tab - Wow, are you really that dense? Are you not aware that the 'scare' of 'Big Tobacco' has INCREASED that duty imposed on tobacco products? To bolster their tax-and-spend motives, they fabricated yet another "crisis" in America -- a "health care crisis" and say tax increases are necessary "to protect the children."
You can always count on the gov't to pull that one out of their hat.....'protect the children'.
Anti-smoking liberals have for years siphoned billions of tax dollars, via Federal and State Grant Money, the ASSIST and IMPACT programs are a primary source, and diverted charitable contribution dollars to their coffers under the guise of improving health and saving children. Funding the anti-smoking groups with public funds, or any other social group with "an ax to grind", is nothing more than buying votes and a way to circumvent the laws that prohibit Government employees from using public funds to promote their own social agenda.
Socialists throughout the government and society began their assault by creating an atmosphere of hateful distrust and by turning public opinion from the tobacco companies accompanied with an avalanche of misleading PR designed to frighten the public. Controlling public opinion was paramount if they were to succeed in extorting billions of dollars from a legal industry and raising taxes on Americans least able to afford it.
The Washington "spin doctors" have successfully twisted the facts about tobacco and smoking and the news media has fed those lies to the American public. Social engineers manipulating the American media went to great lengths to make tobacco industry executives out to be nothing less than liars.
An early success was redefining the tobacco industry, calling it "Big Tobacco," playing on the public's aversion to "Big Government." Lawyers bringing suits against the tobacco industry developed various theories to show the tobacco industry committed a fraud against the American public. They claimed documents have shown that the tobacco industry lawyers controlled scientific research in an attempt to hide data that was damaging to the industry (not unlike any industry), that the tobacco industry has hidden the dangers of smoking (ignoring the fact that everyone already knew of the dangers), that they manipulated the nicotine content of cigarettes to addict more people, and that they targeted children in their advertising (ah yes, the popular "for the children" theme).
Never mind that Americans have been warned since the 1950s of the dangers associated with smoking. Thomas DiBacco, a retired American University history professor from Palm Beach, testified in the Miami Florida lawsuite that hundreds of articles published in the 1950s and '60s warned the public that heavy smoking causes lung cancer and other debilitating diseases. He cited a 1957 story in the Detroit Free Press, ``Doctors are indicting cigarettes, that smoking cuts your life span by seven years.'' DiBacco said 94.2 percent of 556 smoking-related articles published between 1950 and 1963 stressed the health risks of cigarettes. Only 2.3 percent of those articles emphasized the industry's downplaying of those risks. [Miami Herald, Feb. 8, 2000]
Isn't it ironic that these same lawyers, government officials, and other politicians accusing others of lying have perfected the art of lying (who can forget the long string of lies coming from our highest elected official, Bill Clinton). Basing their arguments on fraudulent and bogus research, these corrupt politicians successfully convinced much of the American public and a few activist judges that more private wealth should be turned over to the government.
Dare I remind you who has a tremendous financial motive to convince you the tobacco companies are at fault? These same lawyers making these wild accusations will earn BILLIONS of dollars after they turn you to their position
Raising taxes is nothing new to liberal tax-and-spend Democrats. The U.S. Congress rejected the settlement with the tobacco industry that was an attempt to address youth smoking and instead proposed to impose a HALF A TRILLION dollars in new taxes and to create 17 new bureaucracies to control another American industry. That effort, too, was defeated in Congress as the McCain Bill became bloated with extravagant spending that had nothing to do with smoking.
Sadly, many Republicans who were elected with the mandate of no new taxes has joined the effort to steal more of your money. They have been forced to by the successful PR campaign slogan, "Big Tobacco or Kids?" Never mind truth! Liberals would have you believe that anyone opposing their efforts of the government takeover of another American industry and their welfare state caring for your children is necessarily supporting youth smoking. How ridiculous, but effective....
Most states have enacted cigarette-tax increases or other legislation designed to discourage smoking or lessen people's exposure to secondhand smoke, according to the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, a Washington lobbying group. In Alaska smokers pay $1 per pack in taxes. Washington lifts 82.5 cents from smokers pockets for every pack they buy. In New Jersey smokers pockets were picked by their legislators when they doubled their tax on cigarettes. The new 80 cent tax will be used to pay the costs of medical care for indigent people without medical insurance. Some states (notably California and Massachusetts) have a special indignity reserved for smokers: They must pay for their own persecution. In California, an additional 25 cents per pack tax on cigarettes was passed in 1988 to be used for cancer research, 5%; wetlands, 5%; indigent medical care, 40%; and "education" - read anti-smoker campaign - 50%.
The national litigation, which was settled in 1998, sought to recover money that states spent treating smoking-related illnesses of those on the Medicaid insurance program for the poor and disabled and to prevent future generations from smoking . However, many states plan to use the money for projects unrelated to tobacco. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia, for example, have either decided or are planning to spend nothing or less than 2 percent of their settlement funds on prevention programs. Many others are using their windfalls to reduce taxes or for unrelated programs. National Conference of State Legislatures recently figured that only 8 percent of the money is earmarked for anti-smoking programs. A good portion is slated for "health care," but much is also going into totally unrelated programs like roads, schools and teenage boot camps.
Arkansas wants the money to establish health education centers in the Mississippi Delta, bolster minority health programs, increased Medicaid coverage for pregnant women, expanded benefits for the elderly, and eventually extend coverage to everyone who lives at or below the poverty level. In addition, they want the money to fund medical research for Alzheimer's disease. [Arkansas Democrat-Gazette , Jan. 22, 2000]
California wants to spend the money on childhood development programs, child care, and to fund programs that would allow health care workers to identify and track children for future services. [Los Angeles Times , Jan. 20, 2000] An initiative that would have required the state and counties to spend their share of the national tobacco settlement entirely on health care was scrapped in favor of the Orange county supervisors' plan to use most of the windfall to pay off its bankruptcy debt and to add jail beds. [Orange County Register , Jan. 29, 2000] The city of Los Angeles wants to use their share of the tobacco money to pay for lawsuits in the Rampart police scandal. [Los Angeles Times , Feb 20, 2000] In the Bay area, they plan to spend the money on capital improvements for the Alameda County Medical Center or renovations for Benicia's police station.
Colorado has passed legislation to use their share of the booty to subsidize prescription drug costs and pay for primary care to at-risk newborns. [Associated Press, Mar. 9, 2000]
Connecticut wants to fund education, new roads, and prisons.
Delaware would like to use their portion of the settlement to add nine staffers in the Department of Health and Social Services, fund the state's "pill bill" prescription- assistance plan, help the un- and underinsured, and buy automatic heart defibrillators. [The News Journal, Mar. 28, 2000]
Idaho doesn't plan to spend any of the money, rather they want to invest the money and spend only the interest. Governor Kempthorne has said that health advocacy, state building construction and academic scholarships should be priorities for the money.
Illinois wants to use the money for tax relief. [Chicago Tribune, 4/21/2000]
Indiana will spend the money on a children's health insurance program and wants to help low income senior citizens pay for prescription drugs. [Associated Press, 1/28/2000]
Kansas intends to use all $70 million of this year's settlement to fund the state budget rather than health care. [Topeka Capitol Journal, Dec. 30, 1999]
Maryland proposed tobacco-settlement funds be used for a teacher pay raise. [SunSpot, February 27, 2000]
Minnesota wants to use a large share for medical student stipends. [Associated Press, Mar. 9, 2000]
Nevada plans to use their share of the booty to help low-income senior citizens pay for prescription drugs. [Las Vegas Sun, Mar. 28, 2000]
New Jersey wants the money to provide free or subsidized health care to thousands of low- and moderate-income New Jerseyans [The Record , Jan. 22, 2000], reimburse hospitals for treating uninsured patients, provise mental health services in prisons, programs to care for the elderly, help low-income seniors pay for prescription drugs, and create a fund to bail out health maintenance organizations that go under. A whopping 8% of the money would be used on programs that discourage children from smoking and help others to quit. [The Record , Jan. 27, 2000]
Ohio plans to use some of the money to help rebuild or replace aging Ohio public school buildings. [Cleveland Live, Oct. 28, 1999]
Pennsylvania would devote the funds to a number of important health care-related objectives in Pennsylvania, including an expansion of health insurance coverage for the uninsured and disabled, an expansion of smoking cessation and prevention programs, home and community-based health services, health research, and uncompensated care relief to hospitals which provide health services to the uninsured. [PRNewsWire, 1/27/2000]
Utah suggests using their share for the University of Utah Health Science Center, for a children's health insurance program and for a permanent trust fund for public schools. [The Salt Lake Tribune]
Virginia's governor is throwing his state's tobacco settlement money into roads[SunSpot, February 27, 2000].
Notice how they are not suggesting spending the money on recovering health care costs for smokers! It's even more rare for them to use the money to reduce smoking. No, they want to fund the socialist programs, especially targeting children. These folks recognize that for their socialist programs to succeed, they need to win over the children.
In my opinion, states spending the money in this fashion is nothing short of criminal. Why the tobacco companies ever agreed to this extortion in the first place is beyond me. I find it ironic too, that the folks who were complaining about all the alleged lying going on by the tobacco industry, don't seem to have a problem with lying when it benefits them. The next time someone says something to you about the "lying tobacco companies," remind them about the lying Attorney's Generals.
I suppose the other side of this issue of the states not using the money for what it was intended for is you can pretty well count on them coming back for more. Once they have discovered the easy money at the trough, it will be next to impossible to wean them from the public/private nipple.
Notice, they are not suggesting a total ban on cigarettes! In fact, no one is suggesting a BAN on cigarettes. The anti-smoking lobby says that smoking is a deadly addiction, responsible for three million deaths each year and that because nicotine is as addictive as heroin or cocaine, using tobacco is not a choice once you're hooked. Further they pull the "children" tactic and says the nicotine industry hooks 60% of its customers before they're even 14 years old.
If tobacco was as dangerous and the killer substance they say it is, wouldn't any reasonable person outlaw it ouright? Why don't the do that? See, they are NOT trying to kill their Golden Goose....they are trying to convert it into a PLATINUM PENGUIN!!!
