[GeneD]

You know Joe, I could say something about your moral obtuseness -- after all, anyone saying that Hollywood is responsible for more than smoking you'd label a NAZ -- a conservative, but we'll let it pass. Your famous and controversial scene is another thing. You seem a brave man, Joe: could you describe that scene for us -- in detail?

P. S. I think you're boasting about Basic cigarettes. Anyone know when they were introduced?

[Argus]

Liberal soul-searching always has this quality of being highly selective. Joe would never blame himself for contributing to higher rates of Aids and other STD's by glamorizing promiscuity and perversion in his movies, but CIGARETTE SMOKING! Ah, that's the great evil.

[funkywbr]

Sort of like Jane Fonda finding Jesus NOW!

[Rockiesrider]

I wonder if Joe will get on board with the tobacco companies states litigation. You know, maybe put monies in escrow to pay for the smoking related law suites? Just a thought Joe. It would help those whom your hurt. Bwaaaaaa...fat chance of that happening.

[Psycho_Bunny]

"My, My! Look at me! Aren't I important!"

If he said anything else, let me know because I missed it.

[Richard Kimball]

I had a helluva time getting off cigs. Amazing what seeing a guy with his jaw missing smoking through a stoma will do to you. Hope he makes it a while.

Amazing how many of us don't need God until we're looking the big D right in the face. Hope he's truly found Jesus.

[ClearCase_guy]

I don't get it. Does the media influence the behavior of the young or not? Do people smoke because the movies make it look glamorous? Rob Reiner recently said so, too -- so I guess it's true.

But what about the sex and violence? Do the movies convince young people to indulge in these risky behaviors? Should we get Hollywood to clean up it's act when it comes to sex and violence?

Silence from Joe.

[Great Dane]

And the blame game goes on and on, I am responsible for my smoking..... no one else.

[Taliesan]

Let's see if we can summon the rationality to make distinctions: some of what he says is right, some is not. (surprise!)

When he says Hollywood has blood on its (sic) hands, he is right. Movies do glamorize smoking, smoking is a nasty and lethal habit, kids do try to be the "cool" people they see on the screen.

Artists are morally responsible for the foreseeable influences of their art.

But when he extends that moral argument to make a legal one, that smoking ought to be proscribed like heroin, he is suffering from the inability to make distinctions which typifies liberal culture, and in an ironic way, most on this thread.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

I don't think smoking is every person's right anymore. I think smoking should be as illegal as heroin.

Just exactly what the world needs, Joe: another excuse for masked LEOs to kick in peoples' doors in the middle of the night.

But as long as it makes you feel better, Joe. That's the important thing.

[INSENSITIVE GUY]

Hollywood is also responsible for gun deaths and the wrongheaded use of firearms in general.It is not the tobacco industry or the gun industry that should be sued BUT HOLLYWOOD.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

I don't think smoking is every person's right anymore. I think smoking should be as illegal as heroin. I'm no longer such a bad boy. I go to church on Sunday. I'm desperate to see my four boys grow up. I want to do everything I can to undo the damage I have done with my own big-screen words and images.

Here in lies part of the problem its none of your damn buisness who smokes and who dont [every person's right ]is just that every person's right not yours to say whether we can or not period ....Just be concerned for your own family and leave everyone else alone.

I want to do everything I can to undo the damage I have done with my own big-screen words and images

Try not making it so obvious that your crying out to be a victim

[small voice in the wilderness]

Let me state from the beginning that I detest parasite lawyers and mega-dollar lawsuits based on victimology and stupidity. BUT, if I thought I could make Jane Fonda, Julia Roberts, or Babs(please, someone tell me she smoked in at least one movie) open her checkbook and pay to settle the harm she has done...BUWAHAHAHA, just the thought of it...Muwahahahahaha. oh yeah, I think I could do it!

[beavus]

He's is not to blame for smoking deaths anymore than tobacco companies are responsible for his cancer.

Instead of him falsely accusing tobacco companies of "murder" b/c they allow people to spend their hard-earned money on a product that is a well-known killer, why doesn't he admit that he made a bad choice to take a needless risk.

Libs would never think of blaming themselves for their own bad choices.

[timestax]

bump

[buffyt]

Someone in Hollyweird finally fesses up?????

[cgbg]

I think smoking should be as illegal as heroin.

I love it when the liberal Clark Kent's go into the phone booth of a traumatic experience and out comes....

SuperNazi!

Let us all imagine a world where cigarettes are illegal.

Sit back, relax, imagine it.

Urban gangs fight over "tobacco turf".

Public officials offer protection to the gangs in exchange for suitcases of cash.

Politicians have a press conference promising they will never legalize the dangerous drug tobacco while their trusted aides carry their suitcases to Switzerland.

Head of the tobacco cartel Jose Nefarios declares "I am more powerful than the Yankee President" as he shows off his arsenal of nuclear weapons. He explains that while he has less nukes than his neighbor to the north _he_ is not afraid to use them.

Ah, what a wonderful world. I can hardly wait. :-(