I quote: “[T]his one is enormous in terms of the cost to America’s taxpayers in lost settlement dollars . . .”

I agree in principal. A big however, don’t you find it a bit odd that little attention has been paid the way the politicians in most, if not all states, have ignored settlement terms for the already “punitive” dollars distributed?

Supposedly the funds were to be used, for among other things, to cover the costs of medical care for those (supposedly, in some cases) harmed by smoking, programs to discourage teen smoking, programs to help smokers stop smoking, ad infinitum.

It doesn’t take much research to find that in many (too many) cases, the states have diverted the funds to the general fund. In addition there are instances reported where organizations such as the American Cancer Society officials among others prominent in supporting the measure received grants wherein they used the funds to refurbish their offices in a royal manner and put favored people in “new” “salaried” positions. I won’t go into sources and time periods here. If this is of interest to you please e-mail me with a request and I will arrange to USPS mail you some of the data I collected as well as furnish sources and the time periods involved.

My above remarks are to, to a certain extent, take issue with your remarks I’ve cited above.

I certainly don’t disagree with your basic premise, especially the way the DOJ and other politicians were involved. I do take issue with the ensuing pork barrel political things that have gained traction on behalf of special interests in the aftermath to the detriment of the stated goals.

Now that I’ve vented, I would ask someone with research “know-how” to look into the issue of how many billions of dollars the various states have realized by forcing “a minority population” to pay for the services the tobacco industry punitive damages were supposed to pay for in the first place I refer to the taxes levied with increasing frequency, supposedly to cover the same things the tobacco companies paid for.

Realizing this rant may be considered inflammatory and already ripe for deletion I might as well go on and cite some examples with the caveat it is meant to high light the moral ambiguity re scapegoating too many people seem to revel in:

Prior to the tobacco “settlement” a pack of cigarettes cost from about 60 to 70 cents plus state and local taxes. I can only refer to
Arizona tobacco taxes but I know they are higher in some states. Those “special” “pork barrel” taxes alone are now at least $2.00 a pack and the state and local taxes are added, not just to the original price but to the “special” tax at the rate of at least 7%. Tax the tax.

Now let’s see, there are also other consumer consumption products that the public has been warned about and admittedly get press attention. Just a short list, soft drinks, Coke and Pepsi among others, fast foods, big Macs, among others, cookies, potato chips ad infinitum. How about just a one cent tax on a six pack of soda, a one cent tax on a package of cookies or potato chips, etc. How much would that bring in to address the problems. Oh! well the majority of people consume those so let’s not pay attention. It’s easier to join the “moral majority” when it comes to taxes. Besides, smoking offends me! Okay, It makes sense to restrict smoking in certain areas. However, it’s absurd for each and every individual to define what such “designated’ space should be. Oh, forgot.it shouldn’t even come up to the old and abolished standard of “Separate but Equal”.

If anyone has even got this far or this is even posted, I wholeheartedly agree the political aspects of the supposed DOJ/political investigation or whatever it was regarding the tobacco companies was a travesty. What I object to is the political theft and mismanagement of the pork barrel taxes subsequently being collected by and for the state politicos and their hangers on.

But even considering everything that has become and is becoming apparent about the possibility of criminal influence on justice in America by the Bush group, it’s beside the point – the real point.

As a blogger that I’ve forgotten accurately phrased the current US Attorney manipulations, they suggest “partisan” influence (Republicans against Democrats), not merely “political.” The selection of the “cops” of America has always been political. The sole ability of federal policing being the domain of the executive branch leaves that branch effectively free of any real policing itself – the classic “who polices the police?” We’re seeing and living that now as we march toward a “constitutional crisis.”

The conservative authoritarian Republicanism lived by the Bush group has consistently shown the fundamental flaws in the American system of government by driving a tank through them. Sure, go after these criminals and their criminal political partisan organization with full fury but recognize that having the chief policing agencies of a nation easily manipulated and influenced by political motivations is wrong. The police agencies should be independent of any branch of government and should themselves have required oversight and constant monitoring by each of the branches of government. J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI was an entity unto itself through the abuses of Hoover and his FBI, so independence from manipulation does not and should not mean independence from oversight and overrule as long as any overruling is public, demonstrably needed, and correct. A recent catch phrase has been “monopoly on violence,” meaning the power to use force to effect control. That’s what a nation’s police have (in absence of martial law). That power must be required to act in the interests of the nation and not the few – in the interests of justice and nothing else.

Bush has strongly demonstrated his understanding of the child’s phrase “you and what army?” That someone with a nature like Bush can abuse the “armies” of America is now a bluntly obvious fact representing a danger to the world and to America.

barbara @
17

This is terrific, Christy. Maybe you’ve always been good at deconstructing Bushiness, but it seems as though you’ve mastered it in recent time. Oh. My. Dog. These people are robots. They’ve been programmed by ??? to march in lockstep and speak as one. Where the rubber hits the road (mixed metaphor, big time) is when “mistakes are made” and someone tries to get creative about explaining that away. As long as the Dems keep relentless pressure on them, one by one and as a whole, the inconsistencies will continue to surface, which provides a damning trail. The Supremes? Oh, lordy. Thinking Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas. How does one deconstruct the Supreme appointments? ANd having done so, then what?

And sadly, it’s high time we recognized that it is always showtime. For the last thirty years, maybe longer, there has been ongoing a never ending battle for the hearts and minds of the American public. If we as a people could learn our political lessons and move forward as a wiser body politic, we wouldn’t be in this mess in which we are re-experiencing, if not relearning, the sad lessons of Vietnam and Watergate. But here we are.

And if we look at this through an historic lens, we should realize there is only one issue that matters here. It has little to do with the US attorneys’ firings, per se. It is a much more fundamental issue. It is, simply put: Does the public have the right to know what it’s government is doing?

Of course we all know the answer to that is YES! That is the answer the public believes is correct and so defending that position should be to our advantage. The only reason that the public wouldn’t have a right to know is if there were national security issues at stake, which of course is not the case regarding the firing of the 8 US attorneys.

So that leaves the WH with the defense of “separation of powers” and “executive privilege”. I am a political science undergrad and an attorney with 25 years at the bar and I really don’t know what the hell executive privilege is, so I imagine that 99% of most Americans don’t know either.
I’ve heard the experts argue the concept. Some say it applies, some say it doesn’t and some say it depends on the circumstances. But in the end, it doesn’t matter whether executive privilege applies. What matters is who is winning the battle of public opinion.
In that battle it appears at least from what I read in the MSM that Bush has a defensible position. Yet I scratch my head in bewilderment because the refusal to testify before Congress seems so counter intuitive, so outlandishly contemptuous that no one would readily agree with it.

So I ask myself how is it then that this administration can stonewall so effectively with so nebulous a concept as executive privilege? It’s astounding!

One factor in Bush’s success is the right wing’s domination of the MSM. It’s as if Bush has the MSM in some kind of Jedi mind control where he utters executive privilege and the press repeats it ad nauseum. But the other side is our failure to counter the right’s message and mass marketing of that message.

We need to develop a message, talking points and marketing plan demanding full disclosure by the administration, including the testimony of Rove, et al. Then we need to bombard the MSM with that message and stay on message until we get what we want.

Bush will continue to stonewall until it becomes politically suicidal for hs administration not to honor the subpoenas. Even then Bush may decide to defy the public and take his chances with the courts. He may even win. But his victory will be a pyrrhic one.

If all we do is argue the legal and political angles of the current dispute we are totally missing the big picture. Leave it up to the courts and under the best of circumstances we won’t get an answer for several months and the answer we get may be unsatsfactory as well as untimely.

Make our case convincingly to the public and we win no matter how long the courts take or what they decide. In the end, Bush may win the legal battle, but he will lose the battle of public opinion and the fallout will be devastating.

things come undone@287. Republicans, in general, are the pro-freedom party. Goldwater and Reagan became popular because of the libertarian wing of the party. Not all Republicans are consistent with the social conservatives. Having said that, I don’t believe in moral relativism. Political relativism, on the other hand, is a different thing because politics IS a contact sport. Society (and politics) is terribly conflicted over tobacco. States and the Federal Government(not to mention tobacco companies) make a lot of money from tobacco tax sales. I find it a little unusual that many here would legalize pot (as would I), but would attempt to put the tobacco industry out of business. The point is, it’s a policy choice. The Political people at the Justice Department had a right to exert their influence in a policy choice involving excessive punitive damanges. If they did, that is NOT a crime.

Tobacco like pot which I think should be legal does cost society. The tabacco companies unfortunatly lied for many years and avoided the costs the lawsuits are just societies way of figuring out/getting whats owed . However Pro Freedom Party?, freedom for corporations sure but dissent? Dario Fo (sp?) couldn’t visit America cause Regean was banning subversives, the Edwin Meese (sp?) pornography commission
I’m sure made the libertarines happy. Nope FEAR OF COMMIES and (for Regean ) FEAR OF THE ECONOMY, WELFARE MOMS, MINORITES scapegoats US vs THEM!
FEAR ITSELF is the appeal of Regean and Goldwater. Although Lyndon Johnson’s attack ad with the girl picking a flower followed by an Atom Bomb explosion turned fear BACK ONTO FEAR! Regean and bush are dull nice Christian types who use fear and the herd instinct to unite THEIR people when threatened. Why because only when we’re scared would we elect nice but dull.