Well, smoking is often used for weight loss.

Less money used on smoking will make more people smoke.

The people who smoke will be less obese.

Therefore, we're really getting two birds with one stone here, right? ;)

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We are overlooking an obvious benefit of tobacco consumption. In addition to food consumption, tobacco reduces oil consumption. Another social benefit of premature death.

To generate a net economic benefit, however, we will need to make sure that tobacco users have no access to health care except that paid for from the same source they use to pay for their smokes and chews.

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Tobacco also brings lots of $$$$$$$$ into all levels of government coffers.

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Cato: That's right, and since we subsidize corn, and thus high-fructose corn syrup, so heavily, we're actually spending money to get people fatter.

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I wish more money was spent on actual health care instead of health repair.
Preventative Medicine.

Educate on proper diets.
Educate on healthy choices.
Educate on active lifestyles.
Create communities that enable a more active lifestyle.

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Why post this here? Because fat and smoking kill people and so does THIS from yesterday which shouldn’t get lost in the shuffle.

Fat? Death? I'm reminded of Maggie Gallagher and her so-far ineffectual Catholic anti-gay National Organization for Marriage (NOM) tour which hasn’t drawn crowds so yesterday ramped up their message with a sign in the group showing two nooses -- remember lynchings? -- and a Leviticus quote advocating killing gay and lesbian Americans.

Could you just die? No, no. Seriously.

But wait! There’s more!

ALSO yesterday – MORE support for Christians killing gays and lesbians. Not death from fat or smoking but -- Biblical murder!

Murder sanctioned by God AND two of your favorite Christian shopping destinations (corporations are jumping on the bandwagon)! Who knew they were so Christian all of a sudden?

Both Target and Best Buy stores gave generously to MN Forward in Minnesota to help fund viciously anti-gay state Rep. Tom Emmer who supports hard-core Christian rocker Bradlee Dean's ministry which ALSO advocates killing gays and lesbians.

So the takeaway for Americans per yesterday, Razorbabies, is, “Don’t Smoke, Lose Weight, Turn Straight – or Die.”

Sister-? Feel better now about WBW fighting terrorist religious sects over in the theocratic Middle East?

A tad suicidal every time you shop Target or Best Buy?

Enquiring minds want to know.

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The money tobacco taxes bring is dwarfed by the cost of tobacco related disease. The tobacco industry however is quite sophisticated and generous when it comes to campaign contributions and the manipulation of public opinion. You are quite right that tobacco use will rise as prevention funds are siphoned off.

In AR a few years ago tobacco prevention monies for school curriculum was diverted to a coordinated school health program in fewer schools. This was based on evidence showing that youth tobacco prevention efforts were largely unsuccessful in the long term if the community continued to tolerate tobacco use as normal or appropriate. Also obesity is with out a doubt an impending storm for public health. Unfortunately, the causes of obesity are varied and diverse while tobacco related disease is directly related to tobacco company profit. So now we don't seem to be making much progress on either front.

Like a broken record, sincere tobacco free advocates have repeated that effective tobacco prevention is the result of significantly increased tobacco taxes, tobacco free spaces, and market reform. Legislators would rather blame the victim, despite an addiction most acquire before the age of consent, because it costs them no political capitol. Massive tobacco prevention could be accomplished rapidly if our policy makers would take their responsibility seriously.

Instead we get a bill written by Philip Morris that gives a limited and inane regulatory authority over tobacco to the FDA. Most topically is the debate over how to regulate menthol. In passage of the bill supporters promised that menthol could be eliminated in the same fashion that fruit and candy flavors had been banned. 70% of black smokers smoke menthol. But now it appears that the criteria the scientific advisory panel must use in recommending the elimination of an ingredient is actual harm. While menthol is integral to making tobacco palatable, and the elimination would undoubtably reduce the use and addiction by millions, menthol in itself is not harmful. We'll just have to see how this shakes out. Complicate that with the fact that the U.S. $200 million in burley tobacco produced is dependent on menthol because it is so very harsh. The Framework Convention on Tobacco Control is also calling for the elimination of menthol in tobacco. The Senate's failure to ratify this treaty may well hinge one the fact that 70% of american burley is exported.

Meanwhile, tobacco companies continue to make a killing and there's corn syrup in everything. It's hard to get too optimistic this morning.

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Before some Razorbaby makes a bigoted idiot of themselves, remember NOM is relentless at strong-arming unwanted signs and protesters off their rally sites -- WHEN THEY WANT TO.

Just sayin'.

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I'm surprised big libs aren't advocating a "fat tax." If you are over say 250 lbs, you automatically have to pay an excise tax (per pound) that you are over weight. Say 10 cents a pound. That would subsidize the hit the free health care system will take because of obese people having all kinds of health problems.

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20 million unemployed, millions more underemployed... 40 million on food stamps!

Versailles better hope these fat folk never learn what hunger means.

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Eukaryote , don't forget government also subsidizes the tobacco farmers.

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Don't most tobacco companies also own processed food companies? Like RJ Reynolds owning Kraft (or at least a significant portion.) Food is manipulated in the same way cigarettes are - ingredients added to make it more palatable & addictive.

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The two largest tobacco companies in the U.S. Philip Morris/ Altria and RJ Reynolds got in the food business in a large way in the mid 80s. PM International, split from PM America a few years ago, is one of the larger global tobacco concerns.
While tobacco companies have set the bar on product manipulation they have one of the most addictive substances around, nicotine, going for them. Altria, by the way owns Kraft. The FDA can eliminate anything harmful in mac and cheeze. The FDA's new regs do not allow for the elimination nicotine in tobacco products.
Just as background, this FDA bill is the result of a SCOTUS decision in the late 90s that denied the FDA authority over tobacco because the purpose of the FDA is to guarantee the health and safety of products and would have no choice but to ban cigarettes. The court said Congress had not given the FDA that authority. This latest tripe was designed by Philip Morris to do several things: first it would cement their market dominance in the U.S. PM International had split off so no regs in the U.S. affected them. Second, market reforms would be immediately suspect to legal challenges. And third, would institutionalize tobacco use in a historically unprecedented fashion. And last, it undermines the integrity of the FDA to effectively guarantee the safety of anything. So far this bill has been very successful for Philip Morris.
Oh, did I mention that hundreds of major public health groups supported this bill too! Remember this when you write a check to the Heart, Lung, or Cancer people this year.

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I tolds ya and I tolds ya....when the Do-Gooders got done with us smokers they were going to turn their guns on you fatties! Next thing ya know farting in public will be a jail-able offense. And you ugly people out there.....better reproduce now before door to door tube-tying starts up.

Does this news mean my friend Chel will be getting a smaller and smaller paycheck in the future? Might oughta start researching for the Fat Wars in our future. I'm sure it will be no trouble to find proof that yer fat is costing me big money!

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Inch, old buddy. There is no mathematical way my paycheck can get any smaller. Really.

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Obesity is going to be a much more difficult problem to overcome than tobacco addiction.

Tobacco product prices have continually shot upwards. If you compare them, relative to cost of living, they far out stripped the increased the cost of eating.

Tobacco addiction is a single cause related disorder. Obesity is more complex. A combination of food choices, quantity, and activity levels produce the disorder. Culture also plays an important part. When a 300 lb, biscuits-n-gravy preacher was elected governor for two terms it sends a message and it IS a message. His two-ton offspring are testament that obesity is also related to family values of gluttony and inactivity.

We can howl about food choices all day and prove nothing. Mac and cheese could save lives in populations that are starving and in many ways is superior to diets based on a single grain upon which many underfed populations must depend. Near starving populations simply don't have enough of anything. We have too much.

Regulating food advertisements is a dead end road. Unlike tobacco advertising, food advertising is not a threat to anyone, even the kind that makes an unwitting person crave a bacon loaded cheeseburger on a white-washed bun with a mountain of heart-clogging, high fat potatoes accompanied with 12 teaspoons of sugar/fructose "soft drink."

When was the last time you saw a TV ad for whole, organic foods? Or when was the last time you saw a TV adv which promoted the nutritional value of food? They are few. TV has converted many of us into what is termed "emotional eaters" and in many cases it stimulates "infant eating" syndromes because those two classes of eaters are the most profitable for marketing purposes.

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InchyDeath,

Thanks for the headsup on the coming FatWars!

I am working now on setting up positions on the high ground. That has always been a good strategy for being able to keep an eye on attackers but if the attackers are both fat and smokers it should really be an advantage.

Watchout, here comes a wave of attackers! Oops, never mind, they are all hunched over half way up the hill with hands on knees trying to catch their breath.

Slow moving and wide targets would be an easy shot for a nonmarkesman like myself. Wish I had a full automatic assault weapon. That way I wouldn't have to pull the trigger each time.

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