I note with regret Michelle Obama’s announcement this week that her husband the president, to her evident relief, has kicked his cigarette habit. No details were forthcoming—how he managed to stop smoking, just how serious his habit might have been, and so on—but in the present age, none were necessary. Smoking, especially smoking cigarettes, is now a social pathology far worse than any number of sexual transgressions. Barack Obama’s nicotine habit was a source of distress and embarrassment to friends and admirers. 

Smoking is injurious to one’s well being, of course, and few presidents have advertised their addiction to tobacco. When a photographer entered the White House to take a picture of William McKinley, the president quickly put out his ubiquitous cigar: “The young men of this country,” he explained, “must not see their president smoking!” But it is not at all clear that Obama’s onetime habit was especially fearsome: At a reported four or five cigarettes a day, it probably did not put his health in imminent jeopardy—either for cancer or emphysema—and Obama himself has testified that tension tended to prompt him to light up. Is it altogether wise to deny the president a cherished source of comfort in times of stress? Is it better to drink—impairing judgment and destroying brain cells—in the Oval Office than to smoke?