The Tobacco Settlements are a huge complicated deal, so this should 
 help answer some questions about the settlements going on areound the 
 country.  (For those of you outside the United States, nearly all of 
 the 50 states have filed law suits against the makers of cigarettes 
 to recover health related costs.)  This was contributed by Jacob 
 Giles, Atlanta, GA.
 
 Q: Could you please explain the recent historic tobacco settlement?
 
 A: Sure! Basically, the tobacco industry has admitted that it is
 killing people by the millions, and has agreed that from now on it
 will do this under the strict supervision of the federal government.
 
 Q: Will there be monetary damages assessed?
 
 A: Yes. To compensate for the immense suffering caused by its
 products, the tobacco industry will pay huge sums of money to the
 group most directly affected.
 
 Q: Lawyers?
 
 A: Yes.
 
 Q: Will the federal government also receive large quantities of money?
 
 A: Of course.
 
 Q: How will the tobacco industry obtain this money?
 
 A: By selling more tobacco products.
 
 Q: What if consumers stop buying tobacco products?
 
 A: That would be very bad. That would mess up the economics of the
 whole thing. The government would probably have to set up an emergency
 task force to figure out ways to get people smoking again in order to
 finance the historic tobacco settlement.
 
 Q: If the government really wants people to stop smoking, how come it
 doesn't just make cigarettes illegal?
 
 A: Because people would smoke them anyway.
 
 Q: Then how come the government makes crack cocaine illegal?
 
 A: That is an unfair comparison. The tobacco industry is merely 
 selling a deadly product; the crack cocaine industry is guilty of 
 something far far worse.
 
 Q: Failure to make large political donations??
 
 A: Yes.
 
 Q: Many people started smoking because they watched classic movies in
 which glamorous Hollywood stars were always inhaling and exhaling vast
 clouds of smoke and looking totally cool. What will be done to correct
 this under the historic tobacco settlement?
 
 A: By 1998, all classic movies will be digitally reprocessed by
 special Food and Drug Administration computers so that - to cite one
 example - in Casablanca, when Humphrey Bogart makes his dramatic final
 speech to Ingrid Bergman, he will have the voice of Rocky the Flying
 Squirrel.
 
 Q: Whose voice will the late John Wayne have?
 
 A: The late Lucille Ball's.
 
 Q: What will happen to all the tobacco institute scientists, who,
 despite decades of dedicated research, were never able to find a
 single shred of evidence proving that cigarettes cause cancer?
 
 A: At the request of the White House, they will be reassigned to the
 Whitewater investigation.
 
 Q: Speaking of administration scandals, if President Clinton actually
 winds up in court over this Paula Jones thing, what steps will be
 taken to prevent the trial from turning into a grotesque and demeaning
 pubic spectacle?
 
 A: Mr. Clinton's face will be covered at all times by an
 electronically superimposed dark blob, underneath which will be an
 electronic label identifying him only as "A United States President."
 
 Q: How will the historic tobacco settlement affect the aliens whose
 spaceship crashed near Roswell, N.M. in 1947, and whose bodies are now
 being kept in top-secret government freezers?
 
 A: Millions of dollars will be paid to their lawyers.
 
 Q: I guess that covers it! Thanks! Smoke?
 
 A: I have my own.
 
 _/_/_/_/_/_/_/
  *****Get The DAILY DOSE!  It's Free!  You'll Laugh!*****
  ***** http://harari.org/html/daily_dose_.html *****
 _/_/_/_/_/_/_/
 
 ___________________________ ____           _         ______ |
  \                              \        /   \___-=O`/|O`/__|
   \          Scott Anderson      \_______\          / | /  (0}
   /   Mail : joker@joker.org     /        `/-==__ _/__|/__=-|
  /    Joke of the Day Provider  /         *             \ | |
 /______________________________/  http://www.joker.org  (o)
 
 _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
 This is the ORIGINAL Joke of the Day!  Millions of humorous 
 e-mails sent around the globe since 1994!
 To be ADDED:  Send 'subscribe joke' to jokelist@joker.org
 To be REMOVED: send 'unsubscribe joke' to jokelist@joker.org
 _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
 I'd love to but, I'm teaching my ferret to yodel.

Wil Stark, wstark04 (at) pobox _dot_com

---

Back to home page...