Show The Herald Journal Logan Utah Sunday September 15 2002 — A13 Money to fight tobacco goes up in smoke By Dave Berry The Miami Herald L these troubled times it’s nice to know that there is one thing that can always bring a smile to our faces and maybe even cause us to laugh so hard that we cry I am referring of course to the War On Tobacco Rarely in the annals of government — and I do not mean to suggest anything juvenile by the phrase “annals of government" — will you find a pro- gram so consistently hilarious as the campaign against the Evil Weed' Before we get to the latest wacky hijinks let’s review how the War On Tobacco works The underlying principle of course is: Tobacco Is death! But as comical as all this is it is not the zaniest development in the War On Tobacco For that we must look to North Carolina According to an article by Liz Chandler in the Charlotte Observer North Carolina officials have so far which you may recall was taken from tobacco companies to punish them for selling tobacco which is evil — to these growers so they can buy j So that's your update on the Wacky Wonderful War On Tobacco It is now essentially a partnership between politi 7 They-Tas- t '' " Dave Barry is a humor columnist for the Miami Herald Write to him do The Miami Herald One Herald Plaza Miami FL 33132 te V ” V i i 's da - j As Their Name!’’) No wait that would he completely insane I give them two years cians and tobacco companies to mate money by selling cigarettes It's only a matter of time before some shrewd state cuts out the middleman and starts funding the War On Tobacco by making cigarettes and selling them directly to the public (’’Smoke New JerAs Great seys — machinery that will make them more competitive producers of tobacco! This is like using War On Terrorism funds to buy flying lessons for given $41 million of their tobacco settlement to — I swear I am not making this up — tobacco growers Yes! The state gave this money — tives Take that merchants of K ’'v f ' i 4 ' : r r - The Next Stage Bad It kills many people and it V causes many others - u l to smell like ashtrays in a poorly janitored bus sta- tion So a while ago politicians from a bunch of states were scratching their heads trying to figure out what to do about the tobacco problem One option of course was to say: “Hey if people want to be stupid if s none of our busi- ness” But of course that was out of the question Politicians believe EVERYTHING is their business which is why — to pick one of many exam- pies — most states have elaborate regulations governing who may and who may not - ' give manicures Another option was to simply make selling cigarettes illegal just like other evil activities such as selling heroin or giving unlicensed manicures or operating lotteries (except of course for lotteries operated by states) But the politiciansimmediately saw a'mqjorflaw with this ' approach: It did hot provide any way for money to be tunneled to politicians1 And so they went with option three which was to file lawsuits against the tobacco companies The underlying moral principle of these law- suits was: “You are knowingly selling a product that kills tens of thousands of our citi- zens each year We want a piece of that action!” lawsuits The resulted in a humongous jackpot settlement under which the tobacco industry is paying hundreds of billions of dollars to 46 states (and of course their lawyers) The tobacco companies are raising this money by mowing lawns Ha ha! Seriously they are raising the money by selling cigarettes as fast as they can So EVERYBODY wins in the War On Tobacco: — The smokers get to keep smoking tobacco — Tire tobacco companies get to keep selling tobacco — The politicians (and of course their lawyers) get a big old ton of money as physical proof of how much they are I1 V 'V : 'VS Sj I I ' ill 1' y " - t llrf'lM I i LiU 0 4'-- ' course makes no economic sense: To actually stop smok- I would be to I ers from smoking kill the goose that is coughing up the golden loogies 'j So the states according to the Government Accounting Office are using less than a tenth of the tobacco-settl- e- ment poney on anti-smoki- fig j programs Meanwhile thqy ' are spending bales of it on all kinds of unrelated projects such as highways bridges and museums Officials of Niagara County New York spent 4 $700000 of their money to buy a sprinkler sys- tern for a golf course May t drey were thinking that a golfer while teeing off would get sprayed in the eyes causing him to hit the ball into a foursome of tobacco execu- - i'it 16 )( ' i1 3'' fi x 1 il u tlM'l S' j'jiiimiv ut!i qviX u siMtfjtfj iiiini ' sl fvj: iv - ' r ij j (' ' o - i j ‘‘'i ’ V i ti i : j - i i ' i - j A I i ' ili' : i iv ':- p t rt u ! j-- ii'iv i 6i? Jut! ' I s ' 1 A V 'i 'I' ' iv -' V 1 '’7 ’ V- - :V' n ’ V i 'Ak i ' V f ' v y: T v VY iv” & I'i " V' I'---- anti-tobac- co opposed to tobacco Originally the states claimed that they would use the tobacco-lawsu- it money to well to do something about tobacco But that of HURRY IN AND GET LOW RATES ON HOME EQUITY LOANS r"1 sr H"" - ' ns- n It' n Rates as low as - i'- Si 0 I' o APR ' Sv ) i - That's right Our rates for home equity ioans have fallen lower than ever Arid if you are a Wells Fargo customer you can get a lower loan rate just for having accounts with us ' i How great is that? 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