And about time too! Perhaps some of them would like to pay back the money they or their party have received from the tobacco industry over the years.

 It has long been shown beyond reasonable doubt that smoking is not only very damaging to human health, but is the cause of about three million premature deaths annually worldwide. That is an awful lot of death and an immeasurable amount of human suffering.

 Because of their addictive properties, as well as their immense personal and social importance, it would be impossible, at the moment at least, to prohibit smoking altogether, but to continue promoting it in any fashion whatsoever is nothing less than a crime.

 Those wrongdoers who promote cigarettes appeal to us directly through our senses, by associating their pernicious products with things that are wholly positive, such as young, healthy, attractive people, sporting events, nature, freedom, adventure, individuality, humour, even anti-racism and environmental protection. 

They know exactly what they are doing, and deserve to be damned for it.

 What we must do is change the law, making such crimes illegal, just as we do in respect to hard drugs - which, bad as they are, do not kill anything like three million people a year.

 Smoking is not evil. But promoting it in any form whatsoever is.