The price of gas in America

[Weltall]

Actually, smoking immediately reduces your life expectancy... the sooner you quit the more you will recover, but it'd never be the same as if you'd never smoked.

Alcohol does the same kind of permanent damage, in that it scars, and eventually mutates, your liver, a process that is quite irreversible. The liver of a lifelong alcoholic and the lungs of a lifelong smoker are both not pretty things to behold.

As for banning alcohol, the reason it won't happen has nothing to do with its effects. Look at prohibition. Banning alcohol failed because it was legal forever. It was widespread, common, and more or less a part of life for many people. You can't hope to ban it after it's that deeply ingrained. On the other hand, drugs like marijuana, cocaine, etc. never got that sort of chance. The law of the land stamped them down before they ever got the chance to become widespread the way alcohol is.