She wants people to look at gun violence as a public health issue, more urgent than the campaign against teen-age smoking.

Their view is that the goal should be to reduce teen-age smoking as much as possible.

The money is coming from a $6 million allocation for state promotional efforts against teen-age smoking.

At the time, teen-age smoking was on the rise.

As a result, they estimated that their proposed 43-cent increase in a pack of cigarettes would lower teen-age smoking by 15.7 percent.

House Republicans, to be sure, do not want to look insensitive to teen-age smoking.

Nonetheless, to cut teen-age smoking by 60 percent would probably require a $1.50 price increase.

Yet teen-age smoking during the same period has increased alarmingly.

The best way to combat teen-age smoking is to present unexaggerated facts.

They point out that teen-age smoking is also rising in countries where most forms of advertising have been banned.