Montreal to lose grand prix - Big U.S. Tobacco

[dArKeR]

Citing Canada's antitobacco laws, the powerful head of the Formula One Administration has decided that Montreal's Canadian Grand Prix will be axed from next summer's racing calendar.

The decision will be a devastating blow to Montreal's economy. With its prestige and its loyal, upscale international fans, F1 auto racing brings an estimated $50-million to $80-million in tourism revenues to Montreal each summer.

"I'm sitting here in a state of shock," said Bill Brown, executive vice-president of the Hotel Association of Greater Montreal. "It's going to be a huge loss for Montreal. It's the most important week for tourism in Montreal."

http://theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030808.urace0808/BNStory/National/

Who's killed more people; U.S. tobacco companies or Saddam, his sons and grandson? This is my CNN Poll for the day.

http://darker0darker.tripod.com/

[Pert_UK]

1. Belgium actually delayed laws to keep the Grand Prix....

It's a f*cking disgrace - countries changing their laws to suit big business (which is all F1 is these days).

Outrageous.

I would like to see all countries turn around to F1 and say "Fine. F*ck you. We're not going to let you race in our country at all. Let's see how much sponsorship you get with nowhere to race."

Remember how Bernie Ecclestone donated a shedload of money to Blair, the law on tobacco advertising was mysteriously left to favour the tobacco companies, and then the press found out so Blair had to give the money back???

Ha ha ha......

P.

[Spentastic]

3. Too right

F*ck Ecclestone.

F1 is attempting to bully NATIONS into diluting anti tobacco legislation. It'd be great if the EU decided to tell F1 it couldn't race or show races in Europe.

It's shite anyway.

Williams hoever are to be commended. They have changed their sponsors.

[Muddleoftheroad]

14. Not just big business

This race means $50 million to $80 million in tourism. That generates a lot of jobs.

[IndianaGreen]

2. The Canadians can always do what Belgium did

and make an exemption for their F1 race and the tobacco ads.

Last week, the 2004 Belgium GP at Spa-Francorchamps was reinstated after a year out when laws on tobacco advertising were watered down for sporting events.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/formula_one/3133815.stm

The Gilles Villeneuve circuit is one of the most exciting races in the F1 competition.

I am surprised at the decision because F1 was planning to move the US Grand Prix in Indianapolis from September to June in order to save money by following the event in Montreal, and keeping the teams in North America for a month.

[Spentastic]

4. Yeah

They could also bend over and agree to be buttf*cked live on T.V.!

I like the Canadian GP but I don't think countries should allow F1 to dictate where and when and under what conditions they will race.

[jamesinca]

6. I agree, F1 is a car. Tobacco is your life and health

That is simply put. The article goes on to say that F1 is going to places that don't have restrictions on tobacco. Maybe these people should get the hint that tobacco is evil. I think the message they got was it is big money so they are going in that direction, not the moral direction.

[Frederic Bastiat]

5. F1 had a seven year grace period

Time's up and Legault probably won't appeal; I guess the Jazz fest will officially kick off summer next year.

[MaineDem]

7. I'll believe this when it happens

I think this is one of Bernie's ploys. The teams run without tobacco sponsorship in many countries now.

Tobacco hasn't been the name sponsor at this race for a long time, if I remember correctly. Mostly it's been Molson, Labatt, or Air Canada.

If this race is canceled I'll admit to being wrong but I think this race will continue.

And as mentioned above, the USGP date will be changed next year to make the North American races coincide. This will throw much of US racing into a schedule scramble.

I think it's a Bernie game.

[BiggJawn]

8. I don't get it. They MAKE you smoke when you go to these races?

They stuff cigs in your face and smack you until you suck on 'em when walk in the gate?

I didn't think so.

The racing sponsors can't get their logos or ads infront of the eyeballs, so they lean on the regulatory body to pull the series in locales where they have to re-paint the cars, have different uniforms, etc.

Amazing, isn't it, I quit smoking in March, but I have yet to develop the rabid anti-smoking gene...:7

[Spentastic]

9. Oh yeah

Advertising doesn't work at all. That's why the companies do it.

I'm a smoker. I believe that tobacco companies will do everything in their power to survive. I don't really want to see anyone else smoking.

What exactly does smoking have to do with motor racing anyway?

[BiggJawn]

15. The biggest sponsors of racing teams...

...are tobacco companies.
That's what smoking has to do with racing.

Maybe I'm immune to it. The advertising, that is. I got started smoking because it was the "cool adult thing" to do. I quit because of the way the states are taxing the hell out of smokers and my desire to keep a rock-hard woody beyond the age most guys are going for the "Blue Friend" (another race care sponsor, BTW) :7

[Spentastic]

16. Just had a look

5 teams seem to be sponsored by tobbaco

Ferrari
Mclaren
BAR
Jordan
Renault

Fuck em.

You gave up smoking to maintain wood. Now that's committment! Stay off em.

[Zero Gravitas]

10. Bernie Denies Cancelation

Ecclestone claims that the Canadian GP has not been axed (yet).

http://f1.racing-live.com/en/index.html

"I've no idea where this story came from - the calendar for 2004 has not been put out yet or even considered,” he told Ananova.

“I don't know what's in my head at the moment, I'm so busy, but the calendar for 2004 is not out yet."

Of course if you read it carefully Bernies says he's too busy to know whats in HIS head, so it may well be true...

[dArKeR]

11. Big Tobacco - by Mark Schapiro

Tobacco is one of the most globalized industries on the planet. More cigarettes are traded than any other single product, some trillion "sticks," as they're known in the business, passing international borders each year. As a result, American brands have been propelled into every corner of the world, with just four companies controlling 70 percent of the global market. Marlboro, Kool, Kent: They have become as omnipresent around the world as they are here in the United States. With declining sales in this country, foreign markets have become increasingly critical to the tobacco companies' financial health: The top US tobacco firms now earn more from cigarettes sold abroad than in the United States. How they got there is a tale that leads straight into a global underground of smugglers and money launderers who have played a key role in facilitating the tobacco companies' entry into foreign markets



http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020506&s=schapiro



------

How Big Tobacco Subverted Anti-Terror Act

How Big Tobacco nicked terror act
Firms accused of smuggling cigarettes feared language on laundering
Mark Shaprio
MSNBC

NEW YORK, June 13 — On the one-month anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist
attacks, the tobacco industry took aim at Congress’ first effort to respond
to the crisis with a major piece of new legislation — the Patriot Act. Why
would America’s largest tobacco companies take an interest in a bill
designed to go after America’s terrorist adversaries?

THE ANSWER: legal liability. Not that the tobacco companies are terrorists,
but some of their marketing and distribution strategies look awfully similar
to the illegal financing systems used by terrorists. At least they do from
the U.S. Department of Justice perspective.

To get to the bottom of this story, we need to return to those traumatized
days last fall, in which our lives were filled with fears of another
terrorist attack, the retaliation of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, and shock
and horror at the revelation that anthrax had contaminated the halls of
Congress.

On the morning of Oct. 11, GOP Rep. Michael Oxley of Ohio, chairman of the
House Financial Services Committee, brought what was then called the
“Financial Anti-Terrorist Act” before his committee (and would later be
called the USA Patriot Act when it was passed by the Senate).

http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/intl-tobacco/2002q2/000750.html

--------


Tobacco company had natives smuggle, group alleges
http://theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030712.ucig0712/BNStory/National/

[LeftHander]

12. Monaco will be next....

Tobacco will want to force F1 to race on oval tracks next in the Southern US. Switch from open wheel to stock cars that look like US made cars...

Another example of US "Bubbaizing".

[MaineDem]

13. I'm assuming you're being sarcastic

After all, even Winston is pulling out of NASCAR as title sponsor.

[phgnome]

17. The Cult of Anti-Smoking Zealots

First, Formula One is not being cancelled as a form of protest by the tobacco companies. It's because tobacco companies are the biggest sponsors of that event. Hey, if you still want it to go on, find other sponsors to pay for the event! If the government banned the sponsor from advertising, why are you still blaming the sponsor if the tab for the event is not being picked up by anyone? Do you expect the tobacco companies to actually hand over money to still pay for the event without anything in it for them? I have an idea...why don't all non-smokers pitch in $100 so that this event can still go on instead of whining about it.

Second, this is what I despise about the anti-smoking lobby groups around: without being informed of the situation, they're quick to jump on the bandwagon and blame the sponsor. The anti-smoking campaign has cost many restaurants a lot of business -- many have sunk. But that doesn't matter to this lobby group because they just want to prove one thing: that THEY are right and that smokers are WRONG and somehow second class citizens. I hate the way they banned smoking in restaurants in my city and you see some non-smoker sauntering in a week later and sighing, complaining that the food is not so good. Then, never coming back and watching the restaurant go under. THAT SUCKS.

How about a licencing system that gives SOME establishments smoking facilities -- let market pressures take place. But noooo. Why? Because the smoking restaurants would sink the non-smoking ones. Smokers eat in restaurants more often, smokers like to hang around longer and have more drinks and maybe even dessert. A significant portion of the price of each pack of cigarettes is in taxes.

And let's ask ourselves who the unhealthy people really are -- ask the medical industry the ratio of visits by smokers and non-smokers. I hate the picture of smokers that the lobby group paints. Look in the smoking section of any building, for godsake, they're all people of average, acceptable weight. It's not the obese people like the paint in their anti-smoking ads. A lot of smokers are generally healthy -- health normally starts deteriorating when the smokers quit.

You want clean air? Try telling the smoke stack across the street, that pumps out the smoke of 100,000 smokers every hour. Try telling that to all the cars sitting on the freeway in rush hour traffic. They choose to pick on the smokers because it's the easiest group to crush.

The only thing I hate more than Bush are the anti-smoking zealots that force their way of life on me, take away my hang-out spots and proceeding to economically shut the business down, and whine about it when the hospitality industry slows down or an event is not sponsored. It's short-term mentality. Shouldn't I have some choice in it? Are you forcing your perception of health on me, even though I haven't been sick in 5 years (I had a flu 5 years ago), even though I have no respiratory problems after smoking for 15 years, even though you are still driving your car that pumps gases into the air that cause lung cancer, as well.

So far, since the anti-smoking campaign, I've taken about $35,000 to $40,000 out of the restaurant industry because I dread going into any restaurant now. I hate the pristine-ness of it. I hate all the children in the restaurant screaming and running around while I'm eating and trying to have a conversation with a friend, now that all restaurants *MUST* be at the beck and call of the nuclear families. AND, above all, I hate being told what to do with trivial issues that can be resolved with social compromise. I've always been courteous about my habit, I don't smoke in enclosed places where air quality matters, I don't smoke outside of designated areas and I don't smoke in the homes of non-smokers. I think we smokers have been more than fair.

If the system chooses to treat me a second-class citizen because I smoke by banning all smoking in public places, it can stop taking taxes from me. As long as I'm paying the exorbitant amount of tax (which amounts to more than taxes on fossil fuels that are far more damaging to the environment), I have the right to smoke courteously in public places.

Flame me or put a stigma on me ... I don't care ... just please stop whining about the economic consequences of banning smoking and stop blaming the tobacco companies for it when it's just market pressure causing it.