Defense Dept. Anti-Tobacco Video Competition: "Fight the Enemy"

    The Department of Defense (DOD) has just announced that the public will be invited to vote in a video competition called "Fight the Enemy."  In this case, the enemy is tobacco.  The innovation office of the military's assistant secretary of defense for health affairs is sponsoring the competition among U.S. service members around the world who were invited to film and submit "tobacco countermarketing" videos.
    The videos in the competition are hosted on the Fight the Enemy website, and visitors are invited to click the "like" button to vote.  The following is one of the videos found on the site:

    Dr. Jonathan Woodson, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, says that improving the health of service members is a "national imperative":

“Improving the health and well-being of service members is a national imperative,” Woodson said. “We ask the defense community to help us make tobacco-free living a cultural norm by harnessing the power of social media and sharing the videos with their social networks.”

    Voting will be held for the next month before the winners are announced:

The video with the most “likes” will be declared winner of the People’s Choice Award. A panel of DOD judges will select winners for first, second and third place in the competition. Winners will be announced on March 19 in conjunction with National Kick Butts Day, officials said.

Note: A version of this post first appeared at The Weekly Standard.