Australian Tobacco Companies Have Some Freakin' Balls

The Australian government recently unveiled plans to make all cigarette packages look the same, with the brand name written in simple block type. Naturally, the cigarette companies are not happy about this. So they are resorting to blackmail.

Tobacco Companies Fight New Regulations By Threatening To Slash Prices

British and American Tobacco Australia (BATA) have threatened to slash the price of a packet of cigarettes, if the government implements its plain packaging policy. BATA laid down the gauntlet when its representatives said that more people would end up smoking if cigarette packaging is whitewashed. 

This is what BATA Australian chief executive David Crow had to say:

"Could (the price of) cigarettes halve over time? In the longer term, potentially yes," he added, saying the cheap prices "basically means more people will smoke, more kids will smoke"."It's going to backfire and go bad and lead to more people smoking, which is just mad if you're sitting at a government desk," he told the Melbourne Herald Sun.

Wow. If you make us change our packaging, we're going to get your kids to start smoking. That is just an unbelievably blatant threat. I thought American companies were shameless.