Pubdate: Tue, 16 Jun 1998
Source: Houston Chronicle (TX) 
Contact:  
Website: http://www.chron.com/ 
Author: Greg McDonald 

CLINTON URGES SENATE TO END DELAYS AND PASS ANTI-TOBACCO MEASURE

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton urged the Senate on Monday to pass
anti-tobacco legislation, declaring that "the delays must come to an end."

"Every day the Senate delays plays into the hands of the tobacco industry,
which wants desperately to kill this bill," Clinton said.

"I don't see how any senator can now stand in the way of a bill that fights
drugs, cuts taxes and protects people from a habit that kills," he added,
referring to a number of amendments that have been added to the bill to make
it more appealing to lawmakers.

Clinton made the comments at a White House ceremony honoring presidential
scholars as the Senate debate on a massive $516 billion tobacco measure
moved into its fourth week.

Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., told reporters that he would
allow debate to continue through this week, but warned that if a bill
sponsored by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., or a compromise measure did not pass
before the weekend it would be shelved to make room for consideration of
various appropriations measures.

Lott said he planned to meet with McCain and speak with administration
officials to see if some scaled-back version of the tobacco legislation
could be devised that would satisfy a majority of senators.

"I think there's way too much money provided in this now beyond what's
actually needed," Lott said, expressing his opposition to the McCain
measure, which would raise the tax on a pack of cigarettes by $1.10.

"If the goal is to discourage and have a campaign to stop teen-age smoking,
and hopefully drug abuse, and to deal with, you know, some of the
health-care problems caused by smoking . . . you can do those things for . .
. a lot less than what's in this bill," Lott added.

Lott said he believes that a final bill ought to resemble the agreement that
tobacco companies reached with some state attorneys general more than a year
ago that would limit lawsuit liabilities in return for the companies helping
to fund anti-smoking programs.

"This bill needs to be much smaller than this, probably at least $100
billion less than it is," Lott said.

In his remarks at the White House, Clinton also criticized the tobacco
industry advertising campaign aimed at killing the McCain bill. He said the
companies are spending "millions and millions of dollars on an advertising
campaign designed to convince the American people (that the tobacco
legislation) is nothing more than a big government tax increase to create
huge, big government bureaucracies."

"It is absolutely false," Clinton said.

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Checked-by: Melodi Cornett