Word: tobacco
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...tobacco champions twist their minds around possible defenses to the suits, they appear to be falling all over themselves in a vaudeville of contradictions. On the one hand, they argue, disease cannot be definitively linked to smoking; on the other, they have suddenly begun to point out that of course cigarettes are bad for us. "How can anybody, in good faith, take the position that the risks of the use of this product are not well known to everyone?" demands Donahue. "When you come to the bottom line, what does the consuming public know? They know everything." As Philip Morris...
...lawyers are less quick with a response, however, when asked about what Florida assistant attorney general Jim Peters refers to as "the big bad bear out there": the federal perjury probe launched after seven tobacco CEOs testifying at the Waxman hearings swore that nicotine was not addictive. Philip Morris lawyers point out that their former CEO, William Campbell, did not say tobacco is not addictive: he only said he doesn't believe it is addictive, a "personal viewpoint he has every right to hold," says York. Some tobacco experts speculate that the tobacco industry may seek a deal in which...
...looming over the industry is yet another threat, this one from Washington, where FDA chief David Kessler is considering a series of regulations on tobacco advertising and tobacco's availability to teenagers. The FDA proposal, which would ban cigarette-vending machines, free samples, mail-order sales, and outdoor advertising within 1,000 feet of schools, depends on an agency determination that cigarettes are a "drug-device combination product." But such a move would provoke cries of anguish from tobacco allies, who claim that Kessler, with the support of President Clinton, is actually seeking an all-out ban. "I believe nothing...
Even if the teen smoking regulations were to go into effect, most would merely shore up existing, if unenforced, laws. And just as smoking wafts in and out of vogue, reports of tobacco's demise may be greatly exaggerated. David Adelman, a tobacco-industry analyst for Dean Witter Reynolds, points out that the industry has a remarkable ability to shift gears. "Ninety-five different things have come out in the past, and you have the anti-tobacco people saying this is it, this is going to be the case that brings victory," he says. "But it's a pretty high...
Meanwhile, Jeffrey Wigand, a devotee of things Zen since a stint in Japan as an Air Force medical technician, sits remarkably calmly in the eye of a storm he helped create, maintaining what may be the most realistic vision of how far the tobacco wars can ultimately go. "I'm not an antismoking activist," he insists. "I think people are going to continue smoking, no matter what." And that inescapable fact, in the end, may be the best weapon Big Tobacco...