Jump to full article: Jackson (MS) Clarion-Ledger, 2009-06-03
Intro: Critics of former tobacco lobbyist Gov. Haley Barbour's call to raise cigarette taxes on companies that didn't participate in the state's tobacco lawsuit settlement and change the way the state taxes smokeless tobacco claim he's doing so to help some of his old lobbying clients.
Those critics say Barbour's trying to "level the playing field" for companies that sell premium brand cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products - companies he once represented.
Quite frankly, that's an intriguing political allegation and one that non-participating tobacco manufacturers and discount tobacco sellers would be expected to make.
But the fact of the matter is that even if that political allegation is true - and this newspaper has no particular evidence to suggest that it is or isn't true - the assessment is the same: Big deal. . . .
Why shouldn't those companies pay their share of the freight toward the social costs of smoking?
From the standpoint of public health and from the standpoint of tobacco products as so-called "gateway" drugs - with smokeless tobacco products still marketed toward young people much in the way cigarettes were a generation or two ago - there should be no particular consideration afforded "market share" among the tobacco companies.
Lawmakers have given this segment of the state's tobacco lobby a free ride (or, at the very least, a reduced ride) for too long. Tobacco taxes should be equalized.
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