DAVE ROSS

Forget smoking, Big Tobacco might bore us to death

Nov 28, 2017, 5:33 AM | Updated: Nov 30, 2017, 10:32 pm

tobacco washington, Skagit...

(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

I know many of you dislike advertising, but at least most ads try to maintain your interest. Not this ad!

“A federal court has ordered Lorillard, Altria Phillip Morris USA, and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco to make this statement.”

This, you see, is a “corrective ad.”

It was back in 2006 that a federal court ordered the tobacco industry to pay for a year’s worth of “corrective advertising” to make up for all the wildly misleading advertising that, for so many years, enticed smokers to pick up one of life’s deadliest habits.

Well, the tobacco companies knew what they had to do – make sure no one would listen. So the ad campaign you’ll be hearing in the coming months represents 11 years worth of lawyers giving boredom injections.

“Many smokers switched to low-tar and light cigarettes because they think low-tar and light cigarettes are less harmful. They are not.”

It’s worse than a test of the emergency broadcast system, which at least has an alert tone. I think I detected her eyes blinking a message: “If I allow any inflection in my voice they are threatening to kill my dog…”

“All cigarettes cause cancer, lung disease, heart attacks, and premature death.”

We have to punch this up. So, you’re saying even LIGHT cigarettes can hurt me?

“Lights, low-tar, ultra-lights, and naturals.”

Even NATURALS can hurt me, boring lady? Surely, there must be some safe cigarette.

“There is no safe cigarette.”

The poor tobacco companies. If only they’d sold marijuana.

Dave's Commentary

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Forget smoking, Big Tobacco might bore us to death