What's truly amazing and depressing is that the common sense comments in The Orange Country Register are as rare in the kooky state as honest politicians.

SMOKING MOM - Added July 19, 2000 - Great article from Salon.  In spite of the multi-millions spent on convincing people that smoking is the most awful vice of all time, the public just isn't buying it.  Although too much seeps into the national conscious, at some level rational people feel that they are being fed a load of bull.  When the anti-tobacco agenda finally collapses under its own weight of falsity and hysteria, Americans will marvel that a mother who smokes, and admits it, could ever be a controversial subject.

Removing unwanted opposition - AN OPEN LETTER FROM JEFF JACOBY TO HIS FRIENDS - JACOBY: A RAW DEAL - LIBERAL ENEMIES DID JACOBY IN: WASHINGTON POST - We are sure many of our American readers have read at least some of Jeff Jacoby's terrific columns either in the Boston Globe or syndicated in local papers. He has been an articulate and eloquent spokesman for liberty (and has even been one of the few mainstream columnists to write fairly and accurately on the tobacco issue). The Globe had hired him as a dissident voice to demonstrate "balance" to the leftist liberalism. But apparently, Jeff was gaining too much of a following, so now The Globe has suspended him on the flimsiest of excuses (that he wrote a column on the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and did not acknowledge that others had also written on this same topic). Another voice for liberty and choice is about to be silenced. Write an e-mail to the Boston Globe. Give them a call (617. 929.2000). Send a fax (617.929.2098). Read his side of the story by clicking on the first header. Help to keep alive the Freedom of Expression. At FORCES, we are all with you, Jeff!

AHA PUNCHES OUT THE GOV - Added July 13, 2000 - Attempting an end-run around the executive and legislative branches of California, the American Heart Association took out a full page ad to blast Governor Gray Davis. The ad is the latest in a series of attacks on state governments over the spoils from the so-called tobacco settlement.  A few months ago anti-tobacco was screaming that smoking rates were on the rise and more money was needed to stop the climb.  Now they cry that smoking rates are going down and more money is needed to keep that trend going.

AHA and its partners including The American Lung Association, The American Cancer Society and the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids are slavering over the billions wafting to state legislatures and are frantic that the loot is evading their grasp.  California is planning to use its share of the settlement to expand and prop up health services.  The legislature has so legislated and the governor seems to have approved.

AHA and the others need an emphatic reminder that Governor Davis and the legislature are elected officials.  Californians sent them to Sacramento to make the decisions and policies that govern the expenditures of the settlement funds.  AHA, ALA and ACS have never been elected and represent no constituency.  They ought to butt out.

BERKELEY'S PUSH TO STIFLE FREE SPEECH - Added July 13, 2000 - Tossing its reputation as a bastion of free speech into the trash can, the Berkeley City Council passed a resolution demanding that newspapers refuse to accept tobacco advertising. The resolution, passing unanimously with one abstention, perfectly embodies the anti-choice policies that have come to define the city.

It is telling that in today's Berkeley dissent is so politically risky that the lone city council member who said that the city should not interfere with the free-speech rights of the press was so intimidated that she abstained rather than vote her convictions. Equally cowed are the newspapers that are being asked to curb their profits. Instead of ringing statements referring to the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, the publications, including those that label themselves "alternative" and "independent" appear quite willing to let the Berkeley City Council dictate their advertising policies.

What isn't puzzling is why Berkeley is in the forefront of repression in California.  For over 10 years the Berkeley Health Department and the City Council have operated under the heavy hand of anti-tobacco special interest groups.

Berkeley is the only city in California that has its own branch of the state's Tobacco Control Section.  The TCS works with anti-tobacco special interests to impose smoking bans and demonize smokers.

Berkeley is also the stomping grounds of the Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights.  The tax-exempt pressure group made headlines last year when an enemies list it compiled using tax funds was unearthed. The echoes of the McCarthy era
disturb civil libertarians but apparently are welcome to the current crop of Berkeley politicians.  No wonder the free-speech supporter on the council didn't dare vote to oppose the resolution.

With the ANR and Tobacco Control Section directing tobacco policies in Berkeley it no surprise that free-speech is now under attack by City Hall.

History buffs who wish to experience a culture and political scene reminiscent of Germany during the National Socialist German Workers' Party's rise to power are advised to check out Berkeley for a real blast from the past.

TRIAL LAWYERS UNLEASHED - Added July 13, 2000 - "When state attorneys general joined up with private personal injury lawyers to go after Big Tobacco, their partnership and the billions it produced for state coffers were hailed in many circles. Critics were dismissed as alarmist."

"Since tobacco, however, municipalities have bonded with wealthy personal-injury lawyers to go after the gun industry, and Rhode Island has marched in against the manufacturers of lead paint, although the product has not been sold for decades. One could argue that lead and guns fit into the tobacco paradigm. But how about latex and automobiles?"

ESCALATING VIOLENCE - Added July 11, 2000 - It's becoming all too familiar.  A gang of thugs knocks off a convenience store, severely beating up the sales clerk in the process.  What's new is that cigarettes, not money, are targeted.  Such heists are erupting throughout California.  Inevitably people will be killed.

It isn't supposed to happen.  Hollywood's Rob Reiner, the man responsible for the latest tax hike on cigarettes, promised that tax evasion and black marketeering would not result from exorbitant tobacco taxes.  He was lying and the consequences of his lies are slowly bubbling up through the mainstream media.

When a product is taxed far beyond the actual cost of its production, black markets, violence and tax dodging will occur as night follows day. 

PYRRHIC VICTORY FOR ANTI-TOBACCO - Added July 11, 2000 - A district court of appeals in California has ruled in favor of Stanton Glantz, an anti-tobacco maven working for the University of California, in a case that could pave the way for similar legal actions against tax-funded activism.

Californians for Scientific Integrity sued the university in 1998 after Glantz published a study asserting that smoking bans did not hurt tourism. That study was eventually so discredited that Glantz had to admit that "mistakes" were made and his claims that bans cause no economic harm were dropped. Despite the success of their efforts, CSI pursued legal action asserting that Glantz, and the university, are misusing public money to pursue a political agenda.

By a pretzel twist of logic the court of appeals has decided to exempt Stanton Glantz and the University of California from the rules that govern other recipients of government funds. Because the issue is tobacco, any and all efforts to control its use are to be allowed.

The good news is that Californians for Scientific Integrity is on the right path. Targeting a particularly egregious example of anti-tobacco corruption head-on is the only tactic that will succeed. CSI has suffered a setback and should appeal the court's decision. It may take time but aggressive, sustained action against the grievous misuse of tax dollars to promote the financial interests of anti-tobacco will succeed.

GOING FOR THE GOLD - Added July 10, 2000 - Get ready for the most colossal punitive verdict in history.  A Florida judge refused to set any limits that tobacco companies must pay in a class action suit on behalf of sick smokers.  The sick Florida smokers number between 300,000 to 700,000 which is a meaningless count since the judge tossed out the concept of verifying whether any of this nebulous horde actually was damaged by cigarettes.