Bill Clinton and his flacks have jumped all over Bob Dole's statement that not all people who light a butt get hooked (which is certainly true; especially if you don't inhale) and that each state "ought" to be responsible for enacting "tougher smoking laws," not the federal Food and Drug Administration.
Clinton/Gore '96 media puppets immediately pumped out a television attack ad characterizing Dole's FDA comment as a death warrant for America's children. Senate and House Democrats hit the airwaves decrying the influence of tobacco money in Washington. Of course, they're all hypocrites.
The New York Times has revealed that Sen. Tom Daschle, the Democratic minority leader, was among '32 Senators of both parties who sent a letter in December [1995] to the Food and Drug Administration objecting to its efforts to regulate tobacco, policies pushed by the Clinton administration."
In fact, since 1986, Daschle has stuffed $ 20,500 of tobacco-industry contributions into his campaign coffers. On the House side, the Democratic leadership has had a long history of smoking the peace pipe with Big Tobacco. Since 1986, minority leader Richard Gephardt has accepted $ 67,258 in industry donations, minority whip David Bonior $ 53,800, and the chairman of the Democratic Caucus, Vic Fazio (who also signed the Daschle FDA letter), $ 52,050. Between 1985 and 1996, seven of the top ten House recipients of tobacco-industry money were Democrats.
The final irony of the White House tobacco offensive is that it is meant to reelect a man who has a long history of cigar smoking and is regularly seen chomping a cigar on the golf course.