Wisconsin Attorney General James Doyle, who jumped on the anti-smoker bandwagon to loot smokers instead of standing up for truth, freedom and justice, has now been elected governor. The Milwaukee Shepherd Express exposes his relationship to the private law firms who were his instigators and accomplices. "Employees of the law firms - Milwaukee's Habush, Habush and Rottier and Whyte, Hirschboeck Dudek, along with the Janesville-based Brennan, Steil, Basting and McDougall - poured $73,066 into Doyle's campaign between 1995 and July 2002. The timing is significant, since 1995 marks the year Robert Habush first pitched tobacco-settlement work to the attorney general in a May 22 letter that was recently obtained by Shepherd Express through a Wisconsin Open Records request..." (The Tobacco Connection, by Chuck Nowlen. Milwaukee Shepherd Express 2002 Aug 29;23(35).)

The Healthy So-Called Smokers Class Action

In fact, these people do not represent smokers; they are merely pawns of the anti-smokers, whose intent is to loot even more money from smokers' pockets for the benefit of the anti-smokers. Thanks to the anti-smokers' corrupt and conspiratorial activities, we smokers have been deprived of access to courts of law for the redress our real grievances. Justice in America is a lie, a fraud, and a sham!

(News) Tobacco industry funded 'good science,' witness says. V Smith, Associated Press 2001 Nov 6. At the West Virginia class action suit of healthy so-called smokers (actually anti-smokers' pawns), Harmon McAllister "denied accusations the council was an industry shield formed solely for its public relations value and that it funded largely irrelevant research." In fact, the CTR WAS merely a PR shield to make it look as if the tobacco industry was fighting the anti-smokers when it wasn't. And, the research WAS largely irrelevant, with the CTR functioning as a mere funding pump from smokers to Lasker Syndicate cronies. They made sure that the research was of no benefit to smokers.

Tobacco documents prove that Daniel C. Tosteson, former Dean of the Harvard Medical School (and later principal of the Lasker Foundation-associated Washington Advisory Group) wanted the tobacco industry off the campus - although he was willing to take their money providing that it was used for basic research that was not relevant to tobacco and health.

The Minnesota Tobacco Trial Travesty

Mary Lasker's friend, Washington socialite Frances Humphrey Howard, was Minnesota Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III's aunt.

The daughter of Joseph Robbie, of the Minnesota Candy & Tobacco Distributors Association and the National Association of Tobacco Distributors, whose papers gave AG Humphrey the pretext for his fishing expedition, was Treasurer of the 1998 "Humphrey for Governor" campaign.

Jonathan Samet Perjury Links

Jonathan M. Samet of The Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health was the anti-smokers' star witness on smoking and health. He relied on old, defective studies in order to ignore the role of infection in causing the diseases blamed on smoking.

Arnold & Porter: The "Public Pretenders"

The tobacco industry lawyers never challenged Samet with the evidence implicating confounding by infection as the source of the alleged health risks of smoking. Key subjects such as Helicobacter pylori and human papillomavirus, which have been officially declared to be causes of cancers blamed on smoking, were never even mentioned. Nor did they present evidence of the suppression of research by anti-smokers. Furthermore, the Minnesota lawsuit never went to a jury. Instead, the tobacco industry lawyers took a dive and went for a settlement. This was despite the fact that observers felt that they were winning, and this in turn was despite their abject failure to present the multitude of evidence available for their defense. To make matters even worse, the tobacco industry offered the anti-smokers even more money to settle than the anti-smokers were demanding, instead of the normal process of bargaining the figure down. The tobacco industry's betrayal cost smokers 368 billion dollars, to be poured into the pockets of anti-smokers and used by them to buy politicans and spread lies.

This evidence is a "smoking gun" that the tobacco industry lawyers are secretly in cahoots with the anti-smokers, and cooperating with them to destroy the tobacco industry, and eventually to outlaw tobacco. After they've looted smokers for every cent they can get, that is.

Surely it is not just a coincidence that the firm representing the tobacco companies was instrumental in the establishment of the often-dubious right of the indigent to free legal counsel. The ungrateful beneficiaries frequently refer to these lawyers as "public pretenders," in reference to the poor quality of their work. According to Richard Kluger (Ashes to Ashes; Alfred A. Knopf, 1996), the firm was "a powerhouse in Democratic political circles with a high-profile New Deal pedigree. The firm's top strategist and behind-the-scenes wire puller, Abe Fortas, would shortly gain immortality in American jurisprudential annals with his pro bono 1963 victory in Gideon v. Wainwright, expanding indigents' right to counsel. The embattled tobacco industry, while hardly paupers, also felt the need for illustrious representation in the law courts as well as the court of public opinion, and Arnold & Porter's liberal lawyers were hardly in a position philosophically to turn down the cigarette-makers now being accused of purveying death to multitudes. 'People here felt intensely about the importance of the right to counsel,' recalled Arnold & Porter partner Abe Krash, who was on the Philip Morris account from the start. '...[I]t's not necessary that our views be congruent with our clients'" And obviously it was important to them to actually act in the defense of their clients, either. Just "going through the motions" is good enough to maintain appearances. More than one innocent man has been sent to the gallows by representation such as this. And in the Minnesota kangaroo court, 50 million people were betrayed at once.

LASKER SYNDICATE TIES TO ARNOLD & PORTER

From a report prepared "Upon the request of the Director of the National Commission on Smoking and Public Policy (created by the American Cancer Society)" for its forum in Atlanta, June 14, 1977. It is a cynical attempt to disguise their own activities by misrepresenting them as "Control of government policy by the Tobacco Industry," claiming that "Every attempt in the past by government officials to control or limit the smoking epidemic has been carefully modulated by the tobacco industry, and usually via the Tobacco Institute, to insure that such official goals are defeated. The tobacco industry has obviously employed more legal talent for such purposes than any other industry in the world!" This is what the Lasker Syndicate conspirators who've secretly controlled the US government ever since World War II (and especially the health establishment), want the suckers to believe!

"Arnold & Porter (formerly Arnold, Fortas & Porter)... Abe Fortas left the firm in 1965. Joseph Califano, President Johnson's chief advisor for domestic affairs, joined the firm soon after leaving the White House. He left in a year's time -- June 1971. He became a name partner in the firm headed by Edward Bennett Williams. Of course, he is now Secretary of HEW in the Carter Administration. Victor H. Kramer, was a trial attorney for Justice Department. He was with the firm for about ten years. He left to establish the Center for Law and Social Policy. Thurmond Arnold, was chief of Justice Department's anti-trust division. Resigned to become Judge of the Court of Appeals; private practie since 1945. Paul A. Porter was FCC Chairman and head of the wartime Office of Price Administration which gave him wide acquaintance throughout the bureaucracy. Later President Truman sent Porter to Greece as a special roaming ambassador. In 1961 the Washington office of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, et al, joined Arnold, Fortas & Porter -- there were nine lawyers involved led by Fortas's tax-lawyer wife, Carolyn Agger." Philip Morris was one of their clients, with attorneys Jeffrey A. Burt, Jerome I. Chapman, Kenneth V. Kendal, and Abe Krash.

"Paul, Weiss, Rifkin, Wharton & Garrison... Partners from the Chicago office, which is no longer in existence, were the following: Adlai Stevenson, U.N., Willard Wirtz, Labor Department; Newton Minow, chairman of the FCC; and William McCormick Blair, ambassador to Denmark. After Paul's death and Stevenson's departure, what was left of the Washington office was merged into the Washington firm of Arnold, Fortas and Porter...." Clients included Brown & Williamson Tobacco Co. and Young & Rubicam International, Inc. The source given for this is the book, Lions in the Street; the Inside Story of the Great Law Firms, by Paul Hoffman (1973). In the New York office, partner John F. Wharton had been a director of Benson & Hedges and Tobacco & Allied Stocks in 1954; in 1960, Simon H. Rifkind was a director of Loew's Theatres, which acquired Lorillard Tobacco; and in 1977, partner Morris B. Abram was a member of the Citizens' Committee of the Citizens' Campaign Against Bootleg Cigarettes.

There is another perjuror behind the scenes, Leon Gordis, who wrote the section on epidemiology of the federal reference manual on scientific evidence -- and who just happens to be Jonathan Samet's crony at The Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Gordis has falsely claimed that multivariate analysis controls for confounding, to incorporate this fraud right into the very core of the law.

The Testimony of CTR President James F. Glenn Establishes His Idiocy

And the anti-smoker lawyer looks even stupider because he can't tell a bacterium from a virus. But, this superbly-prepared (and lavishly-rewarded) warrior who vanquished the tobacco industry giant knows with absolute certainty what causes cancer, because the anti-smokers told him so.

Anti-smoker Judge Fitzpatrick's violation of Rule 602

"The Minnesota rule is similar to a federal rule. It says: "A witness may not testify to a matter unless evidence is introduced sufficient to support a finding that the witness has personal knowledge of the matter." When Geoffrey Bible, chief executive of Philip Morris, Cos. Inc., who had worked overseas in non-tobacco branches of the firm until 1994, pleaded ignorance of 115 "secret" Philip Morris documents, Ramsey County District Judge Kenneth Fitzpatrick cut three fours from the defense's allotted 225 minutes. During questioning of RJR chief Andrew Schindler, "[RJR defense attorney Robert] Weber cited Rule 602 at least seven times. Schindler began working for RJR Industries (now RJR Nabisco), the holding company of Reynolds Tobacco, in 1974 and first worked for the tobacco arm in 1976. When Ciresi asked Schindler about a 1969 Philip Morris memo discussing a Reynolds lab where the effects of cigarette smoking were being tested on animals, Weber objected, saying Rule 602 meant Schindler didn't have to answer unless he had personal knowledge. "You can answer if you know," Fitzpatrick ruled. Following another Rule 602 objection by Weber, the judge called the attorneys to the bench for a lengthy discussion out of hearing of the jury. Fitzpatrick then said Schindler could answer the question about chronic smoke exposure research being done by Reynolds in 1969. When asked about a 1953 document, Schindler said he hadn't read it. "I was only 8 years old at the time," he said. "This is 45 years ago ... I don't even know who these people were. I have no knowledge of what these people were doing." Schindler said he started seeing the historical documents about 1 1/2 years ago as the company became more involved in lawsuits. Weber said the judge's reading of Rule 602 may be unprecedented. "I think it is clearly an error to put somebody on the stand and ask them over and over things they have no knowledge of. I don't think this would happen in any other courtroom in America," he said. "The idea of.having a fact witness do that, I've never, ever seen it done before," said David Bernick, who is representing Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. in the trial. Fact witnesses testify on their personal knowledge and differ from expert witnesses, who testify on matters for which their education or training qualifies them as experts. Cliff Greene, a lawyer and visiting professor at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, agreed it was unusual for a judge to require fact witnesses to be prepared to discuss large volumes of documents they had no firsthand knowledge of. Greene did not want to say whose interpretation of`the rule he thought was correct. But he said it was easy to understand the plaintiffs' intent in confronting top tobacco executives with possibly damaging documents. 'They want to associate them with the company. They want someone to personify the company and dramatize some negative inference,' Greene said. 'They need to get exposure for documents, and they don't want defendants to prevent them from doing that by saying, 'We haven't looked at them.' '" The tobacco lawyers filed their third motion for a mistrial. (Tobacco attorneys say judge in error. AP. The News Observer, Mar. 15, 1998.)

California: the bloodsuckers gloat in triumph again

The RJ Reynolds and Lorillard tobacco companies filed a lawsuit alleging that the state of California's anti-smoking hate propaganda, which is funded in part by that state's extortionate cigarette tax, unfairly defamed them. Supercilious pecksniff Judge Raymond C. Fisher of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that expecting the corrupt, bloodsucking government not to lie, smear, and defame its citizens was unreasonable, and sniffed that "The implication of the tobacco companies' argument is that industries subject to an excise tax are entitled to a special veto over government speech funded by the tax." In Bloodsucker Land, basic fairness is not a fundamental human right. It's a privilege to be endowed by our bloodsucker dictators upon their favored pets, while withholding it from others. (Tobacco Companies Lose Lawsuit to Ban Ads. Convenience Store News, Sep. 29, 2004.)

Florida

The anti-smoker vermin in the Florida State Legislature brazenly changed the laws affecting the rules of evidence for the sole purpose of enabling the Florida Attorney General to steal $429 million of smokers' money under the false pretense that smoking cost the State of Florida money. Anti-smoker State Sen. W. D. Childers (D-Pensacola) gloated that "We snookered 'em" into passing the Medicaid Third Party liability amendment in the closing hours of the 1994 session. Anti-smoker Gov. Lawton Chiles signed an executive limiting application of the law to tobacco products and illegal drugs "in an attempt to siphon support from the popular effort to repeal the law" - which convently occurred after it had accomplished its purpose. (The $429 million question, by Jacqueline Horkan. Employer Advocate, May-June 1995.) The anti-smoker vermin in the media crowed triumphantly, and the anti-smoker vermin in the U.S. Department of Justice looked on indulgently. SO MUCH FOR THE "RULE OF LAW" IN ANTI-SMOKER LAND!

Mississippi

Richard Scruggs Indicted for Bribing Judge

The State's attorney in the Mississippi tobacco lawsuit, Richard Scruggs, was indicted on federal conspiracy and bribery charges for offering $50,000 to sway a judge in "a relatively small squabble over fees." He was indicted on Nov. 28 along with four others, including his son Zachary Scruggs, who is a lawyer in his firm. They are accused of attempting to bribe Judge Henry L. Lackey, who was overseeing lawsuit against him by another lawyer, who said he was cheated out of his fair share of a $26.5 million settlement. Other lawyers have similar complaints against Scruggs. "According to an official investigating the Scruggs case who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to discuss it publicly, federal prosecutors have asked the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section to examine whether Mr. Scruggs has engaged in multiple bribery attempts of local judges. A spokeswoman for the Justice Department declined to comment publicly on the case. The case is also likely to fuel further debate over the merits of lucrative class-action lawsuits." The Times describes Scruggs as "a smooth Southern lawyer capable of winning huge verdicts on behalf of smokers," as if he has our heartfelt gratitude for making us pay more for cigarettes for the benefit of professional anti-smoking groups! "Estimates of how much Mr. Scruggs and his partners stand to eventually collect from the tobacco settlement reach north of $1 billion. He is one of Mississippi’s richest men, with a black Porsche Cayenne that is a familiar sight in Courthouse Square in nearby Oxford, where his firm is located.... Scruggs recently contributed $300,000 to Democracy for America, an independent group that supports liberal political candidates. He has also donated about $100,000 to the Democratic Party’s congressional re-election committees since 2000... Mr. Scruggs had been scheduled to play host to a fund-raiser for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton at his Oxford home next Saturday, but that was canceled after the indictment." "Working the political and legal machinery in Mississippi isn’t new to Mr. Scruggs. In his deposition with Mr. Merkel in 2004, he discussed some $10 million in payments he made to P. L. Blake, a onetime college football star in Mississippi. After running into financial troubles, Mr. Blake became a political consultant for Mr. Scruggs, helping his boss navigate the back rooms of state politics and tobacco litigation." Scruggs said of Blake: "He has numerous connections — in terms — when I say connections, I don’t mean that in a sinister way, I mean he just has a lot — he knows an awful lot of people in the political realm. And he — depending on the stage of tobacco litigation proceedings was keeping his ear to the ground, prying, checking. I mean, I never asked who or what or all that." (Court Intrigue for the King of Torts. By Nelson D. Schwartz. New York Times, Dec. 9, 2007.) In 1970, Blake, of Greenwood, Miss., bought the New Orleans Buccaneers. In 1984, Blake owned a Plainview, Texas grain warehouse that was the largest in the country. It was "declared in default on its multimillion-dollar Government contract... after its owner did not come up with 966,000 bushels of missing Government-owned corn," or either replace it or pay the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service $2.9 million. (Grain Unit In Default. AP. Oct. 2, 1984.)

"The Dickie Scruggs bribery case keeps getting curiouser, with yesterday's news that even the tort baron's former defense attorney has copped a federal plea.... Joey Langston, who had until recently represented Mr. Scruggs, has now pled guilty to conspiring with Mr. Scruggs in a scheme to influence a different judge in a separate case. According to the indictment, sometime in 2006 or early 2007 Mr. Scruggs told Mr. Langston that "he could arrange for [Judge] DeLaughter to be considered for a [federal] appointment" and said Mr. Langston should have that information conveyed to the judge. How Mr. Scruggs was intending to help Judge DeLaughter isn't clear, but it has escaped no one that Mr. Scruggs's brother-in-law is Senator Trent Lott." And "three former intimates... are talking to the feds about Mississippi's tort bar culture, in which bribery seems to have been a signature practice." (Another Scruggs Case. Wall Street Journal, Jan. 15, 2008.)

"A mystery man receiving $50 million from prominent Mississippi attorney Richard 'Dickie' Scruggs earned the money by paying off allies during Scruggs' epic battle with the tobacco industry in the late 1990s, said a former colleague turned government witness. As state attorney general during that time, Mike Moore mustered the legal troops Scruggs helped lead into battle, wresting unprecedented settlements from the tobacco industry that earned Scruggs' firm almost $1 billion in legal fees. The war involved lobbying at the state and federal levels and years of negotiations with tobacco company representatives. Scruggs has said a $50 million cut from his fees will go over 20 years to P.L. Blake, a politically connected son of the Mississippi Delta who now lives in Birmingham. Scruggs and Moore have said Blake worked political cloakrooms, bringing his keen political knowledge and connections to their settlement efforts. Blake has said he simply clipped newspaper articles, watched C-SPAN and kept Scruggs updated on political maneuverings." (Witness: Scruggs Paying 'Bagman' $50 Million Going to Mystery Man. By Anita Lee. Biloxi Sun Herald, Feb. 27, 2008.)

Scruggs pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to bribe a Mississippi state judge, and five other counts were dropped. Scruggs faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. (Prominent Trial Lawyer Pleads Guilty to Bribery. By Jonathan D. Glater. New York Times, Mar. 15, 2008.)

Texas

Former Texas AG Dan Morales Indicted

"United States Attorney Johnny Sutton announced today that former Texas Attorney General Dan Morales was charged in a twelve-count indictment with mail fraud, conspiracy, filing a false tax return, and making false statements on a loan application. Houston area attorney Marc Murr was also indicted by a federal grand jury for mail fraud and conspiracy." Morales is accused of back dating documents, forging government records and converting campaign contributions to personal use. (Press Release. US Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney's Office, Western District of Texas, Austin, TX, March 6, 2003.)

But this still does not admit that anything more than the personal corruption of a few individuals is involved! Furthermore, it may be merely the Lasker Syndicate punishing Morales for being an upstart operating independently of their machine.

Judge orders former attorney general to remain in jail. AP June 26, 2003. "Robert Hightower, the FBI agent leading the investigation into the federal charges against Morales, said investigators have found no evidence that the Harvard-educated Morales has had any income since October 2001. Credit reports through May 1 showed Morales had $163, 715 in credit card debt... Morales' attorneys gave no indication how Morales was able to make the payments while not holding a job."

The "Power Elite" Controls Both Sides

The anti-smokers control the tobacco companies, and use them as a tool to loot smokers via unjust settlements.

Just look at the self-righteous words of the bloodsucking anti-smoker filth, who conspired to take over our health establishment with their health fascist Lasker Lobby, to perpetrate systematic scientific fraud by suppressing research and deliberately using defective studies to falsely blame smoking for diseases caused by infection. Who conspired to take over the tobacco companies, and use them to plunder their own customers for the benefit of their enemies. Whose filthy media whores, who were hired for their corruption, have ruthlessly silenced anyone who tried to reveal the truth. Look at the filthy bloodsucker, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), whose corporate crony, Frederic V. Malek, a big donor to the Repuglican Party, was a director on the board of corrupt EPA contractor ICF Incorporated, which wrote their fraudulent ETS report to the order of the anti-smoking vermin, via illegal pass-through contracts to their hand-picked crony, Kenneth G. Brown; who in turn was a front man for anti-smoker A.J. Wells.

(News Conference of Attorneys General of States Settling With Liggett Group, March 20, 1997.) They didn't see the papers, but that didn't spoil their celebration. Nor did the fact that their triumph was the result of a settlement with a "third-tier bottom feeder" who took over the company, and profited from the turmoil he created. (Wealth Creation and Destruction from Brooke Group's Tobacco Litigation Strategy. Working Paper. By Sandeep Dahiya and David Yermack, 1999.)

The Tobacco Settlement

Republicans and Democrats collude to loot smokers in the name of Medicare: "One of the Domenici proposal's main features is the earmarking of any proceeds from a legislated settlement with the tobacco industry over the illnesses caused by smoking [sic] to help Medicare, the health insurance program for the elderly. Although there is no assurance that Congress and the industry will come to terms on a deal, Mr. Clinton's budget proposal allocated $65 billion in anticipated proceeds from any settlement largely to his new spending plans, including $21 billion in new financing for child care over five years and $7.3 billion to reduce the size of classes. Mr. Domenici [US Senator, R-NM] said that since 14 percent of Medicare expenditures -- about $30 billion a year -- go to treat smoking-related illnesses [sic], any tobacco settlement should go to averting the financial problems that Medicare will face as the population ages. The proposal was criticized by some Republicans, who want to use any tobacco money for tax cuts, as well as by Democrats, who said it would gut their spending agenda. But Mr. Domenici defended it as the most prudent use of the money. 'That's the program that's most justified in having that money,' Mr. Domenici said in releasing his plan at a budget committee hearing." (G.O.P. Fiscal Plan Rejects Programs Sought By Clinton. New York Times, Mar. 18, 1998.) President Clinton's announcement of his expanded Medicare plan made no mention of tobacco settlement money. (Remarks by President Clinton at Announcement of Medicare Expansion Legislation. U.S. Newswire, Mar. 17, 1998.)

Rep. Frank Lautenberg, D-NJ, introduced a substitute amendment with a $1.50 per pack tax increase. Domenici's plan also included "generous funding increases for the National Institutes of Health." (Senate Budget Committee gets down to business of markup. By Matthew Tully. CQ, Mar. 18, 1998.)

State Tobacco Settlement Spending for Tobacco Persecution 1999-2000

"Fifteen states - Maine, Mississippi, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Indiana, Maryland, Ohio, Hawaii, Vermont, Wisconsin, Florida, Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa and Washington - have made substantial new commitments in 1999 and 2000 to fund tobacco prevention and cessation. Florida and Mississippi both agreed to launch a statewide tobacco prevention pilot program as part of their separate settlements with the tobacco industry. After initially allocating $92.3 million for its highly successful program, Florida's Legislature and Governor cut the funding by nearly 45 percent. The Mississippi Legislature has mandated that only the returns on the investment of its settlement payments may be appropriated. Thus, when authorization for the state's pilot tobacco prevention program (currently funded at $31 million per year) ends in 2000, tobacco prevention will compete with other health issues for a much more limited pool of funds, leaving the status of this program in doubt.

"Eleven states - Illinois, New Jersey, West Virginia, Utah, Montana, Georgia, Virginia, Delaware, New York, Oklahoma and New Hampshire - have committed modest amounts to new tobacco prevention and cessation programs - less than one-half of the minimum amount recommended by the CDC for these states.

"Fourteen states - Rhode Island, Kentucky, Nevada, Alabama, South Dakota, Alaska, New Mexico, Louisiana, Wyoming, Idaho, Texas, South Carolina, Connecticut and Kansas - have made only a minimal financial commitment to tobacco prevention and cessation - less than 25 percent of the minimum amount recommended by the CDC. Texas, for example, created an endowment that will provide just $10 million for tobacco prevention programs for the entire state, a per capita expenditure of only 51 cents. In comparison, California spends $3.55 per capita and Orgeon spends $2.62 per capita.

"Three states - California, North Dakota and Michigan - make no commitment under current law to provide funding for tobacco prevention and cessation from the tobacco settlement funds. In California, the funds have been transferred into the general fund. In North Dakota, the funds were used for water projects and educational funding with only a small amount left for public health. Michigan allocated 75 percent of its money to a new college scholarship fund and 25 percent to state universities for biomedical research.

"One state - North Carolina - placed its tobacco settlement funds into a trust fund that may be used for a variety of purposes. This would permit, but not require, that some funds be used for tobacco prevention and cessation.

"Six states - Arizona, Arkansas, Missouri, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Tennessee - and the District of Columbia have not made legislative decisions about how to spend the tobacco settlement money. Voters in Arizona, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Orgeon will consider ballot initiatives on the issue in November." (Show Us the Money: An Update on the States' Allocation of the Tobacco Settlement Dollars. A Report by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, American Cancer Society, American Heart Association and the American Lung Association. Oct. 1, 2000.)

Show Us the Money: An Update on the States' Allocation of the Tobacco Settlement Dollars, Jan. 11, 2001.

State Allocation of Tobacco Settlement Funds: FY 2000 and FY 2001. Health Policy Tracking Service, National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), July 18, 2000.

Medicaid and Indigent Care. By Lee Dixon. State Tobacco Settlement Legislation and Activities. Health Policy Tracking Service, National Conference of State Legislatures, Nov. 1, 2000.

State Tobacco Settlement Spending for Tobacco Persecution 2000-2003

From the National Dialog on Cancer (NDOC), the American Cancer Society's Monologue.

The GAO Tobacco Settlement Report, 2005

Tobacco Settlement - States' Allocations of Fiscal Year 2004 and Expected Fiscal Year 2005 Payments. Government Accounting Office, GAO-05-312. Includes the budgets of individual states.

It will never be over until this illegal monopoly is OVERTURNED!

Cato Institute Policy Analysis No. 371, May 18, 2000. Constitutional and Antitrust Violations of the Multistate Tobacco Settlement, by Thomas C. O'Brien.

How much for immunity? TC O'Brien, RA Levy. Legal Times 2000 Dec 14.

Tobacco Cartel: Alive and Well. Robert A. Levy. Cato Institute Daily Commentary, 2001 May 12.

"The point, of course, is to allow Big Tobacco to boost the price of its products at will, without fear of being undersold by competitors. That way, smokers can be forced to pay all those billions that have to be passed on to the states." DC Tice, St. Paul Pioneer Press, 2001.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute Lawsuit Against the Settlement Agreement

(Government-Tobacco Cartel Challenged in Court. Competitive Enterprise Institute Press Release, Aug. 2, 2005.) Filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, the A.B. Coker Co., Inc., S&M Brands, Inc., CLP, Inc., Tobacco Discount House #1, Inc., and Mark Heacock, v. Charles C. Foti Jr., Attorney General of Louisiana.

Securitizing the Tobacco Settlement Money

"The investment banking industry has been lobbying state treasurers nationwide since mid-1999 on the potential benefits of securitizing tobacco settlement money, sponsoring educational conferences and mailing reams of literature on tax-free bond sales."

"'Litigation Bonds' Are a Risky Investment," by James Wootton, president of the US Chamber of Commerce. The Wall Street Journal 2001 Mar 14.

Public policy

National Taxpayers Union Foundation, Policy Paper 115. The Tobacco Deal -- Smokescreen for Bigger Government? By Mark Schmidt.

"Chamber Targets Excessive Legal Fees: Files 21 FOIA Requests on Tobacco Settlements." US Chamber of Commerce press release, 2001 March 14. "'If we allow these trial lawyers to collect this massive windfall, the damage to our economy could be incalulable,' Donohue said. "They've made no secret of the fact that those billions of dollars are earmarked for new causes of action, with numerous businesses and industries on their 'hit' list. The threat is real and no industry is immune.'"

US Chamber of Commerce Amicus Curiae in The Republic of Guatemala, et al. v. The Tobacco Institute, et al. 2000 Aug 18.

The trial lawyers' political power grab

Attorneys' Fees in the State Tobacco Litigation Cases. By John Contrubis, Legislative Attorney, American Law Division. CRS Report for Congress. Congressional Research Service, The Library of Congress, September 23, 1997. 97-883 A.

"Tracking the Trial Lawyers. Putting the Trial Lawyer Contributions on your Radar Screen. The Tobacco Settlement Part II: The Law Firms." TrialLawyerMoney.org.

After the Lion's Share. First legislatures, now plaintiff firms grab at tobacco billions. By Thomas Scheffey. The Connecticut Law Tribune, February 5, 2000.

Trial Lawyers on Trial, by Trevor Armbrister. Readers' Digest 2000 January. "No other profession funnels near as much into politics today."

Litigation Lotto, by Sheila R. Cherry. Insight on the News, 2000 April 3. A more in-depth report of the tobacco trial lawyers' campaign funding relationships with the governors and attorneys general who set their states' lawsuits in motion.

Kickbacks to the Lasker Syndicate

Trial lawyers' tax-deductable donations and money from the tobacco settlement reward Lasker Foundation cronies for crimes against smokers.

Michigan

1 Billion in Tobacco Funds Targeted for a Life Sciences Corridor; Michigan Leads the Nation in Using Settlement Funds for Health Research and Job Creation. Michigan Economic Development Corporation and www.tcsg.org. PR Newswire 2000 March 23. The Washington Advisory Group (of which Lasker Foundation director and Research!America emeritus board member Purnell Choppin is a principal) has been enlisted to help disburse the money. Members of the group with U-Mich connections: Bruce R. Guile got his Master of Public Policy at the University of Michigan in 1979; Frank H.T. Rhodes is a former Vice President for Academic Affairs at the University of Michigan; James Wyngaarden is a former director of the National Institutes of Health, and an emeritus board member of Research!America, who got his MD at the University of Michigan Medical School in 1948; and Frank Press is a longtime crony of Gilbert Omenn of the University of Michigan Medical School. Also, Noreen Clark, Dean of the U-Mich School of Public Health, is on Research!America's Prevention Research Initiative Advisory Council.

Regarding Michigan Tech's efforts to get a share of the state's tobacco settlement loot, alumnus Rob Lawrence '97 asks: "1) Just WHAT connection does the university have to an issue like this? (Answer: NONE!) 2) What makes President Tompkins think we're entitled to ANY share of these settlements? I don't use tobacco and I'm not fond of second-hand smoke; however, I believe the entire prosecution fiasco is highly unconstitutional. Regardless of my (or anyone else's opinion), the university has no business standing there with its hand out saying 'gimme' some of this ill-gotten loot. I want to see Michigan Tech continue as a leader in technological education, but not by stooping to this level." Needless to say, Tompkins' response was disingenuous. And, a number of highly placed persons (chief among them Gilbert S. Omenn) at the University were intimately involved in the conspiracy, fraud and racketeering that made the tobacco lawsuits possible.

"As a party to the November 1998 settlement of 46 states with the four largest U.S. manufacturers of tobacco products, Michigan is expected to receive periodic payments totaling more than $8.5 billion over the next 25 years. Michigan Public Act 120 of 1999 appropriates $50 million from the first of these for a Health and Aging Research and Development Initiative. This initiative, which is slated to receive appropriations of $50 million from the tobacco settlement revenues, will support the development of a technology corridor in Michigan for research and commercial development focusing on the life sciences. This Michigan Life Sciences Corridor (MSLC) will extend from Detroit to West Michigan.... For the initial year of the Fund's operation, the MEDC and the Steering Committee have retained the Washington Advisory Group to provide planning, process development, and proposal review support to the Fund's programs.... The team of nine Washington Advisory Group principals for support of proposal review and program development for the MSLC Fund includes" Frank Press, John Wyngaarden, Purnell Choppin, Erich Bloch, Frank Rhodes, Bruce Guile, Daniel Tosteson, Charles Sanders, and Mitchell Rabdin. (Michigan Life Sciences Corridor Fund, Fiscal Year 2000 Request for Proposals.)

Minnesota

"Tobacco Litigation Law Firm Donates $10 Million to Minneapolis Foundation." Philanthropy News Digest 1999 May 5;5(18). "The Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi law firm has made a $10 million donation to the Minneapolis Foundation in support of the Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi L.L.P. Foundation for Education, Public Health and Social Justice [sic]. The contribution, the second of three anticipated payments over the next few years, is made possible in large part from fees earned by the firm as a result of its representation of the State of Minnesota in the historic Minnesota tobacco litigation case, which resulted in a $6.6 billion settlement. Possible Lasker relation William J. Brody happens to be director of the foundation.

This article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Spending the tobacco money: Is this what the court had in mind? By David Phelps and Deborah Caulfield Ryback. Nov. 18, 2001) shows that the Minnesota tobacco settlement money is going to members of the MPAAT board of directors and their cronies. Nobody should be at all surprised, because corruption is the rule where the anti-smokers are concerned. THE FISH ROTS FROM THE HEAD! Those state tobacco lawsuits were really nothing but a racketeering scheme devised by masterminds in the Lasker Foundation to loot money from smokers in the first place! (Unfortunately, the Star Tribune has let its online graphic, which showed the MPAAT connections so concisely, go dead.)

New York: Anti-trust Challenge to Tobacco Settlement Is Revived

"Foreign cigarette makers won a partial victory Tuesday when a federal appeals court reinstated their claim that New York laws passed to enforce a nationwide 1998 tobacco settlement created a state-authorized cartel among domestic cigarette companies... 'Had the executives of the major tobacco companies entered into such an arrangement without the involvement of the States and their attorneys general, those executives would long ago have had depressing conversations with their attorneys about the United States Sentencing Guidelines,'" said Judge Winter, who also noted that "Until now the State has relied in a conclusory fashion on the claimed benefits to public health as a showstopper rendering further analysis or discussion irrelevant." (Challenge to Tobacco Settlement Is Revived. By Mark Hamblett, New York Law Journal, Jan. 7, 2004.)

North Carolina

"Half of the state's tobacco settlement has been allocated to an endowment that has dispersed many of the funds to applied research projects in the biosciences, including a $60 million grant for a training program for biomanufacturing and pharmaceutical workforce development." (The Competition: Other State Initiatives. Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics. Accessed 8/12/07.)

The Golden Leaf Foundation thus created is just an investment slush fund for non-tobacco development and general relief activities.

Ohio

"The general assembly of the State of Ohio created, in early 2000, the Biomedical Research and Technology Transfer Commission (BRTTC) to oversee the allocation of part of the funds that came to the State as a consequence of the settlement of a class action suit by a consortium of states against a group of cigarette manufacturing companies... The BRTTC has engaged the services of the Washington Advisory Group (WAG) to assist it in making such an assessment and in developing policies and procedures that will move the state toward a position of national leadership in biomedical research and related technology transfer. This report from WAG was prepared by Drs. Purnell Choppin, Frank Rhodes and Daniel Tosteson,..." (Report of the Washington Advisory Group to the Ohio Biomedical and Technology Transfer Commission, Executive Summary, 2001 June 14.)

Pennsylvania

"The Commonwealth's Tobacco Settlement Board has placed $2 million in three venture funds that all invest in biosciences." (The Competition: Other State Initiatives. Minnesota Partnership for Biotechnology and Medical Genomics. Accessed 8/12/07.)

Texas

The Cancer Genomics Program was established in 1999 by Dr. John Mendelsohn, Charles LeMaistre's successor as president of MD Anderson Cancer Center, and fellow director of the Enron Corp. "Establishment of the Core Laboratory and the Bioinformatics Section is supported by a donation from the Kadoorie Foundation and the Texas Tobacco Settlement Fund."

Tobacco case helps fund cancer center. Dallas News 2001 Nov 7. Texas trial lawyers John Eddie Williams, F. Kenneth Bailey, Harold Nix, C. Cary Patterson, John O'Quinn and Walter Umphrey give $8 million to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston (out of the $3.3 billion in legal fees that they looted). Lasker Foundation director Jordan U. Gutterman happens to be Professor of Medicine there.

BEWARE OF BOGUS "CIVIL JUSTICE REFORM"

Supposed reformers play on public outrage about astronomical awards for ridiculous claims. They claim that the civil justice system is broken and needs to be fixed. But in the case of the lawsuits against the tobacco industry, that trial was thrown by the tobacco industry's lawyers, just like a fixed baseball game. What went wrong is that the entire system is totally corrupt. The Lasker Syndicate has owned Congress and every president since the Roosevelt administration, and used our tax dollars to churn out corrupt and fraudulent pseudo-science. The media are their accomplices in propaganda, not watchdogs. And, thanks to their vast wealth (some of which may come from their OSS/CIA connections to stolen World War II gold), they have infiltrated and subverted the tobacco companies themselves. Because of them, democracy and justice have been an empty sham for decades. But the clueless reformers try to frighten us into supporting bogus "reform" that would really only restrict the virtually nonexistent access of the people even further. Beware of those who haven't correctly defined the problem, because they also haven't correctly prescribed the solution.

Canada

The sham behind the science behind the tobacco warnings. National Post 2000. A small victory against the anti-smoking bureaucrats' corruption of the machinery of government with sham contract procurement (reminiscent of the US EPA ETS study's illegal pass-through contracts to Robert Axelrad's hand-picked cronies).

Of course, all this nice intellectual stuff doesn't address the issue of how those bloodsucking vermin are using the money they stole from us. Here is a typical example.

"A teenager approaches a friend at the school lockers and suggests going outside for a 'pick.' They head outside, where they join students hanging around, vigorously digging at their nostrils with their fingers. 'Isn't smoking just as disgusting?' the commercial's tag line says." (Study: Smoking levels drop in tobacco-rich Virginia. By Zinie Chen Sampson, Associated Press Writer. May 30, 2004.) This campaign of lowbrow defamations against innocent citizens is funded by the Virginia Tobacco Settlement Foundation.

Throughout history, there have been inquisitions, persecutions, and repressions - and every one of them has been caused by subhuman vermin like the anti-smokers. They ought to be exterminated to purify the species and make the world safe for truth, freedom, and justice.

And remember, THE MEDIA ARE TO BLAME FOR EVERYTHING. To them, "freedom of speech" means "license for anti-smokers while censoring smokers." They're the ones who glorify thieves as paragons of virtue while pretending that smoking is a "sin." Remember this the next time those bastards are posturing as "defenders of liberty," as they invariably do on behalf of their sacred cause of spewing trash and porn at us (but never on behalf of anything worthwhile!) Remember that they are the ones who deliberately spread the Big Lie that smoking is economic burden, in order to lay the foundation for those state tobacco lawsuits by giving the corrupt attorneys general a pretext for stealing from us.

cast 03-15-08