CREATED 7/7/2011
 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.
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OPINION ONLY
John H Bowman
— Professor John H Bowman temporarily strayed into the cash-for-comment business in 1985, but does not appear to have stayed. — Professors John Bowman and Michael Pratt at the Virginia Commonwealth University became briefly involved in the cash-for-comments economists network being run for the Tobacco Institute by Robert Tollison and James Savarese. Their involvement only lasted a bit over a year.
Tobacco lobbyist James Savarese and Professor Robert Tollison of George Mason University collaborated in the 1980s to provide the tobacco industry, through the Tobacco Institute, with a number of networks of academics who would be willing to write propaganda material ... always provided their names were not linked to the industry or to any of the cigarette companies. The idea was simply that the academic 'sleepers' would be available on a cash-for-services basis when needed to counter attempts to increase excise taxes, or to ban public smoking, or just to appear as independent experts at Congressional hearings and promote the industry causes. Economist were by far the most useful academics to the tobacco industry because the distinction between economics and politics was never clear: so support of the cigarette companies could always be claimed as support for free-market economics ... the rights of individuals to make public choices ... small government ... or even the first Amendment to the Constitution. The economist always claimed to be 'independent' 'professionals' and ' academics' from some credible university, and never revealed the source of their funding in their op-eds or letters-to-the-editor. If ever put under cross-examination, they must be able to claim with weasel-word precision, that they had never received a penny from the tobacco industry. Therefore all payments were laundered, either through tobacco industry lawyers (usually Covington & Burling), the principle organisers, James Savarese & Associates, or through Bob Tollison's Center for the Study of Public Choice at George Mason University. The aim was to have, in each State, at least one academic economist, one academic lawyer, and one academic from a business management, business law, marketing or advertising discipline willing to jump into action and write op-ed articles for their local newspaper, or to appear at local ordinance or legislative hearings. Copies were always sent to a local Congressman, who sat on some important (to the tobacco industry) committee. The academics were always expected to wave their own and their university's credentials vigorously, and loudly proclaim their "independence' from any crass-commercial motives. And those who could boast of being 'non-smokers' were especially prized — since, without this addiction, their non-dependent-on-tobacco-money status was thought to be proved beyond any doubt!
DISAMBIGUATION
Be careful with the names "John Bowman" in the southern states and in economics. There must have been some very fertile members of the Bowmans — probably plantation owners — and they all seem to have been named their sons "John". So the Commonwealth of Virginia is flooded with homonymous decendents.
John H Bowman is the economist associated with Robert Tollison and tobacco industry (albiet briefly).
Don't confuse him with - John B Bowman who was the Chief Information Officer for Philip Morris's PR company, APCO in 1998
- There is also a July 1976 Tobacco Institute file for a John Bowman, a Democrat candidate in the Michigan's 12th district.
- Another John Bowman is a CIA staff claims auditor;
- yet another is Clinical Associate Professor, Health Promotion and Policy at West Virginia Uni.
- who may be the same as the John Bowman, formerly of OSHA and also at EPA, who was selected in 1981 to be Industrial Hygiene Programs Coordinator at the EPA
- A Reporter from Business First (WDRB-TV) who did tobacco stories.
- DuPont have a John Bowman as their representative on the lawyers TPLA Task force (countering product liability claims)
- Another is a supervisor of smoking bans in some township .
- an outspoken Florida juror in the Maddox Trial ($1 million punative damages award) against B&W.
- John Bowman, ex-smoker. Spokesman for the Tulsa Police Department.
- University of Chicago, Assistant Director, IT services
- An anti-smoking activist in Australia
- Note: Bowman was also a family name used by the Gray family who controlled the RJ Reynolds Tobacco company for a few generations — hence, John Bowman Gray I and II.
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Some key documents • Professor of Economist at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond. He worked with Professor Michael D Pratt on some network projects. Another associate at the university, George Emil Hoffer was also involved — perhaps for a longer period
Bowman is also associated with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge, Mass. and is now professor emeritus at Virginia Commonwealth University.
1985 Mar 20: -23 [Doc date Dec 18 84] Ogilvy & Mather have set up seminars for some of the industry's cash-for-comments economists under the auspices of the Southwestern Social Science Association and the Eastern Economic Association. Trish Milita of O&M writes to Jim Savarese who is temporarily resident at the Tobacco Institute:
These are very strong academic panels and add a great deal of depth to our list of consultants for future use. I know all of these individuals personally except for Henry Butler who is a friend of Bob Tollison's at Texas A&M.
They all understand their mission and will be submitting papers for us to review well in advance of the meetings. - The SouthWestern Social Science Association seminar run by O&M in Houston (Mar 20) was on "Taxation and Social Process. It had Robert Ekelund in the chair, and papers by Henry N Butler, Joseph M Jadlow and Richard E Wagner. Keith Watson was a discussant.
- The Eastern Economic Association seminar, run by O&M in Pittsburgh (Mar 21) was on "Perspectives on Tax Reform". It had Robert Tollison in the chair, and papers by William Shughart, Gary Anderson, and a joint paper by John Bowman/Michael Pratt. The discussant was George Hoffer (who also worked with Pratt).
All the speakers were knowingly employed by the tobacco industry to promote their Social Cost and Taxation agendas.  
1985 June 21: James Savarese submits his bill to the Tobacco Institute for the academics who have written articles, and those who have made speeches at important academic conferences promoting the tobacco industry line. - Op Ed Project — $1000 each in 'professional fees'
for Abrams, Alston, Armentano, Harper-Fender, T Anderson, Denzau, Bohanon, Jadlow, Wagner and Menchik.
- Southwest Social Science Meeting — Houston
- Keith Watson ($1,000),
- RB Ekelund Jr ($2,003)
- Joseph Jadlow ($2,605),
- Richard Wagner ($2,716)
- Robert D Tollison ($5,000)
- Henry N Butler ($2,070)
- Eastern Economic Assoc, Meeting — Pittsburgh
- George E Hoffer ($1,431)
- Gary M Anderson ($2,450)
- Robert D Tollison ($6,375)
- Bill Shurghart III ($2,529)
- Michael D Pratt ($1,288)
- John H Bowman ($1,000)
1986 Dec 11: James Savarese sends Fred Panzer at the Tobacco Institute a summary of the activities of his network of economists. This is effectively the beginning of the main cash-for-comments economists network.
Dear Fred,
I have attached a list of all the economists we have used along with the projects they have worked on in behalf of the Tobacco Institute. There are now 62 names on the list (Some states have 4 or 5) not counting himself and Bob Tollison. The details given for each consist of State, Regional Division [of the TI], Name, Address and Telephone number. Added to this is a list of the 'Projects' they have completed (in later lists, also the names of Congressmen they have contacted.)
Virtually all of these cash-for-comment academics have been generating op-ed articles for newspapers, or have, in some unspecified way, opposed the Packwood Excise Tax plan — or perhaps helped fake up one of the 'Chase' [Econometrics studies]. A few participants have attended Congressional or government inquiries ['Treasury I') or local ordinance hearings as 'independent witnesses' while secretly acting for the tobacco industry. Two of the 64 members (Ann Harper-Fender and Gary Anderson) were acting termporarily as advisors to Ronald Reagan's Advisory Council on Intergovernmental Relations— which sought to bring pressure on the FDA, EPA and OSHA and stop them being pro-active with smoking bans.
Other participants have been promoting the industry line at various academic conferences and fora [mainly as keynote speakers at economic society meetings] , and a few of the core-team were involved in brianstorming sessions with members of the tobacco industry looking for new angles for their PR, and for possible research project which might generate some economic propaganda for the industry.
Many of them have joined in with the industry's orchestrated letter-writing campaigns opposing workplace smoking bans. - GSA = General (Government) Services Administration.
- 'Ways & Means' = Congressional committee on finances
- ALEC = American Legislative Exchange Council (a formalised way for big business to directly influence Congressional and State politicians)
- Chase Econometrics = A company that did economic impact studies for the tobacco industry in various locations to 'prove' that smoking bans would destroy local economies.
The references for this network member were: Virginia [ Region VI ]
Professor John Bowman (works with Pratt)
Economics Department, Virginia Commonwealth Univ., 901 W. Franklin Street, Richmond, Virginia 23284
Services rendered:
1986 Dec 11: James Savarese sends Fred Panzer at the Tobacco Institute a summary of the activities of his network of economists.
There are now 61 on the list, not counting himself and Bob Tollison. The details given for each consists of State, Name, Address and Telephone number, together with a list of the 'Projects' they have completed (and the names of Congressmen they have contacted, in some cases). It lists: Professor John Bowman and Professor Michael Pratt [both of]
Economics Department, Virginia Commonwealth Univ.
901 W. Franklin Street, Richmond, Virginia 23284
[Projects] "academic forum"
This appears to be Bowman and Pratt's only involvement with the economists network.
2004: Working with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and the George Washington University's Institute for Policy Studies. [Google]
2010 May: John H Bowman appears to have died in the Chicago area. However the name is so common that there may be more than one with the same initial.
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WORTH READING
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