Thread: Michael Tomasky: Mayor Bloomberg Is Right to Declare a War on Sugar

On second thought this might border on ridiculous at the highest level. I think the these people like to talk because they don't know what else to do, you know those who do, do, those who can't talk, you were elected to take care of the city not dictate what people should do or not do...mind your own business and do your job fool.......



Michael Tomasky: Mayor Bloomberg Is Right to Declare a War on Sugar
by Michael Tomasky Jun 2, 2012 4:45 AM EDT

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's soda ban has come in for widespread ridicule and outrage. But the policy is exactly what Fat America needs, writes Michael Tomasky. Plus: Richard B. McKenzie disagrees—why it won't work.


There’s only one way to say something like this, and it’s loud and proud and without apology: I wholeheartedly support Mike Bloomberg’s war on sugar. It’s unassailable as policy. Refined sugar is without question the worst foodstuff in the world for human health, and high-fructose corn syrup is little better. We are a fat country getting fatter and fatter, and these mountains of refined sugar that people ingest are a big part of the reason. The costs to the health-care system are enormous, so the public interest here is ridiculously obvious. Obesity is a killer. Are we to do nothing, in the name of the “liberty” that entitles millions of people to kill themselves however they please, whatever their diabetes treatments costs their insurers? We have this “liberty” business completely backward in this country, and if Bloomberg can start rebalancing individual freedom and the public good, God bless him, I say.

The surge in obesity is, of course, well-known and quite real. Before about 1980, 15 percent of American adults were obese. Now it’s close to 40 percent. Explanation? Handily enough, Lane Kenworthy of the University of Arizona blogged about this just yesterday. The standard explanation, he writes, is a combination of too much eating and too little physical activity. But Kenworthy shows that declining activity, while real to some extent, does not track with the sudden explosion in porcinity starting in 1980. Something else does, however—total calories in the food supply.

Click on the link above and look at the second chart and you will see that calories in the food supply tracks nearly perfectly with the rise in obesity levels beginning in the 1980s. And memory and common sense tell us that this is when it all started happening. Super-sized fries, Hungry Man Swanson dinners, Big Gulps, all started being laid before us around this time, as well as the explosion across the landscape of the family-casual restaurants that started serving grandmothers portions fit for Lyle Alzado.


Of course, change occurred nowhere else as it did at the movies. I recall the looks I used to get from those confused youngsters behind the counter when they asked me, roughly, “Wouldn’t you like to get a tub of popcorn three times larger for an extra 25 cents?” and I barked, “No, definitely not! And don’t even ask about the soda.” They were a symbol of that age of grotesquerie and excess, those 40-ounce sodas, every bit as much as gas-guzzling SUVs. And they’re indefensible. Completely empty calories. At least potato chips have potatoes. Snickers has nuts. But soda pop has refined sugar. Or corn syrup. There is nothing useful about them. And they have helped to create a crisis.

In New York City, Deputy Mayor Linda Gibbs told me Friday that smoking still kills more people, but that line on the graph is heading down fast, while the obesity line is quickly trending up. Bloomberg had a public-policy problem on his hands, so he requested a task force to make recommendations to him concerning obesity, and this—banning most sugary drinks in sizes larger than 16 ounces—was a key recommendation. “We’re trying to reset the norm here and get away from the super-sized norm,” she says. “People will pretty much limit their consumption to what is in front of them. If 16 ounces is what’s in front of them, they’ll typically be satisfied with that.”

It’s a policy designed to guide people toward a certain kind of behavior. This talk of “freedom” is absurd. No one’s freedom is being taken away. When the rule goes into effect, probably by September, assuming the city’s board of health votes it through (it's appointed by the mayor), New Yorkers will still be able to buy these beverages. And those who really feel that they will perish unless they have 32 ounces of Mountain Dew Code Red can simply buy two. Nothing is being banned, and no one’s being arrested.

A country with half of its adults living in a condition of obesity is literally sick. Under such conditions, the state has every right to take action on behalf of the common good.

Are bacon-cheeseburgers next? As a practical matter, no. Sodas are an easy target because there is nothing, nothing, nutritionally redeeming about them. But might there come a day when the New York City Department of Health mandates that burgers be limited to, say, four ounces? Indeed there might. And why not? Eight- and ten-ounce burgers are sick things.

We have a health crisis in this country. A country with half of its adults living in a condition of obesity is a sick country, quite literally, spending probably not billions but trillions on the associated illnesses and maladies. Under such conditions, the state has every right to take action on behalf of the common good. We once had an epidemic of traffic deaths. We didn’t ban driving. But we came up with a device that is a minor inconvenience at most. And so seatbelts became mandatory, and now the epidemic has receded. A few people still foolishly oppose seatbelts. But most of us accept them and understand that whatever little dollop of our freedom is taken away as we latch up is more than countervailed by the practical upside.

One day, if the country comes to its senses, we’ll reverse the obesity trend and, just as we now chuckle at the prevalence of smoking on Mad Men, we’ll say, “Can you believe people used to peddle this treacle in 64-ounce doses?” We will not only have done something about obesity. We’ll have won an important victory over Libertarianism Gone Wild, a far bigger threat to society than even Sunkist Orange.



Newsweek/Daily Beast special correspondent Michael Tomasky is also editor of Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. Follow Michael Tomasky on Twitter at @mtomasky.

For inquiries, please contact The Daily Beast at editorial@thedailybeast.com.



Michael Tomasky: Mayor Bloomberg Is Right to Declare a War on Sugar - The Daily Beast

Where in the Mayor's job description or formal list of mayoral responsibilities does it state the Mayor has the authority, let alone requirement, to tell anyone in the city what they may eat or drink, or in what proportions? If Bloomberg REALLY wants to fight obesity, he should start by reducing his fat head.

Originally Posted by 4thHorseman

Where in the Mayor's job description or formal list of mayoral responsibilities does it state the Mayor has the authority, let alone requirement, to tell anyone in the city what they may eat or drink, or in what proportions? If Bloomberg REALLY wants to fight obesity, he should start by reducing his fat head.

Bloomberg stressed that we have a responsibility to combat obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, and that the government must consequently regulate what people can/cannot put in their bodies. Michelle Obama even came down to applaud the idea.


We !!!!!!! "We" have a responsibility.....I think "WE" is a very dangerous word... In fact I think that "WE" should vote them all out "As Soon Possible".

[QUOTE
Bloomberg stressed that we have a responsibility to combat obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, and that the government must consequently regulate what people can/cannot put in their bodies. Michelle Obama even came down to applaud the idea.
][/QUOTE]

Michelle Obama is ADVOCATING (Ok, maybe some political arm twisting), but Bloomberg is DICTATING. A world of difference to me. Also, read Ann Coulter's latest column that includes a good description of how NY is declining as a state and how NYC could very well become the next Detroit. But is Bloomberg concerned. Not as long as all the people negatively affected by his policies avoid trans-fats and super-sized sugar drinks.

There is a simple response to this and it is mostly already in place.

The FDA requires that food manufacturers post ingredients on the packages of all foods. All that is necessary to identify sugar as a health hazard is to make the sugar ingredients stand out in some way on the ingredients list. The list of ingredients that you see is listed in order with the ingredient most present listed first. The problem is not really candy and soda pop since nobody expects anything but sugar in these. The real problem is stuff that passes as nutritional like breakfast cereal. Funny, none of these geeks mention breakfast cereal. Next time you are at your local grocer look at the breakfast cereals, not just the stuff marketed to kids which is really obscene, but also the stuff marketed as wholesome for adults and see sugar near the top of the list of ingredients. Even in health food stores, you see the same thing.

Also look at stuff you put on your food at dinner. Salad dressing, barbecue sauce, condiments like ketchup, sugar is in all of these. Also maybe we need to replace the term "corn syrup" with "corn sugar" or maybe just "sugar". "Sugar" comes from plants just like corn syrup, but we aren't obliged to know which plant it is and so there really is no point in distinguishing corn syrup from sugar. "Corn syrup" has a more wholesome sound and maybe that's why they list it instead of "sugar" as an ingredient.

Thursday, 07 June 2012 09:55
Bloomberg’s Soda Ban: Do as I Say, Not as I Do
Written by Michael Tennant


Bloomberg’s Soda Ban: Do as I Say, Not as I Do

Ah, the hypocrisy of the Left. Former Vice President Al Gore travels the world in a private jet to lecture everyone else on reducing carbon emissions. First Lady Michelle Obama tells people to eat veggies while she and her husband consume burgers, fries, cheesesteaks, and ice cream. And New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, trying to ban super-sized sodas on the theory that doing so will curb obesity, gives away free soda in unlimited quantities to employees of his media conglomerate, Bloomberg L.P.

“We have all the junk in the world up there,” a Bloomberg employee told the New York Times in 2010. “I mean, you can gain 15 pounds in a hurry.”

Bloomberg then was merely seeking to prohibit the use of food stamps to purchase sugary drinks, but the Times reported that in addition to a variety of healthful snacks, “there is also free Coke, Pepsi, orange Fanta, ginger ale and Mountain Dew” available in the sixth-floor pantry of Bloomberg Towers.

The situation apparently has not changed in the last two years. According to Fox News, those same free snacks and sodas are still available to all Bloomberg L.P. employees even as the company’s founder and majority owner is calling for a ban on the sale of sugary drinks exceeding 16 ounces.

Bloomberg’s spokesman, Stu Loeser, told Fox News that there’s no conflict between the Mayor’s proposal and his company’s policy since the cups at Bloomberg Towers hold only 12 ounces. “Nothing we’re proposing will stop New Yorkers from drinking more than 16 ounces of sugary drinks, just not in one container,” Loeser said.

That, of course, just goes to show how pointless Bloomberg’s proposal is. Other than slightly inconveniencing folks in the Big Apple, it will do little to nothing to reduce their soda intake.

The Mayor’s soda ban, after all, is riddled with loopholes. First, it prevents the sale only of containers of sugary drinks exceeding 16 ounces; it does not prevent one from purchasing multiple 16-ounce containers or going back to a soda fountain for refills. Second, it exempts diet soda and beverages that are at least 70 percent juice or 50 percent milk or milk substitute — meaning a Starbucks Frappuccino, which can run as high as 340 calories per 16 ounces (there are about 200 calories in a pint of Coca-Cola), can still be sold. Third, it does not cover drinks sold at many supermarkets and convenience stores, so the 7-11 Double Gulp (64 ounces) and extra-large Slurpee (44 ounces) are safe.

Bloomberg’s nanny-state proposal, then, is clearly not about reducing soda consumption. Instead, like most such proposals, it is about showing that the person in charge is “doing something” about the hot-button issue du jour. And like many government edicts, it is meant to apply only to the “little people,” not those issuing the orders from on high.

“[Bloomberg] is known for negotiating voluntary reductions in salt by food companies, and putting salt on his own saltine crackers; for fighting rising obesity among his constituents, and for serving comfort food like grilled hot dogs and ice cream sundaes at his town house,” the Times observed in 2010, adding that the Mayor also permits sugary soft drinks to be served at the official Mayor’s residence, Gracie Mansion, where Bloomberg holds events but does not live.

Thus, while Bloomberg and his employees and guests consume Cokes to their hearts' content, everyone else seeking a 17th ounce of soda must beg Hizzoner, “Please, sir, may I have some more?”

Bloomberg’s Soda Ban: Do as I Say, Not as I Do



Oh well they only have 12 ounce cups, these people are morons