Smokers not appreciated

In an opinion piece in the Gaston (North Carolina, US) Gazette, Lewis Guignard makes the point that nobody thanks the often-impoverished smokers who provide, through the cigarette taxes they pay, additional funds for social projects.

The trigger for his piece seems to have been an announcement that the Golden Leaf Foundation (GLF) was to give $634,000 to support an education budget.

Guignard said that, established in 1999 after the infamous tobacco lawsuits, the GLF distributed money given to the state by various tobacco companies as part of the tobacco companies’ settlement of various lawsuits.

Guignard questions the premise on which the lawsuits were brought by state attorneys general and the fact that smokers were not represented during the lawsuits.

He questions, too, where the money from the lawsuits went and goes.

And finally, he asks who thanks the smokers.

‘So it may be the Golden Leaf Foundation is handing money to these local schools,’ he wrote. ‘But the money comes indirectly from the poor, local cigarette smokers, and who is telling them thank you?’

Guignard’s piece is at: http://www.gastongazette.com/opinion/20170610/my-turn-we-ought-to-thank-smokers.