Lying liars

So I pick up one of these mindless, ubiquitous brochures while I'm waiting for this or that bureaucratic process to unfold. It happens to be from the American Cancer Society. It's 20 pages long or so, full of tips on quitting. It ends with two tips that may be "especially helpful."

One of them is, don't beat yourself up if you slip. Fair enough.

The other?

"Think about how tobacco companies have manipulated you . . . For example, tobacco industry studies done in the 1960's found nicotine was addictive. Yet these studies weren't made public until 1994. During the 30-plus years the tobacco industry was keeping this secret, 9 million Americans died from illnesses caused by tobacco."

Excuse me? Keeping nicotine addiction secret? I left elementary school by the mid 1970's, and we'd been indoctrinated quite well, thank you very much, that cigarettes were addictive. My parents lost more than one pack involuntarily down the toilet, thanks to their little storm trooper. This sort of garbage is known as a "lie."

And it's so unnecessary. It's not like the tobacco companies have the high ground. "Could you please pay us ridiculous money for weeds and die an early and painful death so we can send our kids to Princeton?"