"Um. Right. Except she died of heart failure at age 58, after using up all her sick days every year, two of her kids had asthma, and her husband died of cancer. Probably none of that was related to her smoking. What do those scientists know. You're right, don't mind me, do light up."

The death of this hypothetical woman might have been related to her smoking or might not have been. Lots of non smokers die of heart failure. Nor are all sickly people smokers, not all asthmatics have smoking parents and not all spouses of smokers die of cancer. I'm not arguing smoking is good for anyone, I'm just saying that as with global warming, the media makes the case against smoking far more black and white than the data justify.