WEBVTT - The Tobacco Master Settlement: That Time We Got Em 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:07.720 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:11.640 --> 0:00:14.000 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:16.360 Chuck and Jerry's here too, and this is stuff you 0:00:16.400 --> 0:00:20.880 should Know. I think part of our ongoing corporate mouthfeas. 0:00:20.360 --> 0:00:24.479 In this edition, Yeah for sure. And the beginning of 0:00:24.520 --> 0:00:27.000 this episode ties in a lot with we did an 0:00:27.000 --> 0:00:30.200 episode about the history of the cigarette, sure, like just 0:00:30.360 --> 0:00:33.080 the thing that you shouldn't put in your mouth, but 0:00:33.120 --> 0:00:36.919 people do, right, And so we're going to talk a 0:00:36.920 --> 0:00:39.400 little bit about that here at the beginning, because you 0:00:39.520 --> 0:00:42.320 need to know a little bit about that as it 0:00:42.400 --> 0:00:45.120 leads up to what were the you know this lawsuits 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:49.080 against big Tobacco. And we should start by saying that 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:52.959 it's been a long time that we've known that tobacco 0:00:53.159 --> 0:00:56.000 and smoking was really bad for you and would kill you. 0:00:56.840 --> 0:01:00.639 Like the nineteen twenties we knew for sure, the fifties 0:01:01.240 --> 0:01:06.399 we really really knew. And in the nineteen sixties is 0:01:06.440 --> 0:01:09.520 when John F. Kennedy finally came out via his Surgeon 0:01:09.560 --> 0:01:13.240 General Luther Terry, and said, all right, everybody, it's nineteen 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:17.160 sixty four. I'm finally going to issue a government report 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:21.080 based on you know about a dozen studies with lots 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:25.360 of data about a million male smokers, and this stuff 0:01:25.400 --> 0:01:26.920 is really bad for you. So we're going to have 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:29.440 to start putting warning labels on packages. 0:01:30.160 --> 0:01:34.679 Yeah. The great thing about those warning labels, though, is 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:39.760 you were educated to imagine Sammy Davis Junior saying it 0:01:39.840 --> 0:01:40.440 in your head. 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:41.400 That's right. 0:01:42.440 --> 0:01:48.400 So the cigarette companies this is the beginning of their playbook, 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:52.680 and their playbook was basically, nah, yeah, prove it. You 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:56.360 can't prove it. This is the whole idea of settled science, 0:01:56.480 --> 0:02:00.400 the idea that which is just a complete oxymoron, science 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:03.320 has never settled. It's a constant, ongoing process. But the 0:02:03.400 --> 0:02:07.600 idea that you have to have one definitive proof before 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:11.399 you can even begin talking about whether something is harmful 0:02:11.520 --> 0:02:16.359 or not, and really exploiting and manipulating the public through 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:19.679 really horrible means, this is where that all started. And 0:02:19.840 --> 0:02:22.560 the first response that cigarette companies came up with was 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:26.480 to say, all right, how about we put filters on cigarettes, Because, 0:02:26.480 --> 0:02:30.000 as everybody knows, cigarettes make your throat kind of scratchy. 0:02:30.120 --> 0:02:33.079 Sometimes they can make you hoarse, and that's okay, that's 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:35.760 a part of smoking. These new filters are going to 0:02:36.160 --> 0:02:39.720 help with all of that, and there you go. Cigarettes 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:40.720 are healthy everybody. 0:02:40.960 --> 0:02:44.120 That's right. In the sixties and seventies, that's when we 0:02:44.160 --> 0:02:49.720 saw lighter cigarettes or low tar cigarettes. In the fifties, 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:52.800 they got really sort of organized and official about their 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:58.800 PR campaigns. I guess they're propaganda campaigns. When they formed 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:03.679 the Tobacco Industry Research Committee under the guise of studying 0:03:03.720 --> 0:03:06.600 the health hazards of smoking, but it was very much 0:03:06.720 --> 0:03:10.320 just a PR move. They put out an ad called 0:03:10.360 --> 0:03:14.079 a Frank Statement the cigarette smokers early on, which said like, hey, 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:18.280 we're really like, your health is paramount to us as 0:03:18.320 --> 0:03:20.799 we sell you cigarettes. It's hard not to laugh because 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:23.160 this is just so dumb to think about that people 0:03:23.200 --> 0:03:24.079 would have bought this. 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:26.840 Yeah, but also just so cynical that they would need 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:28.160 for sure this too, you know. 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:30.079 But they said, all right, we're really going to pledge 0:03:30.080 --> 0:03:32.720 to research this everyone because we care about your health. 0:03:33.440 --> 0:03:36.280 But also again, like, you can't really prove that it's 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:38.600 just a cigarettes, Like, how do you know that these 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:41.080 people dying of lung cancer didn't also get it from 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:43.360 all the other stuff that's going on in the world. 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:49.200 Yeah, And actually that would become kind of codified in 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:53.640 what's called the Roper proposal. There was a Tobacco Institute 0:03:53.800 --> 0:03:57.560 vice president, so in addition to the Tobacco Industry Research Committee, 0:03:57.600 --> 0:04:00.840 they also came up with the Tobacco and this Institute, 0:04:01.280 --> 0:04:05.800 and then they renamed the TRC the Council for Tobacco Research. 0:04:06.400 --> 0:04:08.760 No word of the industry in it, so it's even 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:12.960 more trustworthy, right, And Fred Panzer was vice president of 0:04:13.000 --> 0:04:16.680 the Tobacco Institute, and he wrote a memo in nineteen 0:04:16.760 --> 0:04:20.719 seventy two that said, essentially, here's what we should do. 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.799 We need to create doubt about the health charge without 0:04:23.880 --> 0:04:27.600 actually denying it. And essentially it's a variation on the 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:31.400 theme that the case is not proved. And he said, 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:34.479 kind of what you were saying that like these are 0:04:34.760 --> 0:04:38.120 like you can't really prove that it's cigarettes. So for example, 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.960 extroverts are more likely to smoke cigarettes, but they're also 0:04:42.279 --> 0:04:44.880 more likely to get out in the world and drop out. 0:04:44.800 --> 0:04:45.440 Of a heart attack. 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:49.240 So maybe it's just that extroverts smoke cigarettes, or that 0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:53.000 there was one called the constitutional hypothesis that was people 0:04:53.040 --> 0:04:57.600 who get sick from smoking are biologically predisposed to get 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:00.680 sick in general, so it's really them. This was all 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:04.040 just thrown about in nineteen seventy two to basically lie 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:06.919 to the public and confuse the public about whether or 0:05:06.920 --> 0:05:09.200 not cigarettes were unhealthy or harmful. 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:13.120 Yeah, so they're pushing this campaign out behind the scenes. 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:17.520 They're just throwing in the back file drawer every study 0:05:17.560 --> 0:05:21.760 that they had that showed that nicotine was addictive, that 0:05:21.839 --> 0:05:24.839 smoking was bad for you, Like, they're suppressing that information 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:30.440 as well as at the same time targeting children with, 0:05:30.640 --> 0:05:34.880 you know, product placement in movies, specifically Superman two in 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:38.719 nineteen eighty one with Marlborough. Obviously we've talked about camel 0:05:38.760 --> 0:05:41.520 Joe before in the history of the cigarette. That was 0:05:42.240 --> 0:05:46.080 what I say, cammel Joe. Yeah, I like camel Joe. Okay, 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:48.440 I think we should leave all this in there except 0:05:48.560 --> 0:05:50.960 the beep, although there's plenty of those episodes. 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:53.479 Yeah, let's get the beep out. 0:05:54.640 --> 0:05:59.000 So that was in nineteen eighty eight. I like camel Joe. 0:05:59.320 --> 0:06:00.520 I like so called you. 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:03.000 I always called them camel Joe. I didn't know that 0:06:03.040 --> 0:06:03.599 wasn't the name. 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:07.160 I'm sure there's some retired tobacco industry guy who was like, man, 0:06:07.200 --> 0:06:10.159 we should have called him Camel Joe. That is way better. 0:06:11.160 --> 0:06:13.240 Here's a gen X stat for you, which is fairly 0:06:13.279 --> 0:06:19.040 staggering but completely believable. Youth smoking, like kids and teenager smoking, 0:06:19.080 --> 0:06:22.480 had been on the decline kind of through the seventies 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:24.880 and eighties for the most part, and then in the 0:06:24.960 --> 0:06:28.760 nineties when gen X came around to like prime smoking age, 0:06:29.200 --> 0:06:31.760 it really jumped. It hit an all time high in 0:06:31.839 --> 0:06:35.800 nineteen ninety seven of thirty six point four percent of 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:40.000 youth were smoking. Adults were smoking at twenty four point 0:06:40.080 --> 0:06:44.760 seven percent at the time, and that's just a staggering number. 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:46.960 I think it's at like three point something percent now. 0:06:47.000 --> 0:06:49.400 So gen xers were smoking at a rate of thirty 0:06:49.440 --> 0:06:50.000 six percent. 0:06:50.279 --> 0:06:50.559 Yeah. 0:06:50.600 --> 0:06:53.480 And there's two things that they suggest had to do 0:06:53.560 --> 0:06:57.920 with that huge jump in youth smoking. One was this 0:06:58.680 --> 0:07:03.480 big campaign and push to target youth smokers. The tobacco 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:07.960 industry called them replacement smokers. They would replace the other 0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:12.280 lifelong smokers that died off from smoking, right. And that's 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:14.679 the thing too, is like one of the things about smoking, 0:07:14.840 --> 0:07:18.360 very few people start smoking as adults. We call them 0:07:18.440 --> 0:07:23.400 total morons. Most people who smoke started smoking in adolescents. 0:07:23.480 --> 0:07:27.080 So the tobacco industry had every incentive to go after kids. 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:30.000 They just knew that society would not allow them to 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:32.320 do that if they did it overtly, so they had 0:07:32.360 --> 0:07:34.440 to do it, you know, kind of under the radar 0:07:34.520 --> 0:07:38.880 with Camel Joe. The other thing is that there was 0:07:38.920 --> 0:07:42.720 a price war that started in the mid nineties, and 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:48.240 that they think that the drop in the price of cigarettes, Yeah, 0:07:48.320 --> 0:07:51.080 made it more likely for younger kids to smoke, because 0:07:51.200 --> 0:07:54.600 younger kids are more price sensitive than older people who 0:07:54.640 --> 0:07:55.320 are smokers. 0:07:55.480 --> 0:07:58.040 Remember how cheap cigarettes were back then. Yeah, it's like 0:07:58.040 --> 0:08:02.400 a buck buck twenty five a pack or something for sure. Yeah. 0:08:02.400 --> 0:08:05.920 I mean I wasn't a regular smoker. I occasionally smoked, 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:09.280 as we talked about before, So I wasn't like buying packs, 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:12.920 but I sold them at the Golden Pantry in Athens, 0:08:12.960 --> 0:08:15.640 Georgia on the East Side. And cigarettes were cheap, and 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:18.360 they're somebody told me the day that they were like 0:08:18.520 --> 0:08:21.120 twelve to fifteen dollars in like twenty something bucks in 0:08:21.160 --> 0:08:22.560 New York a pack. 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:24.760 I believe that. I totally believe that. 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:27.920 Oly. Well, we'll see why here in a minute. 0:08:28.240 --> 0:08:30.840 So yeah, one of the other things too, that they're 0:08:30.880 --> 0:08:35.080 doing at the same time, besides suppressing studies sewing doubt 0:08:35.360 --> 0:08:38.120 and confusion among the public about the harm of cigarettes, 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:42.160 they're just out and out denying publicly that not only 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:45.600 your cigarettes not harmful, they're not even addictive. That as 0:08:45.679 --> 0:08:50.040 recently as nineteen ninety four, Yeah, they were publicly saying, 0:08:50.160 --> 0:08:53.600 like the head of Philip Morris was saying in interviews, 0:08:53.840 --> 0:08:56.720 we do not believe cigarettes are addictive. In the nineties, 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:58.839 people had known, like all you had to do is 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:01.360 ask a smoker back in fifties if they were addicted 0:09:01.360 --> 0:09:04.000 to cigarettes, and they could tell you that they probably were. 0:09:04.920 --> 0:09:08.280 And like this, the industry in the nineties still wouldn't 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:12.600 fess up to that. Like that was their tactic. Just 0:09:12.640 --> 0:09:16.760 a complete solid wall with zero cracks in it, over 0:09:16.800 --> 0:09:19.040 and over again being reinforced publicly. 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:22.040 Yeah. Actually, in the nineteen fifties, I think they probably said, like, no, 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:23.840 I don't think they're addicted, but do you have a cigarette? 0:09:23.840 --> 0:09:24.800 Can I have a cigarette? 0:09:25.000 --> 0:09:25.320 Right? 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:26.719 I see a guy where they're smoking, you think he 0:09:26.760 --> 0:09:27.959 has an extra cigarette for me? 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:28.520 Right? 0:09:29.480 --> 0:09:32.600 All right? So in the nineteen fifties, we need to 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:35.920 start with sort of lawsuit talk. There were a lot 0:09:35.960 --> 0:09:40.240 of lawsuits all unsuccessful. By the mid nineties, when they 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:43.520 were still saying that it wasn't addictive, there were at 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:48.480 least four hundred lawsuits that they never lost, they never settled. 0:09:48.480 --> 0:09:49.760 They had one hundred percent record. 0:09:49.920 --> 0:09:51.319 That's crazy, which is. 0:09:51.280 --> 0:09:55.319 Staggering to learn. They had obviously a ton of money 0:09:55.360 --> 0:09:58.600 to form like the best legal representation they could, but 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:02.959 they were also actively low being state governments about making 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:05.400 it harder to sue about tort reform because like, hey, 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:09.800 tobacco's a natural product, so cigarettes fall into that category, 0:10:11.000 --> 0:10:13.040 like despite all the other stuff that's in there, so 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:16.720 you can't sue somebody for packaging a natural thing and 0:10:16.760 --> 0:10:17.560 selling it to people. 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:18.440 Yeah. 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:20.040 That was the other thing they were doing, too, is 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:24.959 they were really lobbying government really effectively. 0:10:25.160 --> 0:10:26.800 Like they spent a lot of money on. 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:28.520 Lobbyists, right, not like now. 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:33.840 So yeah, they were like the teflon down of industries. 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:35.960 I guess, yeah, tobacco industry. 0:10:35.760 --> 0:10:39.760 Was what did you just say, not like now, because 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:45.199 I picked up like atastic, Yeah, what were you mentioning? 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:47.800 I'm sure they're still pouring tons of money into the lobby. 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:52.320 Oh sure, sure, yeah, I'm sure too. But so they 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:57.400 were they were just completely untouchable, Like, I mean, if 0:10:57.440 --> 0:10:59.880 you have one hundred percent record, that in and of 0:10:59.880 --> 0:11:03.360 it self will prevent people from filing suit against you. 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:06.079 Right, yeah, because it's expensive, it is, right. 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:07.599 And you're just like, I'm not gonna win, or the 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:10.600 chances of me winning are so low, I might not 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:14.480 even file suit. So the state also, we should mention 0:11:14.600 --> 0:11:17.439 Congress is doing almost nothing about this at this point. 0:11:18.360 --> 0:11:23.959 So the state attorneys general, William Safire just smiled from heaven. 0:11:25.760 --> 0:11:27.840 Led by a guy named Michael Moore, he was the 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.959 attorney general from Mississippi. They got together and they said, well, 0:11:32.160 --> 0:11:35.160 if the federal government's I can't do anything about it, 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:38.880 we're going to Yeah, and one state might not be 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:41.840 able to take on the tobacco industry, but every state, 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:47.720 territory and DC together definitely can take on the tobacco industry. 0:11:47.840 --> 0:11:50.680 Not only can we take them on, we can seriously 0:11:50.720 --> 0:11:54.920 threaten to bankrupt the entire tobacco industry right out of 0:11:55.000 --> 0:11:57.880 existence if we really try. 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:00.600 Yeah, and they play their cards right, because they were like, 0:12:00.640 --> 0:12:04.880 how can we best go at them? Maybe medicaid is 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:06.840 the way to do it, because we have these medicaid 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:11.840 programs through our individual states that are not going bankrupt, 0:12:11.880 --> 0:12:14.120 but they're they're in bad shape in a lot of 0:12:14.120 --> 0:12:17.520 cases because they're treating all these smokers who are really 0:12:17.559 --> 0:12:20.920 expensive to get through, like you know, lung cancer treatment, 0:12:21.480 --> 0:12:24.000 and they have deceived us for all these years. So 0:12:24.160 --> 0:12:28.200 let's go after him for RICO status like fraud and racketeering. 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:33.200 And that'll send a shiver even through the spine of 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:38.160 a teflon don. And they were turning up, like Livia says, 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:43.240 like literal truckloads of documents from the industry about them 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:47.760 selling to teenagers, bearing studies covering up what they knew 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:50.920 about how addictive everything was. And there were I mean, 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:54.240 this would be a good sort of thriller movie, almost 0:12:54.280 --> 0:12:56.439 like a Soderberg kind of thing. You probably do a 0:12:56.440 --> 0:13:00.760 great job with it. Where like they're racing like documents 0:13:00.840 --> 0:13:04.480 out of offices while they're trying to actively like bury 0:13:04.520 --> 0:13:08.280 these documents, Like I think the guy from Texas was 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:11.360 literally trying to put papers on a private jet so 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:13.960 they could be taken to a district judge before the 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:17.120 state court could seal them up because once the Feds 0:13:17.120 --> 0:13:19.760 are investigating, it can't be sealed at the state. 0:13:19.600 --> 0:13:22.040 Level, right or even if they do steal it at 0:13:22.080 --> 0:13:24.440 the state level. This federal district judge is like, that 0:13:24.440 --> 0:13:26.720 doesn't apply to me, so I can I can make 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:29.280 these public are part of a court case, right, So yeah, 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:31.800 I mean yeah, that is like a thriller. And there 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:33.800 is something that kind of touched on this. It was 0:13:33.880 --> 0:13:38.600 the Insider with who is the Australian actor he used 0:13:38.600 --> 0:13:39.839 to get in fights all the time? 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:40.920 Russell Crowe? 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:44.680 Yeah, Russell Crowe is Jeffrey Wiggand I think yeah, who 0:13:44.720 --> 0:13:46.800 was like this whistleblower a movie back on Industry? 0:13:46.800 --> 0:13:47.320 It was great. 0:13:47.679 --> 0:13:50.280 I think that was a Michael Man movie. 0:13:50.920 --> 0:13:54.800 Michael Mann, Man, I nailed it. You should nailing all 0:13:54.840 --> 0:13:55.079 of it. 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:58.560 I should be a guest on movie Crush. 0:13:57.760 --> 0:13:59.000 Oh man, if only. 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:01.680 But one of the other things you kind of touched 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:07.240 on their strategy, like the focusing on lying to the 0:14:07.240 --> 0:14:10.640 public and targeting teens. That was a really smart strategy 0:14:10.679 --> 0:14:13.560 because if they were just like cigarettes are harmful and 0:14:13.600 --> 0:14:15.240 we need to get rid of them, a lot of 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:17.160 adults are like, you don't need to tell me whether 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:19.200 I should smoke or not. I can kill myself if 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:22.400 I want to. So they left that part alone and 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:25.440 they went after the fact that they were targeting teens 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:28.160 and lying to the public, because the public sentiment can 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:30.400 get behind those two things like yeah, kids are out 0:14:30.400 --> 0:14:33.920 of bounds, we don't want them smoking, and you know 0:14:34.000 --> 0:14:36.920 we were lied to all these years by these same people. Yeah, 0:14:37.040 --> 0:14:40.000 go get them. So that was a really smart strategy 0:14:40.080 --> 0:14:44.480 that these attorneys general like took on, like it was amazing, 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:48.280 an amazing court angle, I think is what they call them, 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:51.040 what a court angle? 0:14:51.040 --> 0:14:55.120 Look at that, Yeah, for sure. And the writing was 0:14:55.120 --> 0:14:57.960 on the wall for investors because we're talking about hundreds 0:14:57.960 --> 0:15:01.840 of billions of dollars at stake, and they were like, hey, 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:03.840 this is this is going to look really bad and 0:15:03.880 --> 0:15:06.200 our stock prices are going to really go in the tank. 0:15:06.560 --> 0:15:09.920 And so you got to cut a deal here, which 0:15:09.960 --> 0:15:12.240 the tobacco company never had thought about, you know, because 0:15:12.240 --> 0:15:15.600 they had not only lost, never lost, they never settled anything. 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:19.440 So finally in April of ninety seven, they were set 0:15:19.480 --> 0:15:21.920 to go to trial in a few months and they're like, 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:23.520 all right, let's get a meeting set up with this 0:15:23.560 --> 0:15:26.840 Michael Moore character from Mississippi, not the movie guy obviously, 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:31.200 and an attorney for Tobacco Free Kids who was working 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:34.120 with the States about all the marketing toward you know, 0:15:34.240 --> 0:15:38.680 kids with Joe, Cammel Joe and everybody. So they started negotiating, like, 0:15:38.720 --> 0:15:40.840 all right, out of the gate, let's just say we'll 0:15:40.880 --> 0:15:44.120 get rid of Camel Joe. We love him, kids love him, 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:46.080 but we'll get rid of him and the marble or 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.480 man if that makes you happy. And then a few 0:15:48.560 --> 0:15:52.560 months later in June, they said, all right, we got 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:55.880 to start talking, like hash out the money part. So 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:58.680 how does three hundred and sixty eight and a half 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:02.520 billion dollars sound over twenty five years as just an 0:16:02.600 --> 0:16:03.360 opening salvo? 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:07.320 Yeah, And the States were like, I was not expecting 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:10.520 that actually, but they so they were like, okay, here's 0:16:10.560 --> 0:16:12.840 the problem though, These are like we need to bring 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:16.160 the Feds in, like that Congress has to approve of 0:16:16.200 --> 0:16:18.800 this deal the way that we've set it up. And 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:21.440 there were some federal aspects to it. One was that 0:16:21.480 --> 0:16:26.680 the FDA would start regulating tobacco products. Another one was 0:16:26.720 --> 0:16:31.560 that the companies, these tobacco companies would be protected against 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:34.760 any further civil and class action lawsuits. 0:16:35.320 --> 0:16:35.960 This is the big one. 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:36.520 Yeah, Yeah. 0:16:36.520 --> 0:16:39.320 In exchange, they would create a fund to pay some 0:16:39.400 --> 0:16:41.520 of those people off, and then there would also be 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:45.880 federal restrictions on indoor smoking. And this did not go 0:16:46.040 --> 0:16:49.760 very far because of that protection of the companies. 0:16:49.360 --> 0:16:53.040 Right, yeah, I mean that was the sticking point. I 0:16:53.080 --> 0:16:55.720 think they could have not too happily lived with the 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:59.600 rest of it, but that was a big one as 0:16:59.600 --> 0:17:03.320 far as Congress, and soon enough the American people were like, 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:06.199 uh uh, we can't have that. No, So Congress had 0:17:06.240 --> 0:17:08.560 a build to ratify or at least considering a bill 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:13.080 to ratify it, Universal Tobacco Settlement Act S fourteen fourteen. 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:16.960 They were debating it, all this disclosure comes out and 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:20.880 they're like, man, they were really awful companies and it's 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:24.040 worse than we thought even and the idea of them 0:17:24.080 --> 0:17:26.760 being protected moving forward, like is it going to fly? 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:31.919 So the late Senator John McCain said, all right, how 0:17:31.960 --> 0:17:35.639 about S fourteen fifteen where there's more money, like had 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:38.520 this five hundred and twenty billion sound and we're not 0:17:38.560 --> 0:17:40.760 going to protect you from now on like you you 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:42.520 can be sued moving forward too. 0:17:43.160 --> 0:17:43.440 Yeah. 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:47.120 The industry lobbied like they've never lobbied before to keep 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:50.800 this from getting passed through. And again you mentioned the 0:17:50.800 --> 0:17:53.439 stock prices when all these stuff, the stuff is going on, 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:56.760 their stocks are tanking. When you know there would be 0:17:56.800 --> 0:17:59.600 a win for in the negotiations for the tobacco companies, 0:17:59.640 --> 0:18:02.360 their stock prices would go back up. It's all very cynical. 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:07.320 And this stock price went back up after McCain's bill 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:10.080 did not get passed. And one of the reasons it 0:18:10.119 --> 0:18:15.320 wasn't passed is because other senators added like riders that 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:18.600 had nothing to do with tobacco, and I'm guessing unpopular writers, 0:18:18.640 --> 0:18:21.000 probably at the behest of the tobacco companies. I could 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:25.200 not find the writers to save my life, to basically 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:28.679 sink this bill. You know, like, imagine if you had 0:18:28.680 --> 0:18:32.840 this great bill and then somebody's like, I'm also adding 0:18:32.840 --> 0:18:38.399 a rider to repeal the requirement for child sexual predators 0:18:38.440 --> 0:18:41.560 from having to register and they can live by schools. Now, 0:18:41.840 --> 0:18:43.600 your bill's not going to pass. And I get the 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:46.119 impression that that's kind of what happened to McCain's bill. 0:18:47.200 --> 0:18:51.040 Yeah, for sure, there was another thing we just sort 0:18:51.040 --> 0:18:52.800 of should mention in passing at least, so it was 0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:55.640 another suit in October of ninety seven. This is why 0:18:55.720 --> 0:19:00.439 they're debating these original bills in Congress where they did settle. 0:19:00.960 --> 0:19:03.480 It was a separate class action suit that was filed 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:06.480 ninety one by flight attendants in the United States saying like, hey, 0:19:07.320 --> 0:19:11.000 smoking sections and planes are like killing us and it's 0:19:11.040 --> 0:19:13.840 pretty awful. So it was a husband and wife team 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:17.280 named Stanley and Susan Rosenblatt who filed this one, and 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:20.679 they ended up settling for three hundred million dollars to 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:25.120 fund medical research. And they said this was a big 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:27.439 sort of turning point, and that's the first time they 0:19:27.480 --> 0:19:30.880 officially caved. And again this is while they're debating these 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:32.520 bills in the Congress. 0:19:32.240 --> 0:19:36.399 Right, Chuck, I feel like we set things up pretty 0:19:36.440 --> 0:19:38.840 well for a break, Like we deserve an. 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:42.080 Ad we deserve a break today. 0:19:42.119 --> 0:20:06.040 Let's do it, okay, Okay. 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:09.720 So things are just kind of not going quite well 0:20:10.119 --> 0:20:13.160 because the whole thing was handed over from the states 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:16.560 to Congress, and Congress just fumbled it. 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:17.080 As they do. 0:20:18.359 --> 0:20:20.359 So some of the states went on and we're like, 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:25.080 we're gonna just keep going and negotiating our own agreements 0:20:25.119 --> 0:20:30.280 with the tobacco companies Florida, Minnesota, Mississippi, who had led 0:20:30.320 --> 0:20:34.200 the charge originally in the first place, and Texas. They 0:20:34.240 --> 0:20:38.439 all came up with their own settlements and like pretty 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:42.240 eye popping amounts, Texas got more than seventeen and a 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:46.480 half billion dollars out of their agreement. Minnesota got a 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:50.760 nice chunk of change. But they also had the foresight 0:20:50.840 --> 0:20:54.080 to say, not only are you going to settle with money, 0:20:54.160 --> 0:20:58.320 part of this is that you have to disclose public records. 0:20:58.440 --> 0:21:02.560 All internal documents that are part of discovery in this 0:21:02.760 --> 0:21:06.040 process are going to be made public after this, and 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:09.080 the tobacco companies had to agree with that. So that 0:21:09.320 --> 0:21:11.840 was where a lot of these disclosures came from. That 0:21:11.880 --> 0:21:15.719 they had just been lying, lying, lying, because these troves 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:19.920 of documents that came up in discovery during these cases, 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:24.000 just journalists went crazy. It was like a feeding frenzy 0:21:24.040 --> 0:21:24.400 on them. 0:21:25.160 --> 0:21:28.840 Oh yeah, for sure. They saw the writing on the 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:32.040 wall once again. So they got together with the other 0:21:32.119 --> 0:21:36.679 remaining states who were all plaintiffs at this point in 0:21:36.760 --> 0:21:40.159 November of nineteen ninety eight and agreed to what would 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:45.000 end up being the Tabasco Tabasco, the Tobacco Oh man, 0:21:45.080 --> 0:21:48.920 the Tabasco Settlement. Can you imagine the numbers? The Tobacco 0:21:49.400 --> 0:21:53.840 Master Settlement Agreement, the MSA, which would include two hundred 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:56.760 and six billion dollars paid out over twenty five years 0:21:57.400 --> 0:22:01.160 to forty six states, five territories in DC. Yeah, and 0:22:01.200 --> 0:22:04.520 they would allocate it according to like how many smokers 0:22:04.560 --> 0:22:06.879 they estimated each state had and how much It was 0:22:06.920 --> 0:22:09.640 still based on the medicaid thing, so how much they had, 0:22:09.760 --> 0:22:12.040 you know, had to pay out and Medicaid for all 0:22:12.040 --> 0:22:16.200 these related costs. They said, Well, also stop targeting miners, 0:22:16.240 --> 0:22:18.720 even though they really like to smoke, as it turns out, 0:22:19.080 --> 0:22:23.200