EDITORIAL : FLAWED BILL FAILS; TOBACCO MEASURE WAS MORE ABOUT POLITICS THAN HEALTH.

THE anti-tobacco bill that was snuffed out in the U.S. Senate on a procedural vote was a legislative monstrosity. It was more about politics and election-year gamesmanship than improving public health by discouraging young people from becoming hooked on cigarettes.

So we don't mourn its defeat due to the failure of Senate Democrats to muster enough votes to prevent a filibuster.

The American people deserve better. The health of our nation ought to be more important than partisan politics.

What began as a relatively straightforward bill by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to deter smoking by teen-agers was turned into a political Christmas tree. Republicans and Democrats alike attached provisions to please their core constituencies and score political points against the opposition.

And as a result, the final bill - which among other things called for increasing the federal tax on a pack of cigarettes to $1.10 over five years - took away most of the money that had been earmarked for health programs.

For example, some of the money was set aside for a plan costing $16 billion over five years to stop the flow of illegal drugs into this country.

Another provision would have permitted the use of federal vouchers to help children, who have been victims of violent crimes on school property, attend private schools. Tax deductions for married couples earning up to $50,000 a year would have been increased. The use of federal funds to finance needle exchanges would have been prohibited.

``It's gotten so far from where it started out that it's hard to recognize what it was originally meant to be,'' Sen. John B. Breaux, D-La., said earlier this month. ``It is moving - in circles.''

And, unfortunately, more of the same seems likely.

Senate Democrats responded to Wednesday's defeat by promising to attach the bill to other measures coming before the Senate.

``We are going to continue this fight in whatever vehicle, whatever form, whatever opportunity we have,'' Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle said.

But attaching a measure already overloaded with extraneous provisions to unrelated legislation will only politicize the issue even further.

Indeed, Democrats already are vilifying Republicans as tools of the tobacco industry. Republicans in turn are portraying Democrats as big spenders who want to expand government and take more money out of the pockets of low-income people, who are more likely to smoke than middle- and upper-income individuals.

Enough.

It's time for less heat and more light. Congress needs to pay more attention to public health and less to politics. Daschle and his Republican counterpart, Trent Lott of Mississippi, should display some some real leadership and try to iron out a meaningful compromise that deals with the real issue - discouraging smoking by teen-agers.

Otherwise, the courts probably will be left to sort out the mess.

And if Congress can't do any better than it has, that might be a better alternative.