law, which was approved by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on Wednesday.
Philip Morris, the world's largest tobacco company, is also firmly behind the bill. In fact, it played a pivotal role in writing the legislation, working with the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. What these strange bedfellows came up with is bad for competition in the tobacco industry and bad for public health. . . .
By assigning the F.D.A. responsibility for all tobacco products, the new law would also relieve the industry of any liability for tobacco safety -- and pass it along to the government.
Few lawmakers seem to understand either the bill's origins or ramifications. But the Senate should send it back to the committee and start from scratch. Come up with a law that would give the F.D.A. authority to regulate tobacco, but do so in a way that would truly protect public health.
The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC) is a now defunct industry-funded PR front group run by the APCO Worldwide public relations firm which worked to hang the label of "junk science" on environmentalists. Created in 1993, TASSC began as a front for Philip Morris which was attempting to discredit ETS (Environmental Tobacco Smoke) research as a long-term cause of increased cancer and heart problem rates in the community -- especially among office workers and children living with smoking parents. [1] It advanced industry-friendly positions on a wide range of topics, including global warming, smoking, phthalates, and pesticides. Later still, they extended the role of TASSC to Europe using Dr George Carlo. [2] . . .
[10]
Milloy, an 'Adjunk' Scholar at Cato Institute[11] encountered Rupert Murdoch during Murdock's term as Cato Director -- thus leading to Milloy's Junk Science columns on Fox News website and newspapers. For many years, including Murdoch's term, a Philip Morris V.P. sat on Cato's board, which probably sufficiently explains Milloy's appearance on Cato's payroll. [edit]
on January 30 the Washington Post printed an article by toxicologist and epidemiologist Gio Batta Gori, titled "The Bogus 'Science' of Secondhand Smoke." Gori claims that many published studies on the health hazards of secondhand smoke are based on unreliable data, and that smoking restrictions aimed at protecting public health are "odious and unfair." The byline describes Gori as a "fellow of the Health Policy Center in Bethesda," and mentions his former position as deputy director of the National Cancer Institute's Division of Cancer Cause and Prevention. Hmmm... sounds like a high-level scientist, all right. However, the Post fails to mention Gori's longstanding record of financial and contractual ties to the tobacco industry. Previously-secret internal tobacco company documents now on the Internet (and available to any reporter) show decades of payments made to the esteemed Dr. Gori, primarily from cigarette maker Brown & Williamson, for promoting pro-tobacco views on secondhand smoke in publications and public testimony. Without this information, readers were kept in the dark, unable to evaluate Gori's damning critique of well-established public health research.
Despite what critics of smoking bans say, supporters of the proposed statewide ban say there is a legal basis for the initiative.
Organizations such as the Tavern League of Wisconsin and individual tavern owners have pledged to fight the proposal outlined Jan. 24 by Gov. Jim Doyle.
Critics of smoking bans, like the Cato Institute, argue that free societies allow all sorts of risky behaviors, like rock climbing and skiing, that endanger others, such as rescue workers. Moreover, many public health laws are justified because they protect people from hidden risks.
"Bars where smoking is permitted are hardly hidden risks," wrote Thomas A. Firey, managing editor of the institute's magazine, Regulation.
Those arguments do not carry much weight with people like Aaron Doeppers of the Czampaign for Tobacco-free Kids or Maureen Busalacchi, executive director of SmokeFree Wisconsin.
The Baltimore City Council and the Maryland General Assembly will likely vote on legislation to ban smoking in all bars and restaurants. . . .
Free societies allow people to make decisions that others don’t like. That includes allowing smokers to have bars and restaurants to cater to their preferences, just as nonsmokers should have establishments that cater to theirs.