[Gabz]

Hi there!

You make the comment:

I am stunned at how easily guilt-by-association arguments can sway so many freepers.

I hesitate to comment, no, I won't comment upon it because I am unsure in which way you mean it.

Please bear with me and give me a little of where you're coming from or going to with your statement.

Thanks

[traditionalist]

Okay, I'll elaborate. First of all, yes, I agree that the tobacco lawsuits are a travesty of justice. The idea that people didn't know that cigarettes are harmful is just plain stupid. My Dad started smoking back in the 1950's and he knew at the time that it was bad for him. He quit in 1976 when he found out my Mom was pregnant because, in his words, he wanted to live to see me graduate from college. I also agree the state suits are completely without merit. That a company can be sued for producing a legal product whose health effects were known to all signals a total breakdown in the rule of law.

Restrictions on smoking, however, are good public policy. Smoking is bad for public health. That's a fact, and the promotion of public health is one of the roles of government, unless you are a libertarian, which the founding fathers were not.

Using the fact that the Nazis restricted smoking is not a valid argument against such restrictions. Such an argument employs a fallacy that logicians call guilt by association. Are you going to tell me that it is evil to make trains run on time because the Nazis did it?