Puffery leads to hyperbole

The ALP one trick ponies propose to increase the already excessive rates of tobacco excise, repeating the tired old lie that smoking costs society $31.5 billion per annum (Canberra Times, 24 November 2015). 
 
The figures the ALP relies upon again include $19 billion in ‘’intangible costs’’ such as the hypothetical cost of pain and suffering, and $9 billion in ‘’reduction of unpaid household labour’’, whatever that is.  The net costs of tobacco consumption to the health care system are about $318 million, much less than the $8.85 billion annual tobacco tax smokers are forced to pay to engage in a legal pastime.
 
Smokers already pay taxes that are too high to be fair, and far exceed the alleged cost to society. 
 
There is a word to describe the continuing draconian persecution of smokers by politicians at the behest of self righteous anti smoking cultists, and that word is bullying. Proposing yet more taxes to punish smokers “for their own good” is repulsive to the basic libertarian principles that ought to limit the use of government force, and is indicative of the poverty of ideas afflicting the ALP.