I'll tell you a little anecdote from my past. Over a decade ago a U.S.-based tobacco company--it will have to remain nameless here--commissioned me to lead a study on long-range prospects for non-cigarette tobacco products. So I put a team together and we looked at snuff and chewing tobacco and other products and did our analysis and wrote up a draft report, which I mailed off to the client.

Somewhere in the report, in discussing the various reasons such products might be attractive to consumers, I mentioned "nicotine addiction" as one of the rather more obvious factors.

BZZZZT! The phone rings and it's my client with comments on the draft and one of the first comments is a request to change "nicotine addiction" to something innocuous, something like "tobacco satisfaction," if I remember correctly.

The reason was that apparently the Feds had anything and everything in that company under subpoena and the final report when delivered would have fallen under the subpoena's umbrella.

Well, I thought about this request for a while, had a chat with my company's then-corporate counsel (a wimp in such matters), and decided that just this once I would change language in a report I was writing per a client's request. Which I did.

I also decided that I would never do any work that would benefit the sale of tobacco products again, and I haven't. I've turned down quite a few projects in the area of the years since then, but the one that was most enjoyable to decline was the visit back from my original client, who wanted me to do a follow-up study. I politely said no, and then explained that the reason was the request to lie about "nicotine addiction" by hiding it inside the eupehmistic and meaningless term "tobacco satisfaction." As I recall, the company's representatives seemed a bit shocked that someone would take such a stance...clueless guys, I thought.

I should add that I was and still am a heavy smoker...I figure smoking is my business, generally, and when I can get the willpower together to quit this highly addictive drug, I will do so. But I'll be damned if I'm going to help the people who promote and sell these potent drugs.

I ain't working for the dealer no more!

---Tom Mandel