Cigarettes are, overall, more detrimental to the overall well-being of Americans than alcohol.

"Actually, it does. Every time you smoke a cigarette, you lose 11 minutes off of your life, guaranteed." While that is a scientifically supported claim that I will absolutely not deny, I will say that there are a lot of variables to consider when talking about one's lifespan. We're not like milk; we don't have an expiration date. For example, a smoker who does not drink and eats a balanced diet might well live longer than his twin brother, a nonsmoker but a heavy drinker who eats a lot of junk food. And how long is 11 minutes? 75 years is 27,375 days (not counting leap years), which is 657,000 hours, which is 39,420,000 minutes. That is 3,583,636.(36) sets of 11 minutes. So each cigarette takes off just over two 7 millionths of an average life, assuming all other variables remain constant (which is effectively impossible). "I didn't say it didn't have an effect on one's health, I just said it didn't have a negative effect on one's health." I fail to see a difference here. Please elaborate. "Really? Alcohol HELPS PREVENT heart attack? Amazing!" But heavy drinking causes heart disease. So we'll call it a tie. "When smoking is used in moderation, it kills you." Just one drink can impair some people's judgement enough to cause problems as well. "We are debating whether or not smoking has a worse effect on Americans health. And as far as heart disease goes, it does." We are debating whether or not smoking has a worse affect on the health of Americans. Not the heart disease of Americans. I agree that heart disease is unhealthy; it killed a lot of my family, but there are other factors that need to be considered. "Again, the argument is on whether or cigarettes are more detrimental to Americans health than alcohol, not if they are the only detrimental things to Americans health." But you displayed your statistic as if it was the only thing that impacted the health of Americans. And if they both cause the same disease, doesn't your argument kind of negate itself? It would have been an excellent argument for the debate, "Cigarettes are bad for your health," but not this debate, like you said. "Next, my opponent states that I make another error when I say that all of these deaths were caused by smoking. I might have mis-worded my statement. It can be said that those deaths could POSSIBLY be impacted by smoking." "Deaths impacted by smoking - 1,509,552 Deaths (possibly) impacted by drinking - 121,599 (and that's being generous)" Yes, you did misword it. And you also didn't include in the drinking deaths all of the deaths that I mentioned were possibly impacted by drinking, which pretty much evens the numbers out. "According to (http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com......), 440,000 annual deaths each year are smoking-associated, compared to 100,000 deaths each year caused by drinking a alcoholic beverage." I strongly suggest that you look at the correction posted in the wiki answer which you attributed the drinking deaths to. "Again, with drinking, their are other things to be considered if you are talking about danger. If you're talking about smoking, there is always a danger." Yes, but would you rather be in an automobile accident due to the driver being under the influence, or would you rather inhale a little bit of smoke? "Well, there's the one-third of cases that were NOT alcohol related" Algebra 101: If 1/3 of cases are not alcohol related then 2/3 of cases are alcohol related. So if alcohol disappeared, so would 2/3 of child beating cases. And exactly what percentage of child beatings are tobacco related? Pretty close to zero, I'm sure. "If you drink the right amount of beer, it can actually help you live longer and be un-detrimental." It only takes a few beers to cause cirrhosis. And tobacco releases CO, which is a poisonous gas, but it also has a calming effect. So I'm sure that smoking has prevented a few suicides. That may seem a little far fetched, but so does your argument about beer making you live longer. I am excited to see what you have to say!