Keep coughing.

Keep coughing because Iowans will continue this year to smoke some 260 million packs of cigarettes.

Keep coughing because Iowa youngsters this year will continue to be able to buy cigarettes pretty easily.

Keep coughing because 4,000 to 5,000 of your Iowa relatives and neighbors will die from smoking this year.

Keep coughing.

Keep coughing because the Iowa Legislature has decided not to do anything about all this - again this year.

Sen. Johnie Hammond of Ames had introduced a bill that would have barred smoking in Iowa almost everywhere except in homes and cars and motel rooms, that would have outlawed the sale of cigarettes through vending machines, and that would have made sellers and distributors of tobacco products pay into a state fund to educate Iowans about the hazards of smoking.

Parts of the bill were awful and probably unconstitutional - the restrictions on advertising and on use of cigarette names in sporting and entertainment events were a terrible suppression of speech - but they could have been discarded.

Instead, the Legislature never really took up the issue.

Why?

Because they want to see us smoke ourselves to death? (Every minute a person spends smoking takes a minute off that person's life.) Because they wanted to see us pour our money into medical care? (Smoking costs Americans $22 billion a year in health care.) Because they think it's neat if our sons and daughters start to smoke? (About 3,000 teen-agers take up smoking every day, and half of them will ultimately die from smoking.) Because they want the tax revenue? (Iowa took in $93.2 million in taxes from cigarettes last year - about half of what smoking costs us in health dollars.)

Legislative leaders often have a hard time explaining why they do do something, so they rarely offer explanations of why they don't do something.

But here's a hint.

We stopped by the Capitol Friday and picked up a list of registered lobbyists for this session. And we counted at least 11 - including some big names - working for tobacco clients. We doubt they were working in favor of Hammond's bill or a similar bill proposed by Gov. Terry Branstad.

• For the record, here are the lobbyists and their clients:

  Frank Chiodo, Smokeless Tobacco Products/Multi-States Association.

  Ned Chiodo, Smokeless Tobacco Products/Multi-States Association.

  Kim Haus, Philip Morris USA.

  Cal Hultman, Philip Morris USA.

  Bill Hutchins, RJ Reynolds Tobacco Co.

  Robert Miller, RJ Reynolds Tobacco Co.

  Lawrence Pope, Smokeless Tobacco Products/Multi-States Association.

  John Schachterle, Iowa Association of Candy and Tobacco Distributors.

  William Wimmer, the Tobacco Institute.

That's a pretty powerful group, and they're the kind of folks you want on your side if you're going to try to influence legislation.

They're just hired guns, they'll tell you, and just doing their job. The fact that their job can be linked to hooking Iowa's young people on the most addictive drug there is, to killing hundreds of grandfathers and grandmothers before they ever get to see their grandchildren grow up, to peopling this state with widows and to keeping its hospitals filled is, well, just business.

But you have to say this about them:
They earned their money this session.
Meantime ...

Keep coughing.

Which side are they on?

There are a couple of ironies in that list of lobbyists.

The Chiodos and Pope also represent Iowa Methodist Medical Center and St. Luke's Hospital in Cedar Rapids.

Hutchins and Miller also represent the Iowa Health Care Association.

And Schachterle also represents the Iowa Managed Care Association.

No conflicts there, of course. One client just keeps the other busy.