The current anti-smoking campaign
is not about curbing children from smoking ...

It is all about YOUR MONEY... They want it!

Does Raising the Price of Cigarettes Curb Teenage Smoking?

If current tobacco use patterns persist, according to the American Lung Association, an estimated 6.4 million children will die prematurely from a smoking-related disease. Oh, really? How do they come up with these numbers? I guess they figure if they repeat it enough, people will believe them.

The money grabbing collectivists claim that one effective method to reduce the demand for tobacco products, particularly among teenagers, is to raise the price through an increase in excise taxes. President Clinton trumpeted this approach saying, "It's clear that one of the things that will lead to a reduction in teen smoking is making cigarettes more expensive."

Senator John McCain (R-AZ) made the preposterous statement that raising the price of tobacco would cut youth smoking in half! Presumably he makes that statement thinking that because of the higher price, young people will not spend their money on those products.

Has the high price of marijuana, cocaine or other drugs deterred youth from buying it? Absolutely NOT! By their own accounts, youth use of illegal drugs has actually increased. McCain and others know this. They really don't care about your children - what they want is your money ... hello?

Medical researchers Joseph DiFranze and John Librett reported on smoking by minors in a respected medical journal, The American Journal of Public Health, reported in July 1999, (AJPH, 1999;89:1106-1107), "Developments over the past decade included:

• An increase in the adolescent population,
• An increase in the prevalence of smoking among youths,
• An increase in the price of cigarettes, and
• The enactment of state and federal laws making the sale of tobacco to persons younger than 18 illegal in all 50 states."
  

These liberal socialists keep harping on their contention that raising the price of cigarettes will reduce teenage smoking. What a fraud!

By their own statistics, youth smoking is on the rise and ... duh ... so has the price of cigarettes. What has the effect been in the past of a price increase of more than $1? According to their own numbers, youth smoking has increased. So much for their version of truth.

Their total rejection of truth was shown in a statement made by Sen. Ed. Kennedy. He claimed that while youth smoking was at a 19-year high, the price of cigarettes has steadily been going down. What!? How in the world can he claim that? Anyone who has purchased a pack of cigarettes in the past 20 years has seen the price of cigarettes go from 50 cents a pack to over $4. Either Senator Kennedy was stupid, totally ignorant of reality, or he was lying.

Sen. Kennedy, Sen. McCain, and others don't want to reduce youth smoking ... they want more of your money! And they'll lie to get it!

Most of their statistics are little more than wild estimates with no basis in fact. President Clinton warned, for example, that one million people would die prematurely if Congress did not pass tobacco legislation. The one million saved lives, for example, came from a statement by the American Cancer Society saying that a 60 percent decrease in youth smoking in coming years could reduce early deaths from diseases like lung cancer by a million. But the 60 percent figure was merely a target of anti-smoking advocates, with no analysis to back it up. "They basically made up the number and I think it was totally irresponsible of them," said Dr. Stanton Glantz, a professor of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco.

Or how about the studies cited by Lawrence Summers, the deputy Treasury secretary, saying that every 10 percent increase in the price of a pack of cigarettes would produce up to a 7 percent reduction in the number of children who smoke. Contrary to Summers citations, a study by researchers at Cornell University came to a far different conclusion. The Cornell study found that price had little effect on childrens smoking behavior. The study found that states that increased tobacco taxes did not have significantly fewer children who started smoking compared with states that raised taxes at a slower rate or not at all.

Politicians and policy makers have tossed out dozens of estimates about the impact of various strategies on youth smoking rates, figures that turn out to be based on projections rather than fact.

Has it worked?

Even the socialist organizations most responsible for stealing your money admit their programs are a failure. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently reported that more high school students are taking up smoking, despite stepped-up antismoking campaigns. Their figures show that the number of high school students who smoke rose by nearly a third over the last 6 years. The number of first-time teenage smokers has risen 73 percent in the 1990s, according to the CDC, topping 1 million a year.

According to American Lung Association statistics in 2003, 4.5 million U.S. adolescents are now cigarette smokers.

In the 1990's, nearly 3,000 American youngsters become regular smokers each day. By 2003, those numbers had doubled to nearly 6,000 children starting to smoke each day.

• Despite government-funded campaigns to stop cigarette smoking in Canada, the number of teenaged smokers rose to 28.3 percent in 1999 from 23.8 per cent six years previous.
• After Finland, Sweden, Norway and Australia banned tobacco and cigarette advertising, teenage smoking rates either increased or stayed the same -- as youngsters rebelled against what they saw as restrictions on their independence.

It's clear they simply don't get enough of your money already ... they want MORE!

Never mind their programs don't work and that higher taxes won't curb smoking, they just want more of your money.

President Clinton outlined what they want... he said that states and the federal government need to raise funds to help pay for smoking-related medical fees, health research and anti-smoking campaigns. In other words, More government, more government, and more government.

In South Dakota, after raising taxes by $1 on a pack of cigarettes, legislators are bemoaning their "shortfall" of tax revenue from cigarettes. In just a two month period they had forecast raking in $11.4 million but had only collected $11.1 million. That's a bunch of taxes representing a whole lot of cigarettes. You would think that if their real motive was to reduce cigarette consumption, they would be encouraged to see the tax revenues being reduced by a corresponding reduction in smoking. Well, folks... that ain't the case. They don't care one whit about your children or anyone else consuming their "cash cow" products. There has been no mention from South Dakota Revenue Secretary Paul Kinsman or any other socialist in the state about their children's health... only that they are not getting enough of your money.