 Plus: British wartime worries over the poisoning of Winston Churchill via cigars!
BULLETIN:
The House of Representatives today failed to override President Bush's veto of the SCHIP bill by a 273-156 vote, 15 votes short of the two-thirds majority needed. Complete coverage coming tomorrow.
Los Angeles, October 18 – Even as C-SPAN carried speaker after speaker railing for or against an override of President George W. Bush’s veto of the proposed State Children’s Health Insurance Program bill yesterday, the online political magazine Salon.com carried its prediction of the results of today’s vote more than a day before the roll was called:
“The headline could be written in advance: ‘HOUSE FAILS TO OVERTURN BUSH VETO.’
“The fate of Thursday's vote on the children's health bill is as predictable as a Rudy Giuliani speech about 9/11. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is destined to fall about 20 votes short – even with a united Democratic caucus and the backing of about four dozen Republicans – of the two-thirds majority necessary to enact the $35 billion expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program over the president's objections.”
If true, that’s good news for cigar smokers and the cigar industry, which would have suffered a crippling hike in the federal tax cap on cigars from the current 4.875 cents to $3.00 while the federal tax rate on cigars would be increased from 20.719 percent today to 52.988 percent on January 1, 2008.
If the vote turns out as expected, the question will then be how it will be brought back up again, as the Democratic leadership is determined to either get the SCHIP bill passed in its current form (not much chance of that) or to try to use it in some way as a campaign issue for 2008 (a surety).
Whether the onerous cigar taxes currently part of the bill (H.R. 976) will be eliminated or reduced in a forthcoming bill are unknown. An enormous lobbying effort has been made by the cigar industry through its trade associations (especially the Cigar Association of America and the International Premium Cigar and Pipe Retailers Association) and by individual manufacturers, distributors and retailers.
And smokers will be called on again to voice their opposition to increased taxes. One of the areas sure to be discussed in any new bill to be drafted is how the SCHIP program will be funded, as it is clear that tobacco taxes cannot reasonably be expected to be enough to pay for the program in its entirety into the future, especially as the number of cigarette smokers slowly shrinks.
Could Cuban cigars have been used to kill Churchill?
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill is perhaps the most famous cigar smoker of all time. In Stephen McGinty’s book, Churchill’s Cigar, published earlier this year, one wartime episode was recalled in which concern was widely voiced within British security circles that gift cigars could be used to poison Churchill.
As excerpted in the Sunday Times of London and further condensed here:
On March 27, 1941, the British ambassador to Cuba, Sir George Ogilvie Forbes, was informed that the Cuban National Commission of Tobacco had prepared a gift for Churchill “in recognition of his services to the causes of democracy”.
It was a beautiful mahogany cabinet, 5ft tall, containing 2,400 of the island’s finest cigars. Forbes made clear in a telegram that, in his opinion, the gift was “impossible to refuse”.
On April 8, at the official presentation in Havana, Ogilvie Forbes saw what a truly striking gift had been given. The cabinet had exquisite marquetry and its doors opened to reveal six shelves, on each of which sat four wooden boxes marked with the exclusive brands they contained: H Upmann, Por Larranaga, Ramon Allones, Romeo y Julieta, El Rey del Mundo and Hoyo de Monterrey.
Churchill was informed in a memo from John Colville, one of his private secretaries, who warned that Scotland Yard had advised against smoking cigars given as gifts: “They say that any noxious substance could have been added to the cigars during the process of manufacture, and it would only be practicable to examine chemically a limited number of them.”
No one in the government, with the obvious exception of Churchill himself, wanted him to smoke the cigars on their arrival. As they were now in the hold of a Red Cross ship travelling to Britain via America, Winston’s concerned colleagues had a little time to examine their options.
. . .
On September 23, soon after the cigars arrived at 10 Downing Street, Churchill was informed that a cigar from each box had been sent to [MI5 head of counter-terrorism Victor] Rothschild for laboratory testing. Colville warned him against sneaking a sly smoke from those that remained. “It is hoped that you will not smoke any of the cigars until the result of the analysis is known . . . there has just been a round-up of undesirable elements in Cuba, which has shown that a surprisingly large number of Nazi agents and sympathisers exist in that country.”
. . .
[The government’s toxicologist later] reported to Rothschild: “I am satisfied that the exhibits examined are toxicologically and bacteriologically normal.”
Churchill himself could have given the doctor this news six weeks ago. He had disregarded all the warnings and had decided to test the safety of the cigars himself.
If they had contained poison, his actions would have cost the country not only his own life but the lives of the defence committee of ministers and military chiefs running the war.
On the evening of September 19, the day the cigars were delivered to Downing Street from the Red Cross, the members of the defence committee were in a deadlocked debate about what military assistance should be provided to the Russians. The service ministers and chiefs of staff had insisted that they could not spare even a rowing boat or rifle without weakening Britain’s own efforts, But Churchill made it clear that a straight refusal was not an option.
The debate dragged on. The prime minister vowed to keep everyone at the table all night. He paused, however, for a two-hour dinner with Clemmie, his wife; and afterwards he ushered the committee into a small anteroom to the left of Downing Street’s hall and proudly displayed his new cigar collection.
“See, this came for me today. I have had some difficulty getting this through customs,” he said, pulling out bundles of long Romeo y Julieta, H Upmann and Por Larranaga.
Lord Balfour, then undersecretary of state for air, later recalled: “Turning to the waiting ministers, he addressed us thus, ‘Gentlemen, I am now going to try an experiment. Maybe it will result in joy. Maybe it will end in grief. I am about to give you each one of these magnificent cigars.’
“He paused, then continued with Churchillian effect, ‘It may well be that these each contain some deadly poison.’ He went on, alluding to the possible act of poisoning the entire defence committee: ‘It may well be that within days I shall follow sadly the long line of coffins up the aisle of Westminster Abbey. Reviled by the populace, as the man who has out Borgiaed Borgia’.”
Each committee member returned to the cabinet room contentedly puffing a rare Havana cigar. As the room clouded up, so tempers calmed down. Otto von Bismarck, founder of Germany, against which they were now embattled, once said: “A cigar is a sort of diversion: as the blue smoke curls upwards, the eye involuntarily follows it; the effect is soothing, one feels better tempered, and more inclined to make concessions.”
Balfour recalled: “In half an hour we had settled all we had argued about for hours. Russian aid was safe and firm.” And nobody died.
Published in England, McGinty’s book is available online and perhaps in some bookstores by request. It has been criticized as being too tightly focused on what the title implies – Churchill and his love for cigars – but since the Allies won the war, what else could be more important?
~ Rich Perelman
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