From: Mannionabc@aol.com
Sent: Sunday, September 15, 2002 5:50 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Subject: Re Corporations As Persons

To Whom It May Concern:

The legal concept of corporations as persons turns reality upside down. In 
practical terms, the right of a multi-billion dollar transnational entity to 
buy advertising time to put forward its not-always-accurate messages is not 
the same as my right to free speech in sending you this email, writing my 
congressperson or participating in public dialogue.

In fact, because the public airwaves are no longer owned by the public, but 
by a few corporations that control our legislators with huge sums of money, 
these corporate "persons" have rights that I and other biological persons and 
citizens do not have.

When it comes to our health, the FDA should make its decisions on the side of 
reality, not legal fictions.  Corporations are not persons.  Advertising is 
not speech; it is advertising and may be knowingly false, as many drug ads 
and natural product ads are.

Michael Mannion
Author of The Pharmacist's Guide to OTC Products and Natural Remedies and How 
to Help Your Teenager Stop Smoking