Obama administration appeals block on new cigarette warnings

[alp227]

Source: CNN

The Obama administration appealed Tuesday a federal judge's decision to block a law that would have made tobacco companies include graphic pictures and messages showing the dangers of smoking on cigarette packages.

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon made a decision on the law in early November. He cited First Amendment rights against unconstitutionally compelled speech as a factor in his 29-page decision.

"This case poses a constitutional challenge to a bold new tact (sic) by the Congress, and the FDA, in their obvious and continuing efforts to minimize, if not eradicate, tobacco use in the United States," Leon concluded at the time.

He said the tobacco companies had shown: a substantial likelihood of success; that allowing the labeling requirements to proceed would cause them to "suffer irreparable harm"; that "neither the Government, nor the public, will suffer any comparable injury as a result of the relief sought"; and that the public's "interest in the protection of its First Amendment rights against unconstitutionally compelled speech would be furthered.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/30/us/tobacco-labels/index.html

[virgogal]

1. This is no big deal. Cigarette cases will sell like hot cakes.

[Poll_Blind]

2. I'm grateful the administration appealed this one! What no president's FDA has...

...had (or will probably ever have) the intestinal fortitude to do is to just call it like it is: Tobacco is an addictive poison which has no redeeming medical qualities.

Of course they won't do that. No problem eradicating marijuana at all costs, though, eh?

I suppose the tobacco leaf-carved pillars of the Capitol would likely crumble from old age before the government puts a stop to that drug.

PB

[DissedByBush]

4. More useless BS

I had plenty of friends who smoked, one of their most beloved brands was Death. Yes, "Death."

It didn't go half-assed like the government's labels. The box said flat out "SMOKING KILLS" in really big letters across the bottom.

The front was a skull and crossbones.

People still smoked them.

Newsflash: People who smoke already know it's not healthy.

[xocet]

7. The negative images are probably aimed at preventing children from considering smoking....

P.S. Not going "half-assed" would require a picture of a rotting corpse - not some artist's conception of a skull and crossbones.

[DissedByBush]

9. A lot of Death smokers were teens

It doesn't matter.

The warnings are a joke to them. They don't say anything the kids don't already know, and making them bigger basically pretends they're blind. They can already read the current warnings. They just don't care.

[harun]

3. My wife had a job interview today where they told her she would be tested for nicotine

and those that use nicotine are not allowed to work there. I didn't know places had started doing that.

(It was a hospital)

[OhioChick]

6. The Cleveland Clinic has the same policy here...

They've been trying to weed out anyone overweight, as well.

"But now the head of the Cleveland Clinic says he wants to take this bold hiring policy one step further – and some are saying this would be going too far. Dr. Delos (Toby) Cosgrove, the heart surgeon who is the Clinic’s CEO, told the New York Times that if it were up to him, he would not only stop hiring smokers. He would also stop hiring obese people.

Dr. Cosgrove maintains that health professionals should be as proactive in addressing people’s weight issues as they are in pushing them to quit smoking."

http://myheartsisters.org/2009/08/24/cleveland/

[Armin-A]

5. Money > Lives

simple

[benld74]

8. Just put a Shull and cross bones on every pack - They will really sell then ARRRRG!