Swirls of cigarette smoke

For @mariannewest in #freewrite

When I watched old movies, I am surprised at how much do people smoked. Swirls of cigarette smoke we suspended in the air. The thoughtful protagonist was delivering some cool line after taking a drag. Even Fred and Barney were featured in Winston commercial.

Then something happened in the mid-nineties. All of a sudden, there was a big class actions suit against cigarette companies. It was given a huge public resonance, the court proceedings were reported in the media, were televised, or so I remember. The cigarette companies tried to fight it with all their financial might but lost. This was the triumph of progress, or so it seemed.

A little bit later I found out from an equitant attorney that it wasn’t all that cut and dry. The United States produces 95% of all the World’s layers. IV League schools pumping them every year and other multiple colleges around the country. When each new energetic litter of lawyers comes out to the hunting ground, they need to find a victim to whom they could pour their righteous anger. In the nineties, it turned out to be cigarette companies and the rest is history... or so they say.)