[Dashing Dasher]

Personally, I believe we should outlaw smoking.

If families can sue tobacco companies because their loved ones died while using tobacco products - and WIN - then why is it still a legal product?

[coolbreeze]

Aren't you a sweetheart.

[Ken H]

Personally, I believe we should outlaw smoking.

Let me know when they do, then we can all get RICH in the multibillion dollar underground tobacco market!

[Michael Goldsberry]

Personally, I believe we should outlaw smoking.

Whoops! Wrong attitude.

[NittanyLion]

If families can sue tobacco companies because their loved ones died while using tobacco products - and WIN - then why is it still a legal product?

Is that a serious question?

[celestine phophesy]

Personally, I believe we should outlaw smoking.

If families can sue tobacco companies because their loved ones died while using tobacco products - and WIN - then why is it still a legal product?

That's a really good point. Of course, smokers find a study here and there and say that smoking is actually GOOD for them. Isn't that funnny? They need something that supports their habit.

[TKDietz]

"Personally, I believe we should outlaw smoking.

If families can sue tobacco companies because their loved ones died while using tobacco products - and WIN - then why is it still a legal product?"

Using your logic ladders would be illegal. Any dangerous products would be illegal because the companies that produce them have been successfully sued when people were injured by their products. That's silly. Do you think that these lawsuits against tobacco companies have succeeded because tobacco is a dangerous product? That's not really what's been going on. What people have been arguing is that tobacco is a dangerous product and therefore the tobacco companies had a duty to warn people of the known dangers of their products. Tobacco companies did exactly the opposite for many years. They lied about their products. They knew tobacco was highly addictive but they denied that it was and did their best to produce junk science to support conclusions they knew weren't true. They marketed their dangerous products to children, wanting them to get hooked early so they would be customers for life. Some of them really were guilty of some fairly egregious conduct over a period of several decades. The lawsuits have been successful not because tobacco is a dangerous product, but because tobacco companies deceived the public about the dangers of their products. Had they not done that, I think they would have successfully defended these lawsuits arguing that they made people aware of the known dangers and those who were harmed by their products had assumed the risks involved.

I hate cigarettes. But if we made tobacco illegal we'd just create another giant illegal industry. It would be a gift to organized criminals and anyone else looking for easy black market cash, including terrorist types wanting untraceable money to fund their operations. We'd probably have to hire more cops and more judges and more prosecutors, public defenders, and on and on and on. We'd have to build more jails and prisons to house those who violate the laws. Smoking would probably go down some but millions would still do it. Cigarettes would be sold by drug dealers who also sell much worse stuff, making tobacco a much worse "gateway drug" than it already is. With so many more violating laws the overall respect level for the laws and those who enforce them would sink further. It would just be a stupid thing to do that would cost us a fortune and create a lot more problems than it solves.