Government By the Cigarette Companies, for the Cigarette Companies

Let's get this straight.  On Tuesday of this week, for no good reasons that anyone can think of, the Bush Administration's Justice Department suddenly, and (not so) shockingly, handed the cancer...er, cigarette...er, tobacco companies a huge gift.  Basically, the government slashed and gutted the amount of money that cancer...er, cigarette...er, tobacco companies would have to pay for smoking cessation efforts aimed at helping all current smokers quit.  In total, the amount of money demanded by the government was cut from $130 billion to a measly $10 billion. 

As if this action weren't heinous enough, yesterday the Bush Administration's (in)Justice Department handed the cancer/cigarette/tobacco companies yet another gift.  Check this out from today's Washington Post:

The government announced yesterday that it will further scale back its demands for penalties on the tobacco industry in a landmark civil racketeering case, saying it is no longer seeking to help 45 million American smokers quit their habit.

In the surprising final day of an eight-month trial, the Justice Department's lead attorney said the government now wants tobacco companies to pay only for smoking cessation programs for an unspecified number of future smokers who may become addicted to cigarettes in the first year after the trial concludes.

[...]

Anti-smoking activists and industry lawyers ridiculed the government's description of its new cessation proposal. They said Justice officials seemed unable to answer basic questions about how many people it would cover, how the government would verify which smokers became addicted in the first year and who would be barred from getting help.

What the hell is going on here exactly?  As usual, it's helpful to
"follow the money."  In 2004, according to Open Secrets, the tobacco industry gave George W. Bush $167,845 --  compared to a piddling $21,050 for John Kerry. 

This is not a new phenomenon.  In the 2002 election cycle, the cancer companies gave overwhelmingly to Republicans in terms of "soft money."  For instance, R.J. Reynolds gave $362,631 to Republicans, $15,000 to Democrats.  Brown and Williamson Tobacco gave $398,193 to Republicans, $12,500 to Democrats.  Lorillard Tobacco gave $408,613 to Republicans, $14,000 to Democrats.  Get the picture?  So what are these companies getting for their money?  Can we say a gift of $120 billion?  See above for  the sordid details.

As the Washington Post says in its lead editorial today, "The episode looks like politically inspired malfeasance, and it should be investigated."  The Post continues, in poweful words that should be read by all Americans in order to understand what the Bush Administration is doing to our country:

The decision appears to be the result of political pressure, not a judgment of the legal merits of the case made by the career lawyers trying it. It was made at the political echelon of the Justice Department and imposed on the trial team -- which strongly objected -- by the office of Associate Attorney General Robert D. McCallum Jr. Moreover, the department appears to have pressed its own witnesses to weaken their testimony. Justice Department officials have not offered anything like an adequate explanation for the switch. Mr. McCallum has suggested that the recent appellate court decision requiring that remedies be "forward-looking" required a change. As a consequence, department lawyers suggested to a federal judge in Washington yesterday that their proposed program would cover only smokers affected by legal violations that take place after the court's judgment -- which would leave at least the vast bulk of the 45 million people who smoke high and dry.

It's insulting that they can't at least come up with a better excuse. Democrats on Capitol Hill are calling for an investigation, and rightly so. If the department was behaving reasonably when it introduced evidence that called for the larger figure, it has no business now -- with circumstances unchanged -- refusing to seek the vast bulk of what its evidence suggests the American people are lawfully entitled to. If the administration was going to cave in to its donors and friends in the tobacco industry, it should have done so six years ago. But then, what's $120 billion between friends?

What's $120 billion among friends?  That's the amount of money, apparently, which the Bush Administration decided it needed to give the cancer... er, cigarette... er, tobacco companies in order to make them happy and to keep the campaign contributions flowing like a mighty river to Republicans. 

That's right.  Screw all the people who these companies have harmed.  Screw the Ameircan taxpayers.  Screw our system of justice.  And screw the idea that, to quote Republican President Abraham Lincoln's great words, "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." 

Sadly, under the extremely hard-hearted but pathetically soft-headed rule of people like George W. Bush and Tom DeLay (and their political soulmates George Allen, Jerry Kilgore and Eric Cantor), this ideal of government is rapidly perishing from the earth -- or at least from the United States of America.  In the future, for your reading convenience, simply insert the words "cigarette companies" (or "Big Oil companies," for that matter) wherever you see the word "people" in the U.S. constitution, Bill of Rights, etc.  It will make so much sense when these sacred documents read more like this: 

We the cigarette companies, in order to form a more profitable union, establish trust funds, insure our own prosperity, provide for the legal defense, promote the corporate welfare, and secure the blessings of subsidies, for ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish...

Well, you get the idea.

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