Tobacco Bill

* Re your April 9 article, “Tobacco Bill Draws Harsh Industry Backlash”: The industry says the bill will bankrupt them. Oh gee, I’m so sorry about that. Let me see, they’ve been targeting my kids for something like 20 years and I’m supposed to care that they’re going to go bankrupt. They are lucky they are not going to jail for life.

The only thing I am worried about is that the proposed laws must not be tough enough because we haven’t seen the army of tobacco lawyers yet. Remember, Congress, the people in this industry may seem like nice folks, from growers, to advertising, lawyers, sales, distribution and management, but they are in fact killer scum selling a product to children and others whose benefits are addiction, poor health and death. Nail them.

RICK ROBINSON

Santa Monica

* Congress wants to raise the tobacco tax $1.50 under the guise of “protecting the children.” What a joke! This is just a politically correct way to raise taxes to fund their pork projects. If representatives truly cared about preventing teen smoking, they would vigorously enforce the laws that are already in place prohibiting the sale of tobacco to minors, instead of raising the taxes of a group of people who already pay more than their fair share.

ROBERT LoBUE

Aliso Viejo

* It was classic Clinton. When speaking to tobacco people in Kentucky (April 10), he said that he was not out to put them out of business, he just didn’t want them to sell their products to children. How noble.

It is obvious that he pretended not to know that if you stop children from smoking, in a short time the tobacco industry in this country will be in big trouble for domestic sales. Most people do not start smoking after they are 21 years old.

If we don’t put them out of business, they’ll be selling to minors in other parts of the world and we can’t be too proud of that either.

LARRY ZINI

Camarillo