Tobacco.org

LETTER: Connecting newspaper dots in drugs, legislation, tobacco ($$) 

How ironic. The front page of the Friday paper features how Rep. John Tilley takes great pride in his legislation to control drugs, and the Oak Grove police raid the sellers of synthetic drugs and seize everything — and both of these lead stories surround a color picture of how we go to great pains to grow tobacco. Only in Kentucky and only in the New Era.

Jump to full article »

LETTER: More criticism for newspaper’s front-page tobacco photograph ($$) 

I’m writing in response to James Barone’s letter in Monday’s paper about the tobacco photograph on Page A1 of Friday’s paper. It’s a sad day when the tobacco industry is lauded while it is responsible for most of the respiratory diseases and all cancers. And sadly Kentuckians rank the highest in these!! Only in Kentucky and only in the New Era.

Jump to full article »

Betsy's Trivia: Smoking Edition 

During John F. Kennedy's inaugural Meet the Press appearance on December 2, 1951 (sic), the MTP set saw a rare event: a panelist smoking during the program. Legendary New York Times journalist James Reston, the paper's longtime Washington Bureau Chief, smoked throughout much of the interview, including while questioning Kennedy. Host Lawrence Spivak's hatred of tobacco was well-known at Meet the Press, where there were no-smoking signs and artwork warning of its dangers throughout the office. Spivak was usually unshakeable in his ban of smoking during the program, including during commercial breaks. Even his famous guests did not escape: Randolph Churchill, son of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, once called Spivak a "goddamned dictator" for not letting him smoke. And when Edward R. Murrow was denied his usual supply of cigarettes during a 1961 appearance, he was visibly unhappy on camera and crew members reported seeing his legs twitching under the table from nicotine withdrawal. . . .

A visibly annoyed Spivak leaned farther away from Reston for the remainder of the interview. While Reston then questioned Kennedy on his striking criticism of the State Department, he gestured with his lit cigarette, with no apparent awareness of how much it was upsetting his panel neighbor. You can watch a clip of the smoking drama unfold below, as well as more from John F. Kennedy's first appearance on Meet the Press.

Jump to full article »

Academic Journals and Corporate Interests: Reed Elsevier and ALEC 

What do prestigious scientific journals like Cell and The Lancet have to do with union-busting, cutting corporate taxes, or denial of global warming?

The publishing company that owns these journals, Reed Elsevier, has supported all of these goals through its contributions to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

ALEC is a corporate-funded, politically conservative “bill mill,” which develops legislative templates for state-level laws that serve its political goals. The group holds networking conferences for politically sympathetic state legislators – such as Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, when he was a State Assembly member – where ideas are shared and its model bills are circulated (see "How ALEC Operates").

Reed Elsevier is a leading member of ALEC – and also the parent company of Elsevier, one of the largest academic publishing companies in the world. It owns about 2,000 academic journals, primarily scientific and medical, and a diverse array of other information-related businesses, including LexisNexis.

. . .

[Editor's note: On April 12, Reed Elsevier announced its resignation from ALEC.

Jump to full article »

• Cigarette Advertising Is On The Increase Again—And Entertainment Weekly Is To Blame  

Cigarette advertising came back to the magazine business with a vengeance in Q1 2012, up 11 percent to 160 pages, according to Magazine Radar.

The rest of the magazine ad business is in decline.

Tobacco advertising has been down in recent years as stricter regulations prevented most companies from promoting their product. But a complete ban on tobacco promotion is not permitted by the First Amendment, according to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The company that won that ruling, Lorillard, has taken full advantage. Ad page placements for its Newport brand went up for a second straight year, according to Magazine Radar, by 67 percent to 65 total pages. American Spirits, a brand of the Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Co., increased ad pages by 10.5 pages (24 percent) to 53.5 total pages.

The most-favored magazines for cigarette ads are Motor Trend, Entertainment Weekly and National Enquirer.

Jump to full article »

• Tobacco giants promote their product as stylish in new ads 

TOBACCO giants are spruiking cigarettes as refreshing and stylish more than two decades after the Federal Government outlawed advertisements.

The Herald Sun can reveal Dunhill and Marlboro have taken out two double-page advertisements in an Australian magazine. . . .

Australian Bartender publisher David Spanton said two editions were printed each month, with the one containing cigarette ads distributed only to tobacco retailers.

A spokesman for Philip Morris, maker of Marlboro cigarettes, said the Tobacco Advertising Prohibition Act 1992 allowed for communication of tobacco product information to retailers of tobacco products.

Jump to full article »

• Up in smoke: Philip Morris fined for publishing ads  

ISLAMABAD: Philip Morris has been fined for publishing full page advertisements in leading magazines including Herald, Newsweek Pakistan and the weekly magazine of The Express Tribune among others in violation of laws.

The advertisement campaign of its cigarette brand Marlboro cost Philip Morris approximately Rs50 million, according to Pakistan Today.

The court imposed a fine of Rs5,000 as per the tobacco control laws. This case was the first-ever against a tobacco giant in Asia, said National Coordinator, Coalition for Tobacco Control-Pakistan, Khurram Hashmi.

Jump to full article »

"60 Minutes" icon Mike Wallace dies at 93  

CBS News legend Mike Wallace, the "60 Minutes" pit-bull reporter whose probing, brazen style made his name synonymous with the tough interview - a style he practically invented for television more than half a century ago - died Saturday night. He was 93 and passed peacefully surrounded by family members at Waveny Care Center in New Canaan, Conn., where he spent the past few years. He also had a home in Manhattan. . . .

In another controversy, Wallace's 1995 interview of Jeffrey Wigand, the highest-ranking tobacco executive to turn whistle-blower, was held back for fear of a multi-billion dollar lawsuit that could have bankrupted CBS. The interview, in which Wigand revealed tobacco executives knew and covered up the fact that tobacco caused disease, was eventually broadcast on "60 Minutes" in February 1996. The incident became the subject of the film, "The Insider" (in which Wallace was played by Christopher Plummer). . . .

Wallace went to Vietnam, India and Africa to report for Westinghouse Radio's "Around the World in 40 Days," but really wanted to be hired by CBS News, the "mother church," as he often referred to it. He was turned down at first, despite some remarkable documentary work, including a breakthrough piece on black Muslims, "The Hate That Hate Produced." In fact, CBS News wouldn't broadcast a documentary on nuclear proliferation that he reported because he appeared in cigarette ads. Promising to drop commercial work, he was made a correspondent at CBS News in 1963.

Jump to full article »

• Quid Pro Quo: Tobacco Companies and the Black Press [American Journal of Public Health] [FREE FULL TEXT] 

As advertisers, the tobacco companies sought and received favored treatment; publishers justified their position by claiming that they could not survive without tobacco advertising. 186 But this position did not merely violate an abstract principle. Ethnic media, and African American media in particular, have a ''triple rolereinforcing ethnic identity, transmitting culture, and facilitating advocacy and political participation.''27(p213) As a Black press historian said, ''The black press was never intended to be objective. . . . It often took a position. . . . This was a press of advocacy.''25 If African American readers across the decades of the last century assumed that the Black press advocated positions on their behalf, then the quid pro quo we have described takes on new significance. NNPA newspaper readers likely expected that publishers had their best interests at heart and assumed that they conveyed complete, accurate information about tobacco's harmfulness and about public policy measures to reduce it. These publications' apparent prioritization of serving the tobacco industry over safeguarding their readers' health suggests that they may not have fully appreciated the extensive harmthat tobacco caused the Black community. The NNPAtobacco alliance was understandable in earlier decades, when advertisers were fewer, evidence of tobacco's harmfulness to health was unclear, and the industry was actively working to further the ''controversy'' idea. But the alliance continued even as the evidence became irrefutable and African American communities began resisting tobacco marketing and industry overtures. . . .

Conclusions

Today's tobacco-related health disparities among African Americans1-4 result from numerous intertwined factors. Historic racial oppression surely contributed to the NNPA's willingness to continue to serve industry interests because it feared losing the Black press's voice without tobacco money. Yet, this does not seem to fully explain the continuing ties still linking many African American leadership organizations to tobacco industry patronage. 209-214 Recently, a Wall Street Journal article described how an African American public relations consultant and founding member of the National Association of Black Journalists pitched an editorial opposing a menthol cigarette ban on behalf of the firm's client, Lorillard tobacco company (maker of the leading menthol brand).215 Progressive African American leaders have called for a reevaluation of these relationships. The quid pro quo some organizations still sustain with tobacco companies is the legacy of an inequitable trade that has contributed to incalculable harm to African American communities.

Jump to full article »

Famed CBS Journalist Mike Wallace Dies At 93  

• Quid Pro Quo: Tobacco Companies and the Black Press 

Methods. In this archival case study, we analyzed data from internal tobacco industry documents and archives of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), the trade association of the Black press.

Results. In exchange for advertising dollars and other support, the tobacco industry expected and received support from Black newspapers for tobacco industry policy positions. Beginning in the 1990s, resistance from within the Black community and reduced advertising budgets created counterpressures. The tobacco industry, however, continued to sustain NNPA support.

Conclusions. The quid pro quo between tobacco companies and the Black press violated journalistic standards and represented an unequal trade. Although numerous factors explain today's tobacco-related health disparities, the Black press's service to tobacco companies is problematic because of the trust that the community placed in such media. Understanding the relationship between the tobacco industry and the NNPA provides insight into strategies that the tobacco industry may use in other communities and countries.

Jump to full article »

Burning issue: Abida Hussain called out for ‘promoting’ smoking  

Health experts and civil society expressed their concern over a testimonial given by a renowned politician which they said was for promoting the habit of smoking.

Protesting the PPP leader, and former ambassador to the US, Abida Hussain’s one-page testimonial titled ‘My favourite mistake’ (published in Newsweek), they said that it was a violation of law.

They also urged the government to take stern action and ask Hussain to make an apology, it has been learnt.

The Network Executive Coordinator Nadeem Iqbal said it is the second violation of tobacco laws by the same organisation and the government seems unable to act. “This is another implicit advertisement campaign by Philip Morris which has unfortunately hit the inherent gaps in Pakistan’s tobacco control laws,” he said.

Adding that, “Testimonials are an established advertisement and propaganda technique for promotion using words of famous people or authority figures. The network condemns the approval of a lethal product that causes more than 100,000 deaths annually in Pakistan.”

Jump to full article »

• RAZA: ‘The Marlboro man again making a “mistake” by deceptive promotion’  

Two months after publishing full page Marlboro advertisement in violation of Pakistan’s tobacco control laws, Newsweek Pakistan has published a one page testimonial of influential politician, industrialist and former Ambassador to USA, Syeda Abida Hussain. The testimonial titled “My Favourite Mistake, When Ms. Syeda Abida Hussain fell in love with Marlboro Man” published in recent issue of Newsweek Pakistan.

This is another launch of implicit advertisement campaign by Philip Morris which has unfortunately hit the inherent gaps of tobacco control laws of Pakistan. TheNetwork condemns the admiration of a lethal product and habit causing more than 100,000 deaths annually in Pakistan, stated Nadeem Iqbal, the Executive Coordinator of TheNetwork.

Testimonial is an established advertisement/propaganda technique for promotion of a product by using words from famous people or an authority figure.

“The Favourite Mistake” by Ms. Abida Hussain in Newsweek Pakistan has not only mocked the tobacco control laws and policies of Pakistan but certainly has underrated the efforts of tobacco control advocates worldwide. The Newsweek Pakistan and Ms. Abida Hussain should make a public apology for promoting and endorsing a tobacco brand. . . .

Ms Abida concludes: “Battling the smoking stigma helped toughen me up as a politician, and along the way it gave me memories that keep me grounded to love.” The obvious target is educated females.

It is worth mentioning here that Philip Morris International aggressively advertised Marlboro through Newsweek Pakistan and other popular magazines in recent past in 2011. Monthly Herald has showed the courage and uphold highest journalistic standards by making an apology for publishing that ad. The Newsweek Pakistan on other hand continued violation of tobacco control laws.

Jump to full article »

'Reports of my survival may be exaggerated': My brave friend Marie Colvin and a passion for speaking the truth  

It seems that Marie Colvin, the distinguished Sunday Times journalist killed in a Syrian army rocket attack alongside photographer Remi Ochlick, was deliberately targeted. During her distinguished career, she reported on numerous conflicts including Bosnia, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Chechnya and Libya. And while agreeing that her death is a terrible tragedy, her colleague and friend IAN BIRRELL argues that the ultimate tragedy would be if others failed to follow in her footsteps to report on the savagery of war with such an honest, unflinching gaze. . . .

She liked to do things her own way: When a smoking ban came into force at the Sunday Times, she blithely turned up with three packets of cigarettes and puffed away at her desk; typically, no one dared stop her.

Jump to full article »

In the club that she loved, Marie's inner circle grieved for the friend they'd lost 

THE friends and colleagues of Marie Colvin who gathered at the Frontline Club to remember her last night didn't watch the report of her death on Channel 4 News at 7pm - not because it was too hard to bear but because the club's founder Vaughan Smith was struggling to get the TV working. . . .

When Ghoodoosi was reunited with Colvin many years later at the Frontline Club, her former boss still combined her familiar sense of fun, cigarettes and gallows humour. After a panel discussion, the pair of them went downstairs for a cigarette break, standing out on Norfolk Place. "Some guy who was a huge fan of Marie came downstairs," recalled Ghoodoosi, "and said: 'Oh my god, you smoke, it's so bad for you, you beautiful ladies, you shouldn't be smoking'. And Marie stood there and said to him: 'I promise you, that's not how I'm going to die'. And it wasn't."

Jump to full article »