For thy sake tobacco, I would do anything but die.
Charles Lamb, (1775 1834) A farewell to Tobacco

Money talks. Frequently it finds its voice only when it is given to others. Consider Senators Mitch McConnell (R KY) and Richard Burr (R N.C.). Senator Burr, having received $534,000, has the distinction of being the recipient of more money from cigarette companies than any other member of Congress, according to statistics compiled by the non partisan Center for Responsive Politics. His colleague (and the minority leader of the Senate) Mitch McConnell has received $456,000. The money that cigarettes have paid the two men, as well as some of their colleagues, makes them understandably sensitive to the well being of their donors and they have expressed their gratitude by letting Europe know that it can’t follow in Australia’s footsteps and impose restrictions on how its donors are portrayed to the public. But first, a bit of history.

In August 2012 the High Court of Australia issued an opinion that was exceedingly unfriendly to the package in which the cigarette is delivered. The court, depriving individual cigarettes of that which causes them to standout from their competitors, said all cigarettes had to be sold in uniform packages. Company logos can no longer be displayed on packages. All printing on the packages must use identical fonts and the package must have a dark brown background. To add insult to injury, the Australian Court said graphic health warnings have to cover 90 percent of the back of the package and 70 percent of the front. That ruling was especially distressing for the cigarette because it came just a few months after the United States Federal Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit had approved rules issued by the Food and Drug Administration that required graphic displays of warning images on cigarette packs. It also approved the rule that required graphic warnings to be placed on the top half of the front and back of each pack. In its opinion the court said We can envision many graphic warnings that would constitute factual disclosures… A non exhaustive list of some would include a picture or drawing of a nonsmoker’s and smoker’s lungs displayed side by side a picture of a doctor looking at an x ray of either a smoker’s cancerous lungs or some other part of the body presenting a smoking related condition a picture or drawing of the internal anatomy of a person suffering from a smoking related medical condition a picture or drawing of a person suffering from a smoking related medical condition. Australia plus the 6th Circuit created an air of gloom among cigarettes that no amount of smoke could dispel. The U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Columbia dispelled it.

Ten days after the Australia Court ruled, the D.C. Court declined to approve the graphic warnings the FDA had required. Among one of the more catchy images it refused to approve was a picture of a man with cigarette smoke coming out of the tracheotomy hole in his throat. Saying that many “of the images chosen by FDA could be misinterpreted by consumers.” It suggested, as one example, that the tracheotomy image could be construed by the consumers as suggesting that receiving a tracheotomy “is a common consequence of smoking.”

Since two courts had arrived at differing conclusions it was widely assumed that the U.S. Supreme Court would weigh in and let the cigarette know which court got it right. It was not to be. On April 22, 2013, the Supreme Court let it be known it would not resolve the differences between the two Courts of Appeal. Although the domestic threat is at bay until the FDA comes up with new rules, the cigarette’s need for vigilance goes on and it is in Europe that it enlisted the aid of those it has supported.

In December 2012 the European Commission proposed significant restrictions on tobacco branding and flavoring. On the theory that for a cigarette to be fully appreciated, it should taste like tobacco and not like peppermint, it banned flavorings such as menthol. On the theory that cigarettes are harmful, it said graphic warnings on the front of the package that now take up 30 percent of the package must be increased to 75 percent. The rules also require that the packages include the kinds of graphic warnings favored by the 6th Circuit and not favored by the D.C. circuit

On June 7, 2013, it was reported that Senators McConnell and Burr along with Senator Rand Paul (R Ky.) and Kay Hagan (D N.C.) had written to the European Union warning of dire consequences should the Union adopt the regulations on cigarette packaging it was proposing. The senators said the proposed regulations would violate international trade rules and adversely affect trade relations with the United States. It’s good they explained. Otherwise one might have thought it had to do with all the money the cigarette companies pay them in order to preserve their friendship.
Christopher Brauchli can be emailed at brauchli.56 For political commentary see his web page at

Cigarette – encyclopedia article about cigarette.

Smoke shop discount cigarettes – marketplace – the monitor

The process of blending gives the end product a consistent taste from batches of tobacco grown in different areas of a country that may change in flavor profile from year to year due to different environmental conditions. 62

Modern cigarettes produced after the 1950s, although composed mainly of shredded tobacco leaf, use a significant quantity of tobacco processing by products in the blend. Each cigarette’s tobacco blend is made mainly from the leaves of flue cured brightleaf, burley tobacco, and oriental tobacco. These leaves are selected, processed, and aged prior to blending and filling. The processing of brightleaf and burley tobaccos for tobacco leaf “strips” produces several by products such as leaf stems, tobacco dust, and tobacco leaf pieces (“small laminate”). 62 To improve the economics of producing cigarettes, these by products are processed separately into forms where they can then be possibly added back into the cigarette blend without an apparent or marked change in the cigarette’s quality. The most common tobacco by products include

  • Blended leaf (BL) sheet a thin, dry sheet cast from a paste made with tobacco dust collected from tobacco stemming, finely milled burley leaf stem, and pectin. 63
  • Reconstituted leaf (RL) sheet a paper like material made from recycled tobacco fines, tobacco stems and “class tobacco”, which consists of tobacco particles less than 30 mesh in size ( 0.599 mm) that are collected at any stage of tobacco processing. 64 RL is made by extracting the soluble chemicals in the tobacco by products, processing the leftover tobacco fibers from the extraction into a paper, and then reapplying the extracted materials in concentrated form onto the paper in a fashion similar to what is done in paper sizing. At this stage ammonium additives are applied to make reconstituted tobacco an effective nicotine delivery system. 2
  • Expanded (ES) or improved stems (IS) ES are rolled, flattened, and shredded leaf stems that are expanded by being soaked in water and rapidly heated. Improved stems follow the same process but are simply steamed after shredding. Both products are then dried. These two products look similar in appearance but are different in taste. 62

In recent years, the manufacturers’ pursuit of maximum profits has led to the practice of using not just the leaves, but also recycled tobacco offal 2 and the plant stem. 65 The stem is first crushed and cut to resemble the leaf before being merged or blended into the cut leaf. 66 According to data from the World Health Organization, 67 the amount of tobacco per 1000 cigarettes fell from 2.28 pounds in 1960 to 0.91 pounds in 1999, largely as a result of reconstituting tobacco, fluffing and additives.

A recipe specified combination of brightleaf, burley leaf and oriental leaf tobacco will be mixed with various additives to improve its flavours.

Additives

Various additives are combined into the shredded tobacco product mixtures, with humectants such as propylene glycol or glycerol, as well as flavouring products and enhancers such as cocoa solids, licorice, tobacco extracts, and various sugars, which are known collectively as “casings”. The leaf tobacco will then be shredded, along with a specified amount of small laminate, expanded tobacco, BL, RL, ES and IS. A perfume like flavour/fragrance, called the “topping” or “toppings”, which is most often formulated by flavor companies, will then be blended into the tobacco mixture to improve the consistency in flavour and taste of the cigarettes associated with a certain brand name. 62 Additionally, they replace lost flavours due to the repeated wetting and drying used in processing the tobacco. Finally the tobacco mixture will be filled into cigarettes tubes and packaged.

A list of 599 cigarette additives, created by five major American cigarette companies, was approved by the Department of Health and Human Services in April 1994. None of these additives is listed as an ingredient on the cigarette pack(s). Chemicals are added for organoleptic purposes and many boost the addictive properties of cigarettes, especially when burned. citation needed

One of the chemicals on the list, ammonia, helps convert bound nicotine molecules in tobacco smoke into free nicotine molecules. This process is known as freebasing which enhances the effect of the nicotine on the smoker. citation needed

Cigarette butt