At the start of the new year, the State of Minnesota cashed its latest check from Big Tobacco: a cool $242 million. That sum pushed the current public take in the much-lauded 1998 settlement with the industry to $787 million. But state Sen. Thomas Neuville isn't smiling about those astronomical numbers. The haul, he notes, has fallen short of early estimates, and the Minnesota Department of Finance's most recent calculations anticipate an additional $46 million drop in tobacco collections over the next two years. That's because the settlement negotiated by the state's attorney in the lawsuit, current U.S. Senate hopeful Mike Ciresi, links payouts to domestic cigarette sales, which have... More >>>