Little bit of a rant here.
Okay, the verdict is in on the Big Tobacco trial we have been covering under the watchful eye of Judge Jeff Streitfeld. The jury came back with a more modest number, 8 million, for the death of Stuart Hess from nicotine addiction. It is a lot less than the lawyers asked for, 130 million, and a lot more than I would have given. I would have given monopoly money. Not that Big Tobacco wasn't full of deceit or deception, but...
The first articles about the dangers of tobacco only appeared in the New York Times in 1965. Sure, the companies told you if you smoke you would get laid, it would not hurt you, and every business deal would fall into your lap and you would become a millionaire. And I have swampland in the Everglades that is the next Aventura.
Maybe the smokers needed to watch more of Gunsmoke, then they would have seen that snake oil salesman dude pulling a buggy full of ludicrous potions that are today being pushed by the same guys who are reincarnated selling you those weight loss machines on paid programming in the middle of the nite. I am with WC Fields here, that there is a sucker born every minute. People damn well should have known better. Yeah, that's how I feel. And it is not being a hard ass. It is having been a revolutionary my entire life, never buying into the pablum that our government or corporate America ever gave us. Go back and read The Waste Makers by Vance Packard. Let's face it. We have never been told the truth. Not now. Not ever.
Question authority, As Don Corleone said: "Listen, whoever comes to you with this Barzini meeting he's the traitor. Don't forget that."
Never doubted that the story would go national, as it could be the first of some 8.000 suits on the subject, and you can link back to some of the original stories here. Guess I am disqualified from some future juries.
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