The government has been deriving bills since people the city of St.Louis have began [begun, not began] making suits against tobacco companies who [that, not who] have been providing individuals with its [pronoun/antecedent disagreement--companies/its] tobacco products.  The measures which [that, not which] have been taken have seemed [seem to have had, not have seemed to have] to have little impact over whether a person will quit smoking cigerettes of [or, not of] not.   People will continue usage of the tobacco products unless something is done about it.  Ideas [on how to curb smoking habits? or tobacco companies?] have been set into motion and [the] state has been taking action in the city of Saint Louis as well as the several other municipalities around the area of it [delete 'of it'] in order to stop teens from smoking cigerettes and cracking [to crack down] down on people who would sell to minors.   It is now [no, not now] wonder that it took so long for the city to begin working to clean up its act because the city has become more commericial rather than residential.  The fact is people want laws passed so that they do not have to suffer from second hand smoke or see their relatives or direct family go through the process of filing a claim because they did not use a program or quit on their own.  St. Louis will be reforming itself in the near future and 2004 is one of the set due dates for all of the action to take effect.   The people of the city will find themselves with a brighter cleaner and smoke-free atmosphere where they can breathe easy [more easily] and perhaps start a new life in the city. [this sounds like an ambitious proposal--if everyone in St. Louis is for this proposal, why do we still have smokers?  you might include something to that effect within this intro paragraph]

Mel Carnahan has prepared a method that would keep the tobacco companies from [becoming] infuriated with him.  It begins with each citizen on any level of education.  A list of goals had [has?] been set up by the governor that was designed to foster along how an individual [eh?  clarify--ambiguous] should be taught to be a better Missourian by following the guidelines presented [wordy--cut it by a third].  The bulk of the goals are being enacted inside school teaching students to stay away from tobacco products and how they should go about respecting [replace 'how they should go about respecting' with 'to respect'] their bodies.   The rest of the goals were measures taken to keep kids in schools and getting [ reword with 'to set up adult literacy programs'] adults literate.  The Missouri Health Department developed one of the major programs that is being used to change peoples ideas about smoking is [lose 'is'] called ASSIST, which is an acroymn for American Stop Smoking i[capitalize?]ntervention Study.  It has been set up expressly for the heartland communities who [that, not who] have to face a growing problem with individuals [lose the 's'] teenage smokers who get other kids hooked on smoking.  Mel Carnhan's position on the anti-tobacco legislation may appear unclear since he is currently dealing with campaigns to get him into the senate. [this last sentence is irrelevant--why not start this paragraph off with the ASSIST program and explain how Mel Carnahan's plan fits into this, then bring closure by telling me why ASSIST is important to the thesis]

Big business [insert a comma] such as the major corperations like [of, not like] Marlboro and Camel [insert a comma] are two of the main stay [one of these words is redundant] prevailing companies.  The lawsuits that older companies have been sustaining have been brought on by angry families who have lost their family members due to advertisements on the television that made people believe that smoking was good for you. [which advertisments?  there haven't been any television smoking ads in almost a decade] Most people know now that smoking is unhealthy and causes numberous [spelling] diseases that could complicate peoples insides resulting in death.  During the 40's[insert a comma] these companies which were distributing tobacco had the television as a tool for them to get more business. Luckly [spelling--insert a comma] the companies have lost most [almost] every media they once had to advertise their product.   An example of how Camel has conformed to legislation passed is that they were forced to remove the cartoon camel which drew in younger smokers.  [how did this affect St. Louis?] Smoking advertisments [spelling] have disappeared from the radio, the television [there you've got it] and even the newspaper. The only place where one might find tobacco advertisements in magazines.  If that wasn't [use subjunctive--If that were not] enough [insert a comma] the companies who want to sell their products also get taxed very generously. That would explain why the [lose the article] products [lose the 's'] prices have steadly risen.  In 1993 [insert a comma] there was a mandate set by the general assembly [of what?] that a seventeen percent tax on cigerettes and a ten percent tax on smokeless tobacco [would do what?].  The reason for this is to pay for the programs that help people who have to go through nesscitation [spelling--what?  define that word for me].  All the legislation is setup to make the Tobacco [lower case] companies loose [lose, not loose] money but really all it is doing is giving [causing] the tobacco companies to mark up the price of their tobacco products.  [good closure--strengthen this as it applies to St. Louis--are there any tobacco companies in this city?  are there any specific groups in this city that have helped to lobby for that legislation?]

The City of Saint Louis would feel a substantial loss in funding [if what?  tobacco were banned?].  Tobacco companies must pay thousands of dollars in order to renew liscenses [spelling] so that they may sell their products.  The stores which [that, not which] market the products must also pay a sum in order that they are [replace that they are with to be] allowed the right to sell the [such, not the] products in their place of business.   For every three dollars and fifty cents spent upon a pack of cigerettes [insert a comma] a portion of that is set aside for either the program spending or other city spending.  The companies are making a large profit from each pack sold, in addition to that the city is making a bundle of cash too since they wave the legislative hand and can continue to draw funds from the companies.  [run-on sentence--cut the first clause--focus on the city having a vested interest in keeping tobacco sales high--what does that mean for a city to suddenly turn around and attack a chief producer of revenue?] The laws set up to keep the tobacco companies in check normally are broken by either convience [spelling] store dealers who sell to minors and wholesalers [or whom?  if you have an either, you have to have an or].   If the rule is broken before an officer or undercover officer [insert a comma] the dealers are fined five [insert a hyphen] hundred dollars per pack of cigerettes.  The sloppiness of the tobacco dealers and not the company can result in further funds being drawn from all of the taxes that have been levied.  The money generated from the taxing is generally used for programs set up to keep younger kids from smoking[insert a comma] such as television commercial adds [spelling] and radio adds [spelling] which try to keep the cities [city's] youth from ever picking up the harmful product.  [doesn't that defeat the purpose, though?  if that program were strictly enforced, there would be no new markets and, after awhile, all the smokers would die out and the tobacco companies would lose all their customers--is it just at 18 that cigarette companies care to addict a person?  are all these programs aimed at proving the health risks of smokers only for those under 18?   what does it mean for the city to be complicit in this?]  Missouri['s] passing legislation to ban the sales of cigerettes would be determental [spelling] to both the government, state, and city since the tax money brought in from sales or fines is fantastically large in the millions of dollars. [excellent--you made the point that this was aiming towards--flesh out some of my questions, though]

If cigerettes were to be made illegal to not only minors but all people in the city of Saint Louis[insert a comma] there would be a black market to fill the slot [compensate, not fill the slot] for [tobacco's inability to pursue] legal sales.  The number of smokers is too numberous[spelling] for any agency to enact nessecitation [eh?] programs city wide.  The scenerio [spelling] that would be most likely is that the police departments would find themselves issuing a bulk amount [number] of tickets to people for smoking the tobacco products and all the money that went for government spending would be going straight into the pockets of the black market who provide the cigerettes. [at least the revenue that the city loses from taxes could be redeemed through fines] The black market could probably squeeze any amount of money out of the consumer.  People would probably begin growing their very own tobacco setup in simulated tropical conditions not to dissimiliar from how men in the twenties created their "Moon shine."  Most men and women require some sort of substance to change how they are feeling because life is not always perfect.  [do they?  is it most men and women who smoke?   of those who do, how easily could they find ways to replace their smoking habit with something new?] The men in the 1920's had to suffer through a loss of employment as well as intensified poverty through out [one word] major cities.  Saint Louis has a good financial standing [insert a comma] but the tax dollars that are skimmed from the big tobacco companies['] pockets is enough to keep the cities [city's] streets paved well and kept up.  The[re] is already a black market for such things as heavily damaging drugs, [so] to keep the black market in check it would be best to allow the tobacco companies to remain in business but surveyed [under surveillance, you mean--has surveillance worked in the past?] so [that] minors do not damage themselves with the tobacco. [good, but strengthen this closure--that is the significance of this impending black market to the thesis?  why is it important and how realistic is it?]

With the coming of this millineum most would hope that people would be interested in preserving their health to stay alive so that they could view
the marvels to come in the future [introduce this paragraph with the ideas of cessation].  Cessation [you mean, stopping cold turkey?] can be used to help people get off their addiction and get them on the track to healing their damaged lung tissue.  Cessation[insert a comma] in 1998[insert a comma] helped a numberous [spelling--reword to large] amount of people who were looking to stop smoking quit.  In 1997, fourty[forty]-eight percent of adult smokers went on cessation to help them quit for good.  Over all the people through out the years of 1996-1998 [awkward clause--reword, insert a comma] women have been trying to use cessation as a key to their quitting the aweful[spelling] habit of smoking.   It would appear that men are more interested in deficating [eh? defiling?] their lungs with the tobacco products.  [how so?  why is that?] Some people may require the help of doctors in some cases to help them stop.  Tobacco products have certain elements inside of them which [that, not which] make them far more addictive than the conventional legal drugs.  Quiting [spelling] smoking on one[insert an apostrophe]s own is not an easy thing to do as shown above through some vague [eh?] statistics finding a help circle or aids such as gum or patches can also be used to stop the need for tobacco.[awkward syntax--reword this sentence and cut it by a third of the words in doing so]  However[insert a comma] as long as the adds [spelling] continue to be placed where ever [wherever] they are allowed[insert a comma] people will go and buy the cigerettes or whichever tobacco products they perfer[spelling].S[was there more to this paragraph that did not come through?] [bring closure--how is cessation important to the thesis?]

In most cases[insert a comma] youthful individuals come across their first cigerette [spelling] or smokeless tobacco product by using their parents [ambiguous pronoun--what has been left out?  the parents? or the smokeless tobacco product?] which have been left out for easy access.  Youth smokers continue to smoke normally until they are caught and reprimanded for it [insert a comma] being told it is bad for their health.  That usually is not enough, [run-on] young adults wish to remain trendy [insert a semicolon] therefore [insert a comma] they will smoke regardless of who says what to them.  This is where programs have to be set into play to take them away from what they do not need.  [what's their incentive for quitting when their role models are adult smokers?] Adults are a tougher case because they are hard set in what they do and for them to set aside smoking they would about have to [about have to--now, there's an interesting colloquialism] give up a way of life.The main way to combat young people from [combat...from?] smoking is [by] making all the laws strict and clear on who may use them and who may not.   Small shops and convience [convenience] stores must clearly post that individuals of 18 years or older may buy cigerettes.  If the person appears under the age of 27 then a photo identification card must be shown[insert a comma] otherwise access to the product is denied.  When kids see it is tougher to get the cigerettes they will begin to hate the fact that they must do all the identification showings and begin to think smoking is stupid because it requires to [too] much work [I have a more optimistic view of the nature of teenage smokers--in that regard, they're quite industrious].  Then [insert a comma]ideally[insert a comma] they will realize that all they are doing is destroying their lungs and will die because of cancer.  Scared straight has to be something a person sees on their [pronoun/antecedent disagreement--a person/their] own.  Programs for the most part used on youthful people are in some cases a waist [spelling] of money[insert a comma] but for the most part they see that it is cool not to smoke.  [do you have any proof of that?] Smoking does not make you [lose the second person] cool, [insert a semicolon] however [insert a comma] it does make you [lose the semicolon] unhealthy and unwanted.  [if that's the case, why is it that cigarette ads portray healthy, sexy bodies smoking their cigarettes?] The mainstay [main, not mainstay] reason for getting adults unhooked is either them [they are] getting a serious illness because of the tobacco products.  [you can't have an either without an 'or'] Hopefully[insert a comma] in other cases[insert a comma] the adult will wish to alot[spelling] themself [pronoun/antecedent disagreement--adult/themself] a long span of living time by quitting.  Adults and youths both can use cessation[insert a comma] which would be desirable for those who can not [cannot is one word] just stop on their own.Teenagers and A[lowercase]dults alike should reconsider there choice of smoking if they have began are already smoking[these last five words need to be clarified--awkward syntax].  The only way to get rid of the products though is to get rid of the business all together though of course.[delete this sentence--the paragraph should be closed by telling me the significance of the parents influence on the kids being destructive--tie it back to the thesis, back somewhere to St. Louis action programs--are there parent/child seminars where parents who smoke can take their kids to learn more about the ill effects of smoking and how children should not model themselves after their parents' bad habits?]

All the people of Saint Louis deserve to have a smoke free habitat.  The tobacco companies will never quit producing until the people have decided
that they do not need the sickness derived from the products.  The big businesses may blow off deaths of individuals as statistics[insert a comma] but real living human beings will lose their lives from cancer and other horrible diseases if anti-tobacco company legislation is not put fully into perspective.  In this closure[insert a comma] I will make a challenge to the state of Missouri as well as the city of Saint Louis to clean out all of the smoking areas from all businesses public and private so that smokers are not welcome in and around these places. [so much for objectivity in this thing, eh?]  It should be made a sort of fire code to prevent the smokers[insert an apostrophe] cigerettes [spelling] from causing accidental fires.  It should be made a law so that people will not have to suffer second hand smoke because of being down wind of a smoker[insert an apostrophe]s burning cigerette.   2004 is not too far away, [run-on] action is being taken[insert a comma] but more should be to ensure that the companies are stuck with a bunch of products but [and, not but] nowhere to smoke them.  I have heard some companies say that the smoker is persecuted. [that's the Dirt Cheap commercial--you can cite it]  It is not they that are being persecuted[insert a comma] it is the business trying to draw sympathy from the smoker so they will buy more of the product as though it were going out of style.  Smoking cigerettes [spelling] and using smokeless tobacco products are [or, not are] any thing [anything is one word] with tobacco in it is not good for anyone.   The companies should be shut down, [run-on] of course they will not be because they own us with their influence.  The lesson that should be learned is big business may be helpful but not at the expense of people dieing [dying] because of its products. [nice closure]