The Fat Police Are Out in Full Force

Everybody from representatives from the Kansas legislature to the Mayor of New York City to university researchers certainly want to make it more difficult and expensive for you and I to enjoy such pleasures in life like pizza and soda.

In Kansas, the legislature wants to tax the citizens of that state one penny per tablespoon of sugar in sodas and sports drinks.

The justifications are the super-duper combo “we need to raise more money” to the ever present “war on obesity”.

Michael Bloomberg, mayor of the bastion of freedom, New York City, also agrees with with the Kansas legislature and wants his legislature to pass a penny-per-ounce tax on soda. He wants to prevent making cuts in education and health care.

Mr. Bloomberg also said:

“In these tough economic times, easy fixes to our problems are hard to come by,” he said. “But the soda tax is a fix that just makes sense. It would save lives. It would cut rising health care costs. And it would keep thousands of teachers and nurses where they belong: in the classrooms and clinics.”

And then there are the eggheads. Researchers from the University of North Carolina published a study in the Annals of Internal Medicine which came to the conclusion that an 18 percent tax on pizza and soda would cause American adults to lose 5 lbs. per year. Wow. How many politicians are going to sink their teeth into this study to advance their agenda of advancing the fat police?

I didn’t even have the heart to talk about all the new cigarette tax increases being proposed nationwide.

Of course I have a couple of questions for the above people.

1. Instead of taxing more, have any of the above governmental entities think about eliminating wasteful positions, programs and positions. Its the government, I’m sure there is a plethora of things that fit the category of “wasteful”.

2. When is it a good thing to raise taxes in good or bad times, but especially bad times. Will desperately needed jobs not exist as a result of these proposed taxes? Yea probably.

And lastly, just a comment. If the government wasn’t so heavily involved in every aspect of our lives, they would never require so much money to operate, and believe me efficiency is not a priority for any government program or agency that sucks off the teet of the taxpayer.

This kind of stuff can not go on forever. At some point the people will eventually (I hope and pray) not put up with so much bloated government and interference into everything we do.