Judge Munter, upholding the Henley verdict in 1999, put it this way: “having asserted that causation has not been established, Philip Morris cannot argue persuasively that members of the general public knew better, and by reason of their superior knowlege, are deprived of legal recourse”.

www.tobacco.neu.edu/box/BOEKENBox/ Henley%20v%20PM/MunterOrderHenley.pdf

The tobacco industry wants to “have it both ways” because of its endless zeal to blame the customer. In essence, the dialog goes like this: it’s the customer’s fault the product hurt him; but you lied to the customer, you misled him; right, so it’s his fault for believing us, he should have known better.

Judges can say, OK, that reasoning isn’t going to fly.