by Judy Mosca

Created on: July 03, 2008

Any company that legally produces, markets, and sells products within the purview of the law should have the right to advertise. The tobacco industry should be no exception. In April of 1970, Congress passed the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act. The Act banned tobacco companies from advertising cigarettes on television and radio after January 1, 1971.

If we can put aside our personal feelings in regard to this subject and give due consideration to the principles of fairness, we will or should come to this conclusion: that the tobacco industry should be permitted to advertise any and all of their products using any medium available should they choose to do so.

I cannot think of any other legal product that has been banned by lawmakers from advertising. Just why this industry has been so severely targeted, I do not know. It is mildly amusing to me that there is a ban on smoking in public places, yet some of the highest sales taxes are attached to the sale of tobacco. The federal and state governments have no qualms about collecting them. In addition, federal funds have been used to subsidize the tobacco industry since 1933. A little hypocritical, don't you think?

Certainly there are major health issues or there can be, associated with the use of tobacco products over a long period of time. The risks can be quite serious. Insurance companies were probably the most instrumental forces toward a government ban. Somewhere in the process of all the lobbying, media attention, and speeches by some health officials, society has come to view smokers as low class or bad people, and caused many to consider smokers somewhat dangerous to be around because of secondhand smoke.

Currently there are some states considering a ban on smoking within so many feet of a building entrance. It has been said people do not like to smell it as they enter. What about the smell of those who have had one too many alcoholic beverages? The stench is certainly discernible when they pass by. What about women's or men's cologne that we find terribly offensive, even sometimes putrid? We have to smell that as they pass by.

Obesity in the United States is found in well over 50% of the population and has become the number one health issue. Being excessively over weight is the primary link and direct cause to the onset of various diseases and other health problems. Many of these diseases are life threatening, such as diabetes and heart disease, not to mention the lesser problems of damaging the knees,

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