USA

WARNING: This site deals only with the corporate corruption of science, and makes no inference about the motives or activities of individuals involved.
    There are many reasons why individuals become embroiled in corporate corruption activities - from political zealotry to over-enthusiastic activism; from gullibility to greed.
    Please read the OVERVIEW carefully, and make up your own mind.

OPINION ONLY

James Savarese and Robert Tollison ran a nationwide network of academic economists for the Tobacco Institute. These economists were always on tap to write articles (op-eds) turn up as witnesses at local ordinance hearings, etc. and generally work for the tobacco industry while pretending to be independent of such influences.

They were almost always Professors of Economics at a local university who did not want his name associated with cigarette promotion, or his reputation sullied by known financial links to the cigarette industry. For that reason, their money was washed through James Savarese & Associates, Ogilvy & Mather PR (and its later manifestation, Ogilvy Adams & Reinhart) or Tollison's Center for the Study of Public Choice at George Mason University.

Smoking-gun document

• James Savarese, was a lobbyist specialising in union/labor matters and in economics. He originally began to work for the tobacco industry through Ogilvy & Mather, PR.

He later ran the main network of academic economists across America through his private company, James Savarese & Associates [aka Savarese & Associates]. His partner inthis venture was Robert Tollison, Professor of Economics at George Mason University who's wife, Anne Tollison, and members of the staff of Tollison's GMU think-tank, the Center for the Study of Popular Choice, also worked for Savarese. They ran a network of 50 to 100 academic economists [about 130 were involved at various times] with one or two always available in each state.

    It was clearly a very profitable operation for all concerned. They earned between $1000 and $3000 for each article, and $200 to $250 per hour for giving evidence at legislative hearings, ordinance inquiries, or face-to-face meetings with legislators or editors.

1992 Oct 16: Tobacco lobbyists James Savarese and Eric Shulman [of Ogilvy Adams & Reinhart] has written to Martin Gleason at the Tobacco Institute promoting a new project to publicise a book and paper written by Professor Bob Tollison (George Mason University) and Professor Richard Wagner — both long-term tobacco industry lackeys.

    The paper attacks the SAMMEC concept [Smoking Attributable Mortality Morbidity and Economic Costs] and the book tries to discredit the figures used in calculating the "social cost' of smoking [external costs, attributable to the society itself and to non-smokers, as a result of smoking — fire, pollution, insurance, absenteeism, medical and hospital, general non-smoker's health, welfare payments, etc.]

    These papers and books are written under commission from the Tobacco Institute, and they plan to attack the promotional problem in a number of different and well-tested ways.

• Program Aim
  The aim of the promotional program for the "SAMMEC II" paper and The Economics of Smoking is to show targeted audiences that smokers do not impose any "social costs" on nonsmokers, specifically in the forms of lost productivity and increased health care costs, and that assertions which attempt to quantify such alleged costs are politically motivated and lack scientific merit.
  
      The program will explain that smokers pay their own way. Thus, increased regulation of tobacco use — in the form of advertising bans, consumer excise tax increases, public smoking bans, and the like — is unwarranted, based on claims that smoking imposes costs on society.
  
  
• Target audiences
  The key target audiences for promotion of the "SAMMEC II" paper and The Economics of Smoking are local and state government policy makers, other opinion leaders and the media. Indirectly, the program also can target specific Members of Congress by attempting to educate the public and the news media on tobacco issues in their districts.
  
      As we promote "Sammec II" and The Economics of Smoking, we will tailor our pitch to the particular political context and social dynamic of the target audience.       Essentially these pitches are:
  • People make the choice to smoke and they take the consequences [No mention of addiction.]
  • Regulation of tobacco will lead to prohibitions of other products [The slippery slope/scare argument]
  • Smokers and non-smokers must learn to live in harmony. [Accommodation argument]
  • Only tobacco-funded economists can correctly calculate social costs.
  
      Each message will be incorporated into the materials used in the promotional program and Wagner and Tollison will repeatedly refer to these themes in interviews and presentations.
  
  
• Commissioned papers
  We now have [an additional] source in the paper entitled "The Political Element in Science and Technology: SAMMEC II and the Anti- Smoking Lobby" co-authored by Richard W. Ault and Robert B. Ekelund, Jr. of Auburn University. [Both members of the Savarese/Tollison economist's network]
  
  
• Media tours
  Media tours offer an organized, controlled and highly effective way to obtain media coverage in targeted markets. An article in a home town newspaper or an interview on a local radio or television news program.

  To promote the last Tollison/Wager book Smoking and the State they'd run ...... 38 media tours. Wagner and Tollison conducted 235 interviews in 54 markets in 27 states during an 18-month period from 1988 - 1990.
  
      The structure of the tours will follow that of the previous tours.

  • Visit state capital and one other major media market in each state.
  • Influencing specific Members of Congress, by chosing the media in their districts.
  • Arrange interviews with reporters from print and electronic media outlets: also meet the editorial boards of the larger newspapers, and editors of business publications.
  • Hand out press-kits with biographies of Tollison and Wager, plus various economic papers, articles, and charts/graphs ready for newspaper reproduction
  • Provide briefings for state legislators and local business groups like the Chambers of Commerce,
  • Localise the statistics that Tollison and Wagne will use, and compile briefing materials for each state.
  
  
  
• Matte Services
  [These are ready-to-print articles distributed to small local and shopping newspapers ]
  
  
• Op-ed placement
  Opinion editorials by the economists will be prepared for placement in state capital publications in states where "social cost" is a major issue.
  
      In addition, op-eds written by members of the Savarese economists' network will discuss issues raised in the book and "Sammec II". The economists are very successful at placing pieces in their local papers. As with the matte service reviews, these pieces would lend credibility to the book and the analysis.
  
      It is important to note that these op-eds would be placed in publications not reached by the matte service such as state capitals and larger city newspapers.
  
  
• SAMMEC Response Strategy
      There is a need for a responsive mechanism to handle media references to the SAMMEC study on "social costs." OA&R [ Ogilvy Adams & Reinhart] will take a proactive approach to having SAMMEC discussed on the media tours and in op-eds.
  
      Additionally, we will prepare a standard letter to the editor on the flaws of the SAMMEC study — providing room for localization in the first and last paragraphs. The letter will be distributed to, and eventually authored by, a Savarese & Associates economist in the particular state. The economist will generate the letter in response to an editorial or article in their local paper on "social costs" and SAMMEC.
  
      If there is not an economist in that state, Dwight Lee [A tobacco lackey from the University of Georgia] will sign the letter. In this way, we will have the capacity to respond quickly to negative press based on the "social cost" theory.
  
      In order to give full exposure to both the "SAMMEC II" paper and The Economics of Smoking. George Mason University's Center for the Study of Public Choice [This was a tobacco-funded think-tank on University grounds, run by Tollison] has indicated that they will publish the "SAMMEC 11" paper as one of their Working Paper series.
  
  This will give added credibility to the paper as a truly scholarly piece of research. We will distribute the working paper along with other advance materials to potential media tour sites.
  
  
• Summary
  Wagner and Tollison stand as important resources for the Institute. Their expertise and credibility on the "social cost" issue enables them to assist the Institute in efforts to defeat measures to increase government regulation of tobacco.
  
      Promotion of their new book, The Economics of Smoking, and the "SAMMEC II" paper will constitute an essential component of these efforts, allowing Wagner and Tollison to reinforce and expand the messages disseminated during the initial "social cost" program.
  
      The promotional program we have outlined will maximize use of Wagner and Tollison. The program elements will effectively take the spokespeople's messages to a wide and diverse audience.

    We hope this proposed plan is helpful. We would be glad to meet to further discuss these ideas and to develop a timeline for implementing the agreed-upon elements of the project.

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