And so it begins

[_JS]

Notice the deafening silence from the left?  Same thing occurs, everytime the anti-1st amendment (un)Fairness Doctrine comes up in debate.  Most often indicates positions they'd advocate but have no valid basis to support such

Some of us are rather busy on the weekend.

I can't speak for everyone, nor would I try.

For me this represents a massive waste of time and effort. I have no desire to tell others how to eat, what to drink, or what chemicals they can use to pursue their own happiness if that is an avenue they choose, willingly.

Having had two parents that smoke, I'd want to see the scientific data on second-hand smoke and especially as it concerns respiratory illnesses. In that sense one may be infringing upon another's health and well being. The same holds true for the government when it regulates the disciplining of children. There is a point where "discipline" becomes abuse and as a parent I find that intolerable and have no problem telling others so. Again, the well being of another is being placed into harm's way.

But, what an individual chooses to ingest makes no difference to me and should not be within the purview of the government.

[yellow_crane]

Is the general health of the public mentioned in the constitution?

I am sure that tobacco company lawyers have a massive, high number, high bucks defense if it is.

The truth is that consumerism has conditioned the mind of the average American into believing that any intrusion upon the free flow of profit is a threat to the freedom of all Americans, no matter how destructive the products they peddle are.


We have come to the point where the tobacco industry creates a product full of chemicals (over 400 and climbing--product research) which fuse nicotine to all addictive receptors in the average citizen, and quitting smoking today is much harder than in the past due to the perfection of the product.  I will not even waste space arguing the effects of smoking on people--even doctors, long since sold out to the profit machinery, will not go so far as to sing the tobacco corporations song.

The junk food industry also creates chemical addiction to its products, as well as a daily, high-financed psychological assault that the average nincompoop swallows hook line and sinker along with a product that causes epidemics of diabetes, cancer, etc. 

One of the biggest tenets of addiction is that denial reigns supreme, and carries the promise of a downward spiral that will eventually kill the people who are addicted, no matter how intelligent they are otherwise.  In some quarters of addictionology, the more intelligent, the harder the nut to crack, since addictions will employ every molecule of cerebral energy towards denial, not enlightenment.

In medical schools, they refer to the 4-2-l disease--doctors go to medical school for 4 years to get a 2 hour lecture on the number 1 disease in the country--addiction.

Any of you folks so imbued with the calibre of your unassailable intelligence really should consider outside sources--people in the rest of the world see Americans as the rubes in the carnival who keep throwing the ball, unaware that too many factors are under the control of the carnie, and they just keep reaching in their pocket for more. 

Such is the success of the advertising industry in America.

Your average European, for instance, is not subject to the effects of American advertising conditioning, and marvel at the obtuse twist of even the most enlightened Americans when it comes to their gumptious gullibility.

[Amianthus]

Your average European, for instance, is not subject to the effects of American advertising conditioning, and marvel at the obtuse twist of even the most enlightened Americans when it comes to their gumptious gullibility.

And yet, they're building Mickie D's all over Europe; go figure...

[Xavier_Onassis]

People ALWAYS deny that they are influenced by advertising. This does not mean that they aren't. I observed that when Oil of Olay started an intensive ad campaign, my ex-wife stuffed the bathroom with Oli of Olay products, yet she could not even recall seeing or hearing the commercials.

On the other hand, not all ad campaigns work. Zima spent a fortune advertising their "malt beverage", which was attractively packaged, tasted pretty good, not expensive and would get you drunker faster than beer or malt liquor with far less belching and peeing, and still, it did nto sell, and seems to have disappeared fromthe supermarkets I shop in entirely.

[yellow_crane]

Your average European, for instance, is not subject to the effects of American advertising conditioning, and marvel at the obtuse twist of even the most enlightened Americans when it comes to their gumptious gullibility.

And yet, they're building Mickie D's all over Europe; go figure...

Okay.   I'll go and figure.

Meanwhile, you hold your breath.

[Universe Prince]

The truth is that consumerism has conditioned the mind of the average American into believing that any intrusion upon the free flow of profit is a threat to the freedom of all Americans, no matter how destructive the products they peddle are.

Then again, sometimes threats to freedom really are threats to freedom. As I remarked to someone else recently, frequently the same people who talk about not interfering with consenting adults in the bedroom seek to interfere with consenting adults everywhere else. It's not concern for tobacco companies that makes me oppose smoking bans. However, seems to me that adults who consent to go into a bar where some patrons smoke cigars should be just as left alone as the consenting adults in the bedroom.

We have come to the point where the tobacco industry creates a product full of chemicals (over 400 and climbing--product research) which fuse nicotine to all addictive receptors in the average citizen, and quitting smoking today is much harder than in the past due to the perfection of the product.

I have a hard time believing that last part. Can you point me to some evidence?

The junk food industry also creates chemical addiction to its products,

Again, I want to see some evidence.

Any of you folks so imbued with the calibre of your unassailable intelligence really should consider outside sources

Such as?

Such is the success of the advertising industry in America.

Yes, this is why everyone drives a Ford Edsel.

Your average European, for instance, is not subject to the effects of American advertising conditioning, and marvel at the obtuse twist of even the most enlightened Americans when it comes to their gumptious gullibility.

Yeah, like Europe isn't full of consumers buying things they don't need. Besides, I'm not sure I'm all that concerned about the opinions of people who helped support David Hasselhoff's singing career.

[Amianthus]

Again, I want to see some evidence.

Better watch it. Asking for evidence from Crane is like calling him a liar; he might kick your ass across Texas...

[Plane]

I remember being in Espaina in 1981 , there were large downtown billboards all over the place advertising Marlborough cigarettes. The background was a scene from a movie and the forground was the star of the movie in larger scale enjoying a cigarette, the Motto was "The Genuine Flavor of America".


All sorts of stars were featured all Americans, I thought the Bogart and John Wayne pictures were very ironic because they might have lasted till 1981 if they had not been smokers.


I was always getting asked for a smoke , ?Fumar? I didn't have any I did not smoke , shock was the reaction , as if as an American I really ought to be smoking.

[yellow_crane]

Again, I want to see some evidence.

Better watch it. Asking for evidence from Crane is like calling him a liar; he might kick your ass across Texas...

The "across Texas" ought to clue in even the most dense regarding the humor intended, rather than a threatening intent, of the sentence.

Yet here (better watch it) you suggest that a threat was actually made.  You did not say Crane made a joke, you said it as if Crane said it as real, and you the toughie are now merely mimicking Crane and his 'real' threat.

You can get sloe-eyed over the humor if you want, or you can respond to what you think is a threat.

But you cannot take it one way and use it another--people won't play cards with you.

The word "liar" should be used as your average kid on the street uses it--a clear understanding of someone telling a lie.

It should not be used as I have seen here and elsewhere.  For instance, in one of Michael Moore's whistle-blower services to our nation, somebody said that something Micheal Moore said was inaccurate.  They went on then to call him a liar.
You can see the slick gain-step, using anything to label someone a "liar" which, because of its shaming inferrence, renders them then not credible at all.

In the case of a real lie, you still cannot label everybody who tells a lie a liar, because that would infer forever and continuing, and one current lie does not make that float.  Since we have all lied on occasion, we are by that logic all liars and the very use of the word, then, moots itself out.

I know where I am with the word.

But here, you, on the other hand, are slick with it.

[Amianthus]

The word "liar" should be used as your average kid on the street uses it--a clear understanding of someone telling a lie.

Hmmm, I have been taught around here that a person is a "liar" even if he gets something wrong, in innocence.

You mean that's incorrect?

[yellow_crane]

The word "liar" should be used as your average kid on the street uses it--a clear understanding of someone telling a lie.

Hmmm, I have been taught around here that a person is a "liar" even if he gets something wrong, in innocence.

You mean that's incorrect?

Clearly.

I myself would never refer to a person who got 'something wrong in innocence' as a "liar," unless of course I was being humorous.

[Plane]

The word "liar" should be used as your average kid on the street uses it--a clear understanding of someone telling a lie.

Hmmm, I have been taught around here that a person is a "liar" even if he gets something wrong, in innocence.

You mean that's incorrect?

Clearly.

I myself would never refer to a person who got 'something wrong in innocence' as a "liar," unless of course I was being humorous.

Pehaps you are innocent of malace , but from vaious sorces I have seen a lot of houmor ,of this sort, directed at our President.

[Universe Prince]

Better watch it. Asking for evidence from Crane is like calling him a liar; he might kick your ass across Texas...

The "across Texas" ought to clue in even the most dense regarding the humor intended, rather than a threatening intent, of the sentence.

Okay, but I still don't see any evidence.

[_JS]

I remember being in Espaina in 1981 , there were large downtown billboards all over the place advertising Marlborough cigarettes. The background was a scene from a movie and the forground was the star of the movie in larger scale enjoying a cigarette, the Motto was "The Genuine Flavor of America".


All sorts of stars were featured all Americans, I thought the Bogart and John Wayne pictures were very ironic because they might have lasted till 1981 if they had not been smokers.


I was always getting asked for a smoke , ?Fumar? I didn't have any I did not smoke , shock was the reaction , as if as an American I really ought to be smoking.

It is worth noting that American cigarettes are far superior (or were, I'm not sure about now) than European cigarettes. But yes, some of the most materialistic people I've ever known are Europeans. Germany, right now, is going through an incredible (and quite frankly sad) bout of crass consumerism where young folks fall all over themselves to have very specific brand labels. Certain brands of shirts, sunglasses, and other apparel are very much in demand amongst the youth culture there - especially the West Germans, but the Osies are not immune.

Going back to an earlier conversation, I tend to believe that these young people are the most susceptible to advertising. They are certainly among the most targeted.

[Xavier_Onassis]

Advertising is a universal curse, but it was invented (along with political advertising known as propaganda) by Americans, and US companies have done more research in how to sucker ASmericans into buying crap they do not need, with money they have yet to earn, to impress people they do not know.

What Plane said about Spain in the 1980's is how it works. In Spain after the fall of Franco, the US was venerated in Spain, and Marlboro took advantage of this by suggesting that Spain would become another US and every Spaniard could become a Marlboro man by just switching brands.

I hardly think you can state categorically that US cigarettes are better than Spanish cigarettes any more than you can say that hamburgers taste better than gazpacho. But US cigarettes are laced with dozens of additives that Philip Morris does not have to reveal, and these materials.