courtesy c-span.org

“Of course there are other similarities between Big Tobacco and the gun lobby. Both had a stranglehold on Congress (the NRA still does) even as their products were killing every day. And Big Tobacco and gun manufacturers were the only two industries that could not be sued. Today there is only one and it is not Big Tobacco.” – Martha Rosenberg in ‘Guns As Cool As Cigarettes – NRA’ [at opednews.com]

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98 COMMENTS

  1. Dear Martha, find something useful to do with yourself. I realize your Daddy may not have given you the attention you seek, but certainly there is still worth in your life. Volunteer at something, and so on… Try not to be so sad or inflict your sadness on other people.

    Thank you.

  2. Someone needs to put this troll back in her cave.
    Of course you can sue a firearms manufacturer, she’s just pissy because you can’t sue firearms manufacturers because of deaths caused by firearms…. Newsflash troll, you can’t sue GM if a drunk t-bones you in a silverado either. SMH.

    Look at them all squeal, whine, and cry as they lose the fight.

    • Obviously she has never heard of the insurance industry or agrochemical/agricultural industry. There are plenty of industries you can’t sue due to congressional orders. You can’t even investigate the insurance industry due to a congressional order.

      That’s really their problem, they have no power to take away our individual rights and are whining.

  3. Let’s not forget that big tobacco was also 5 million members strong and made up of people voluntarily donating money and participating in grassroots efforts to affect tobacco legislation. Oh wait…

  5. Comparing tobacco to firearms? OK, I’ll point out the obvious:

    Tobacco has zero chance of saving lives no matter who uses it.

    Firearms, on the other hand, can save lives as is evidenced by all the DGUs, military, and police uses where lives are saved. Firearms can be used to save lives or take them, and often one goes with the other (to save a life, you may have to take another).

    And fun fact, everyone dies. Maybe if people were quicker to grasp their own inevitable mortality and get over themselves as unique snowflakes they can stop fixating on the method of their demise. IE. Firearms aren’t “bad” because they could be used to kill someone. People die all the time on the toilet. Do we ban toilets? No. And I have yet to see a toilet save a life.

    Firearms save lives. Deal with it.

    • Actually Tobacco CAN SAVE lives. If I recall, the potential ebola vaccine is grown in tobacco plants after the enzyme/genes were harvested from mice.

      • Well sure. But I’m talking about tobacco in the form of cigarettes, cigars, etc. IE. “Big Tobacco” as the author was referencing.

        I’m not talking about tobacco in context of it’s medicinal properties or chemical composition and/or alternative uses.

        That’s like me saying firearms are great because they’re made out of steel and composite materials then associating it with a bunch of steel and composite inventions and materials that are positive or negative.

        That’s a bit abstract and beyond the scope of the analogy the article was about (I think).

        • There’s actually some evidence that smokers are less likely to get Alzheimer’s Disease; that holds up even if you adjust for the effects of some of them dying earlier than they might get it, though it doesn’t distinguish between smoking being preventative and people who are less likely to get it for other as yet unknown reasons being more likely to smoke. It’s a matter of choosing your poison, I suppose.

        • Well I guess that kind of ruins her analogy even more. 🙂

          And that’s a pretty cool article!

      • Get off facebook already. Made for teenage girls and people who want their “friends” to know every song they listen to. “so n so is rocking in the free world in his new his beetle” “so n so likes this!”

        This lady is unable to understand how votes work. Sad I thought they still taught that in school. The more votes for or against something… But no it’s because the nra is evil. what I head her say in the quote-“i’m afraid of things I don’t understand so I deem them as evil. I am therefore scared of many things”

        • Why do people think that having a FB account means sharing absolutely everything you do? Do you call your parents every time you have a bowel movement simply because you own a phone?

          Facebook is the easiest way for many people to stay in touch with family and friends. You can say as little or as much as you want.

    • The basis of the lawsuits against the tobacco industry was that the companies were outright deceptive, falsely claiming that tobacco wasn’t a health hazard.

      No gun company claims that guns aren’t lethal.

      Fail.

    • @tjlarson2k Your comment reflects exactly my first reaction to this person’s remarks. Tobacco is connected with far more deaths than lives saved. Guns are also connected with millions (conservatively) of deaths (factoring in Wars, chiefly), but on the civil side, guns save far more lives day-to-day than tobacco, so her analogy is invalid.

      Once again, this is another person engaging in creating emotional-appeal agit prop that does not stand-up to logical analysis, nor is supported by hard facts. I would also dispute her claim that the NRA has a “strangle-hold” on Congress, possibly a firm, influencing grip, but definitely not a “strangle-hold”. Another Statist, Progressive Propagandist at work fear mongering and lying to scare the low/no information public into accepting her deceit as truth.

  6. I saw her and thought that I was linked incorrectly to the before shots on Today’s makeover mom page. Ooops

  7. Firearm manufacturers can be sued and are successfully sued all the time. She’s just butthurt that the gun control legal fantasy of vicarious liability doesn’t hold water in the real world.

    • No company can be sued for an individual’s misuse of their product. You can’t sue GM because your wife was killed by a drunk driver driving a Chevrolet. You can’t sue Dow Chemical because your son died huffing one of their products. You can’t sue Chevron because an arsonist used their product to burn your house down. You can sue any of these companies if they make a faulty product that leads to injury. The same rules apply to gun manufacturers that apply to all other companies, the only difference is that liberal/progressives don’t like the fact that they’re treated the same.

      • That doesn’t stop people from trying.

        And the reason the lawyers keep pushing it, is because eventually they’ll get a jury that finds for the plaintiff in a vicarious liability suit, and then just like asbestos, the floodgates will open for another massive wealth transfer to lawyers on the backs of the American consumer.

  8. This woman makes a living bitching about things. When it’s not Big Guns or Big Tobacco, then it’s Big Food and Big Pharma.

    Interestingly, while she ridicules business in general, she then looks to business to provide the leadership in banning guns and they’ve largely banished smoking from the workplace. Just another facet in her love/hate relationship with life.

    • A lot of things weren’t enumerated when the Bill of Rights was authored, that doesn’t change the fact that they are, in fact, natural rights.

      That mindset is dangerous…

      • IIRC, certain of the Founders did not want a specific Bill of Rights for pretty much that reason.

      • Please read what I wrote again as I believe that you have misunderstood it. The phrase enumerated as specifically necessary conveys the assertion that tobacco use wasn’t considered necessary to a free state so it wasn’t enumerated as necessary to a free state. I was not making the statement that one’s right to consume tobacco products was somehow not a right because it wasn’t enumerated in the Constitution! The statement is not the same as “Tobacco use wasn’t enumerated in our Constitution so it is not a right.” If I had written the latter then your advisement would be well warranted. Indeed, had I written it as such, I would agree with you.

        • I think tobacco use fell under that “pursuit of happiness” thing. In that vein, tobacco was one of the primary products exported from the Colonies to England that the English went to war over. And with tobacco use down in her personal world she may start running out of things to whine about one day.

          She really needs to put a bag over her head and go to a singles dance.

        • Oh, I agree. Government needs to keep it’s nose out of both, IMHO.

          And, I don’t think there are enough bags in the world for that miracle. Maybe cats… a house full.

    • Allow me to clarify my concise, one sentence statement before there is any further unintended inference drawn.

      Martha Rosenberg’s statements, as I understood them, question why tobacco companies could be controlled by government (sued extensively, etc) to the degree that they have and firearm companies cannot. I don’t think either industries ought to be controlled in such ways by government. My sentence was in response to the Ms. Rosenberg’s equivocation of tobacco and firearms (sidenote: BATFE anyone?). It was demonstrating a major break in any linkage she was making. A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. So, the keeping and bearing of arms is special in that protection was enumerated in the Constitution. This activity, the keeping and bearing of arms, is necessary to the security of a free state. This is but one break in the linkage she was attempting to forge between tobacco companies and firearm companies. I made no statement or inference in that one original sentence as to rights relating to tobacco.

  10. Can you imagine walking around so unhappy every day? Misery loves company. Smile and continue the fight; we’re winning the (current) war!

    • Oh I can imagine it all too clearly. I lived with a woman like this for 3 years, enjoyed her own misery so much, she wanted to share it with everyone around her, especially me. Best day of the last year was the day I left.

  12. Why is it these people’s only solutions to problems is banning and suing?

    How has that worked out so far?

    • It is actually an effective tool for the progressives especially when they have a friendly ear in an agency’s leadership. An activist group wants something changed in government and in discussions with the appropriate agency discover that the changes can’t be made by the agency without Congressional action. Whether it was by coincidence or collusion these groups have learned that if they sue the agency for the change they can often get it in a settlement. (Recent example: the IRS agreeing to monitor churches.) The big ‘tell’ that these cases are done in collusion with agencies which want to expand their authority without Congress is that standing is almost never challenged.

      • It’s a favorite tactic of the radical enviros. They sue the government agency involved – the EPA, for example- which then rolls over and settles for a substantial sum of taxpayer money. The sympathizers in the agency get what they want, the enviros get what they want, plus a chunk of our money to fund the next suit against the government. And so on, ad nauseum. . .

    • It’s because they’re statists. Regardless of if they are right, left, or center, statists believe that government has authority to do this stuff. They don’t really believe in individual Liberty no matter how much they profess otherwise. Free people don’t look to government to solve all of their woes and right all perceived wrongs. A free people turn to government as a very last, desperate resort.

  13. I do not use tobacco products and I actually have bad reactions to them. However, I have resisted anti-tobacco laws as this a freedom and perhaps even an unremunerated right of people to enjoy products as they wish. Passing badly needed anti-tobacco use legislation, sets the stage for more government incrementalism. The statists will leverage the sensible and reasonable anti-tobacco legislation precedents into other badly needed legislation covering such things as sodas and guns.

  14. How about we worry more about suing big pharm for side effects caused by the proper use of meds by people who need them.

    And worry less about suing gun manufacturers for the blatant misuse of guns by criminals and crazies.

    Hell, I’d probabaly rather be shot than deal with some of these side effects I hear about… Anal leakage, gynecomastia, blue pee, artificial insemination,

    Ah yeah, no thanks, I’ll just deal with my knee aching, doc.

    • I know, right? I could’ve sworn I heard the auctioneer-like and lengthy disclaimer in one of those commercials the other day indicate side effects may include “mild death.” Excuse me? Wait, what was that last one?

    • It seems like lately I’m seeing more and more class action suits for medical prostheses and drug side effects. And regarding the side effects that are announced – jeez! I’ll stay with the disease – it’s not as damaging!

      • Mother Nature has already given us pretty much all of the drugs we need, but Big Brother, in his infinite wisdom , has banned them and is insisting on pushing artificial chemicals that do more harm than good.

          • “Rich! Where have you been? I’ve missed your posts!”
            I’m kind of laid up, using a borrowed laptop, and don’t really have the time to spend online like I’d like. This laptop, like most or all of them, has that stupid touch pad which is a royal PITA, and I’m on a Wi-Fi that doesn’t seem to keep up too well, and I spend half the time dismissing popups and other crap, so I’m not really participating like I’d like.

            I’m still the same radical libertarian loon and all that so all is not lost!

            Thanks for the note. 🙂

  16. Funny, I can’t register with the site because it insists my browser is blocking cookies (it isn’t). Wanted to give her a piece of my mind, but I guess they got tired of the pro gun comments. What’s funny is that when they get the inevitable avalanche of potg following one of these ridiculous screeds, they sit around and marvel at how wonderfully well coordinated the NRA is, not realizing that almost NONE of the people ridiculing them is actually a member. That they can’t summon a similar sized movement, even while being able to PAY for the pleasure, does not dissuade them in the least.

  17. Last I looked I saw no right to smoke…BTW I had security certificate crap pop up on my phone since the “fixes”.

    • I replied to someone above about this same thing, if you need your right treat your body however you see fit so long as it doesn’t hurt or prevent someone else from doing same defined; you’re part of the problem, not the solution.

      We’re all fortunate in that our right to bear arms was codified, but that doesn’t make it any more important than the next right we’re born with.

  18. What liberal, progressive idiots hear “Guns are bad and all gun owners are one step away from being a killer.”. What law abiding gun owners hear “Blah, blah, blah, GUNS, blah.”.

  19. I love this nonsense. Funny how only few mention the 1 lobby that real does have a stranglehold on both parties of congress, AIPAC. Author and political activist Norman Finklestein wrote that AIPAC carries power over our government that would make the NRA blush.

  20. A victim has no legitimate standing to sue a frozen food manufacturer if a criminal or negligent person bashes the victim’s skull with a frozen turkey. Neither does a victim have legitimate standing to sue a firearm manufacturer if a criminal or negligent person injures the victim with a firearm.

    This isn’t rocket science.

    Of course Ms. Rosenberg’s position isn’t based on science or facts … it is based on clinical hysteria.

    • Yes, it’s called PUBLIC SCHOOL.

      Statists run the education system, and then we are surprised that same system churns out a bunch of statists?

      WE should be smarter than that.

      Read Marx and Engels then ask yourself if public school is a good idea.

      • with common core, there is marginal if any difference between public, private, or parochial school. Even home schooling will be the same, just minus some of the social engineering sexual material.

        • “Even home schooling will be the same, just minus some of the social engineering sexual material.”

          And states are rejecting CC left and right…but it will take time.

          And beside, they can TRY to regulate the homeschool with CC, but it will fail. We have our lobby groups and legal representations and grassroots thing going on as well…

          And at the end of the day, what we teach in our homeschool and how we teach it is our business.

          This is one reason why so many countries in Europe have outright outlawed homeschooling…it represents too much ‘personal freedom’ for the citizens of those nations.

          The UN Treaty on the Rights of the Child are a real danger, however …

        • @JR_in_NC Sounds like you are on top of this, that’s great. Seems to be an increasing number of people homeschooling, but the media will never report that.

  26. SCOTUS has ruled that citizens may own guns and that police departments are not responsible to intervene if a criminal places a law abiding citizen’s life in jeopardy.
    You want to ban guns? Then amend the Constitution. Talking about it or writing oped’s is a waste of everyone’s time.

    • You want to ban guns? Then amend the Constitution. Talking about it or writing oped’s is a waste of everyone’s time.

      Hear, hear! Not only that but calling for anything less than a constitutional amendment is advocating the violation of the Supreme Law of the Land. They are calling for unconstitutional governance.

  27. Guns do not kill people. People using guns to kill people kills people, and also people being idiots who had negligent discharges. Cigarettes however, do kill people. And Big Tobacco tried for years to suppress the research showing that their product causes cancer and to discredit the scientists. They purposely sought to mislead the public.

    With guns, the entity that is akin to the grassroots activists who sought to bring down Big Tobacco is the NRA and other gun rights organizations. The people who are akin to Big Tobacco and its distortion of the facts are the gun control proponents.

    Also, Big Tobacco was an industrial lobby. The NRA is not.

    • No, smoking cigarettes kills people. The pack lying on the table does exactly nothing by itself, same as a pistol.

  29. “Of course there are other similarities between Big Tobacco and the gun lobby.”

    I suppose that’s why Hollywood changed the bad guys in John Gresham’s novel The Runaway Jury from Big Tobbacco to Big Guns. And made the entire movie stupid and pointless.

    I can really imagine Bill Ruger, Dan Wesson, and the CEOs of Colt, S&W, Remington, etc., getting together to raise money to buy off a jury.

    • If the system tries to treat the firearm industry like it did the tobacco industry, perhaps they should consider it. Loaded dice, rigged wheels, and stacked decks.

  30. I clicked the link. I laugh out loud. Their logo…. OEN.

    OpEd News.

    Progressive • Tough • Liberal.

    They don’t even get two out of three.

  31. Yes, and the similarities do not end there. Both cigarette manufacturing and the right to self defense have Constitutional Amendments protecting those unalienable rights….or not.

  32. This person is so obviously full of sh!t on the NRA – what makes her speak gospel on tobacco, or is it just the credulity of those who have falllen for the Big Lie promulgated by the Church of Antismokerism?

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