Mayor Bloomberg needs a Big Gulp of common sense

Chuck Pinkey

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June 19, 2012

Mayor Bloomberg needs a Big Gulp of common sense

Anonymous Daily Star The Daily Star Tue Jun 19, 2012, 03:24 AM EDT

New York City, the Mecca of modern liberalism, is a much safer place. The "Big Apple," under the guidance of Mayor Michael "RINO" Bloomberg, has taken another step to ensure the health and safety of its subjects.

Bloomberg, who ascended to the throne in 2002 and still reigns by the Divine Right of Kings, has taken a tough stance on foods with trans-fats and on smoking. He decreed a stiff tax on cigarettes and has banned smoking in workplaces, parks and beaches.

Yes sir! Only in New York City can one find gambling, prostitution, strip clubs, drugs, gang violence, massage parlors, gentlemen's clubs, legions of homeless and the New York Mets, but you can't smoke a cigarette in Central Park or on Coney Island beach.

Luckily, the Occupiers who seized Zuccotti Park for months only smoked dope, did drugs, committed sexual assaults, excreted body fluids in public and harassed the police. Had they smoked a Marlboro, they would have been in real trouble.

Just recently, Mayor Bloomberg and the New York City Board of Health also proposed a ban on jumbo-sized sodas and other "sugary" drinks. No more super-sized Cokes for NYC subjects.

The limit is 16 ounces, but wait! There is no refill limit. You can pack your chubby self with as much sugar, either natural cane or high fructose, as you want, but only at 16 ounces or less at a time. It's a better world!

According to MyFoxNY.com, "His proposed first-in-the-nation ban, formally announced May 31, would apply to venues across the city, from restaurants to street carts to movie theaters. The ban would not apply to diet sodas, fruit juices, dairy-based drinks or alcoholic beverages, nor would it include drinks sold in grocery or convenience stores. Food establishments that don't downsize would face fines of $200."

Obviously, Mayor Bloomberg doesn't want New Yorkers super-sizing sugary drinks. However, during "Miller Time," you are allowed to chug brew from a gallon container, but fill that jug with 7UP and "It's gonna cost ya big time!"

MyFoxNY.com also states, "Interestingly, employees at the media and financial information company he founded can guzzle all the free soda they want, while they work. Employees at Manhattan's 55-story Bloomberg Tower, which houses Bloomberg L.P., retail shops, restaurants and condominiums, enjoy unfettered access to pantries stocked with juices, soft drinks, coffee and tea.

"Although no one counts how many trips workers make to the freebie shelves, drink portions are 12 ounces or less, smaller than the giant gut-busters Bloomberg wants to ban at city restaurants, sports arenas and movie theaters." Twelve ounces or less _ I feel better now, but do we sense a little liberal hypocrisy here?

Next in the crosshairs are moviegoers. That's right. (You fat moviegoers know who you are.) For your own sake, New York City is taking aim at yet another of your life's gluttonous pleasures. Brace yourself; hot buttered popcorn is next.

New York City Board of Health member Bruce Vladeck has proposed limiting the size of movie theater popcorn containers. "Popcorn isn't a whole lot better than the soda," he said.

Other board members have started brainstorming additional ways to cut the fat. One nit-wit suggested limits for milkshakes and "milk-coffee beverages."

Good heavens! Can you believe this? Government is dictating our sugar consumption. I suffer from an affliction called the Dun-Lop disease. That's when your belly "done lop over your belt," and I'll tell you Mr. Mayor, if you want my 32-ounce Pepsi, you'll have to pry it from my cold, dead, fat hands.

Seriously, obesity and sugar consumption are not good things, but neither are AIDS, career politicians, single moms with seven children born out of wedlock and the thousands of other lifestyle choices that people make that cost society dearly.

I've never been an advocate of government sticking its nose into our business. America became great because of personal freedom, not by being coddled from cradle to grave. Think of our Founding Fathers, the Minute Men fighting the mightiest army in the world, pioneers taming the continent, industrialists such as Henry Ford, such bold inventors as Thomas Edison, and our astronauts riding rockets into space and beyond.

Bold men and women made my country the greatest nation in history, not some PIA, Barney Fife, Walter Mitty, feel-your-pain, big-time politician worried about my diet.

Unfortunately, it has become so bad that now our food choices are being decreed. Even the Lord Mayor of London, in an interview this week discussing this issue, offered to take the "huddled masses yearning to breathe free" to London, if they wished to flee New York. Boy, that sounds familiar. Where have I heard that phrase before?

In a larger context, it's just another example of liberal-progressives telling you that you are an idiot, too stupid to make your own life choices. Not to worry! Big Nanny Government will always take care of you, as long as you remember to vote for them and behave like a mindless twit.

Chuck Pinkey is the owner of River Valley New Holland Inc. in Otego. He can be reached at chuck.rvnewholland@gmail.com. The views expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of The Daily Star and its editorial board.