On Friday, Apr 30, 2004, at 13:26 US/Pacific, Mike Hord wrote:
> The surprising exception to this rule has been smoking.  Lawmakers seem
> to have no trouble making widespread laws against smoking, despite the
> incredible revenues and resources of tobacco companies.

You can probably explain this by noticing whether the insurance
companies (including government-sponsored insurance like medicare) have
gotten bigger than the tobacco companies.  Everyone likes collecting
the assorted tobacco revenues, but no one likes paying for the long
term consequences...

It's rather a scary thought, that anything likely to cause major
medical bills might become illegal on the grounds that insurance
doesn't want to pay the bills.  There's a fair amount of stuff that
becomes illegal largely because the 'required insurance' is
unobtainable.

BillW

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: To leave the PICList
mailto:piclist-unsubscribe-request@mitvma.mit.edu