Sonic Youth Gossip - China Sez: Everyone must smoke to save the economy

in the latest installment of wtf news.....

LOCAL government officials in China have been ordered to smoke nearly a quarter of a million packets of cigarettes to boost the local economy during the global financial crisis.

The edict, issued by officials in Hubei Province, in central China, threatens to fine officials who "fail to meet their targets" or are caught smoking rival brands manufactured in neighbouring provinces.

Even local schools have been given a smoking quota for teachers, while one village was ordered to buy 400 cartons of cigarettes a year for its officials.
The edict, which flies in the face of national anti-smoking policies from Beijing, is aimed at increasing tax revenue.
In total, officials have been ordered to puff their way through 230,000 packs of Hubei-branded cigarettes worth about $812,000.

However the order was reported to have been rescinded yesterday. A notice on the Gongan government web site said the rule was introduced in March in an effort to crack down on fake cigarettes and illegal cigarette smuggling in the area, which is causing the government to lose revenue, but said it decided to scrap the edict since the article appeared. It did not elaborate.

Tobacco sales, the biggest source of government revenue, brought in $A82.4 billion in the first 11 months of 2008, up 18 per cent from 2007, according to the Communist Party's People's Daily newspaper. About 2000 people a day die from smoking-related illnesses.

maybe obama will adopt this policy we all know hes a smoker anyway.