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The Fresca Rebellion
theodp writes "They can ban the Marlboros, tax the Cokes, and zone the Whoppers, says Slate's William Saletan on the subject of today's morality cops. But it's time to put the brakes on the paternalistic overreaching of the food police, Saletan argues, when they come after his editor's beloved Fresca ('there are concerns that diet beverages may increase calorie consumption by justifying consumption of other caloric foods'), which will have to be pried from his cold, dead hands. '40 states have enacted special taxes on soda or junk food. And the soda taxers are becoming ever bolder. Their latest manifesto is an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, co-authored by the health commissioner of New York City, the surgeon general of Arkansas, and several others. It declares soda fair game for government intervention (PDF) on the grounds that "market failures" in this area are causing "less-than-optimal production and consumption."' Where do we draw the line?"
As an avid soda drinker, I don't have any problem with a 'soda' tax. I have much more of a problem when the government outright bans something. Keep it legal and tax it, I say. I would much rather the government got income through 'sin' taxes than through the income tax.
I'm not in favor of higher taxes in general, but I would like to shift taxes. Carbon taxes would be much more efficient than income tax, for example.
Instead of people choosing their foods based on preference, we'll have politicians picking our foods based on how much money is contributed to their campaigns!
I, for one, welcome our politician overlords.
Wait...
Random Google search says US spent $4,920,813,719 subsidizing corn production in 2006. Corn gets turned into HFC (High Fructose Corn) Syrup. HFC is what makes most sodas and candies sweet. Fresh berries are $6.00 a pint in my grocery store. Make me president and I'll switch that $5B from corn to subsidizing the production of fresh produce.
I've heard tons of stories from cyclists in the US detailing how people in vehicles purposely drive as close as possible to them, cut them off, throw things at them etc.
First, I agree with you in spirit... I fully believe that the US having such poor pedestrian and cycling accommodations largely ties in with the current obesity epidemic (though I would point out that the latter doesn't exist solely as a US phenomenon).
That said, you have to understand that American cyclists, for the most part, ride like complete assholes. Despite a legal obligation to obey the exact same rules of the road as cars, they completely ignore 99% of those rules. They don't feel a need to obey speed limits (in either direction - They'll blow through a 15mph zone as fast as their bike can go, and they'll crawl along in a 45mph zone as though on a leisurely ride in the park). They routinely ignore traffic signals, running red lights and stop signs whenever convenient. They make no strong distinction between "road", "median", and "sidewalk", using whichever will get them to their destination quickest (ie, they'll pass a half mile line of cars in the right shoulder, only to proceed to run the light at the intersection all those cars have waited for). I've actually had my mirror clipped by a cyclist trying to squeeze up to a light between two lanes of traffic (and the bastard had the nerve to try to accuse me of queuing up at the light too close to the other lane!).
Now, as with any generalization, this doesn't hold true of all cyclists. But I've seen a hell of a lot more of them behaving as I describe above, than I have obeying traffic laws. When you wonder why Americans generally hold cyclists in low regard, you now have your answer.
All of the ideas being pushed in the health care reform are leftist because nobody on the right is offering any positive ideas. Their only contribution is in screaming DEATH PANELS! and SOCIALISM! and NAZIS!
And it's "little more than thinly disguised socialized medicine" because it is being promoted as including a socialized medical option. There is no disguise.
There is an enormous gap in your reasoning when you say "once bureaucrats run health care, they run your life."
Socializing health care won't allow them to run your life any more than socialized education, socialized postal services, socialized military, etc.
And for some reason we don't hear about the governments of Western Europe telling people "[w]hat [they] can eat, when [they] can eat it, how much [they] can eat, when, where and what kind of exercise [they] will do, when [they] get up, when [they] sleep. and (if all that wasn't frightening enough) Who lives, who dies, and when they die," despite the prevalence of socialized programs, especially socialized medicine.
I find it funny that, being the United States the land of the free and all, most Americans just can't warp their heads around the fact that they've been brainwashed for the past 70 years into thinking that anything even remotely resembling socialism is evil. This is especially obvious considering the fact that a lot of Americans regard Obama as a dangerous socialist. Those who actually know what socialism is cannot help but laugh at such an idea.
But I digress. We've had what you call "universal health care" in Europe (and I don't mean the left bloc countries; I mean western and northern Europe as well) for decades, and in general it has worked acceptably, thank you very much. I've never seen the governments of any of those countries pushing to regulate what people eat and drink, how much exercise they make, when they go to sleep, or when they die. I don't know where you get the idea that universal health care implies that, but keep in mind that saying so does not make it true.
Sadly, the real question behind the universal health care debate really is the one most often forgotten, because you're too busy discussing how much control the government will have over you, and how much money the rich will have to fork over for universal health care to work. The real question is what should we do about people who absolutely cannot pay for health care or health insurance, because they are unemployed and have no savings; because they were marginalized and no one will give them a job; because they have become permanently disabled and cannot work. Should we let them live a miserable life and even die in the name of small government and the right to be rich? Until the "no universal health care" camp gives an acceptable answer to that question, their arguments are all moot to me.
Score: i, Imaginary
Haha, really? I am self-employed. I have the options for . . . two different insurance networks in my area (one of the largest cities in the country). Both are so expensive, because as an individual I cannot get onto a group plan, so as to be infeasible to carry. There is no competing low-cost plan that will let me on. Where is my choice?
Fortunately, my spouse is employed at a large company, and is therefore given entry into the pearly gates of a group plan, which I am covered under. That employer was able to survey the vast field of roughly three or four possible providers, only two of which (the two with the largest presence in our area) were really viable choices. HR then chose a provider for everyone in the company, and selected which plans (two of a dozen or so) which they would allow its employees to select.
So, let's look at the choices involved. I had the choice between two plans that were impossible to afford, due to the way the insurance industry has organized itself (treating large-group insurance as a separate pool from individual or small-group). There's no meaningful choice when neither choice is feasible.
My spouse did not have any choice as to which provider the company offered, or any say in the selection process. The same goes for deciding which particular plans would be available. The choice was essentially from 2 options, presented by the employer, out of a universe of (a rough estimate) 40 or so plans. That's essentially the choice, picking between two options presented to you by your employer, without any real say in the process. In our experience, the limited options they give are usually just between one plan and another, more expensive plan with better coverage. Again, the employee has no say in what the baseline (the lower of the offered plans) is, no real say in what the more premium plans are. This is like sitting down to a full meal and being told that the only thing you have control over is what dressing you get on your salad. Yay, there's choice! But it's superficial and pretty much meaningless.
The only real "choice" involved is the "choice" to essentially ditch your comfortable employment for the uncertain prospect of getting a new job with better insurance. That requires you to first find another, similar job that will provide something roughly on par with the income you were earning before. This employer, for this to be any sort of real choice, should be somewhere where it would be easy to move. And, finally, before even employment, you would have to extract the exact details of the (again, limited) insurance options the employer has decided to make available for you, which may or may not be available before you begin your employment. What wonderful and free choice we all have!
This isn't even getting into how much of our earning power is destroyed by the crippling and rising price of insurance. But hey, it's easy to wave your hands, shout "free choices" and pretend that everything is a-ok.
Health care is not an entitlement or a right.
Maybe it isn't for YOU, but it is for people in many countries. In the United States it actually is an entitlement for people over 65, Veterans, the extremely poor, (and I think recently children?). So except for the majority of people in developed countries, and a significant portion of Americans, you're right.
Among the major options that many right-leaning politicians in America have been pushing is tearing down regulation that has prevented insurance companies from offering low-cost catastrophic-only insurance, and removing regulation that prevents cross-state offerings for insurance.
His point wasn't that he couldn't get catastrophic only insurance, his point was that because of the way the insurance pools work, he had to pay a LOT more for as a self-employed individual than he and a large employer would pay when you join a much larger pool that large businesses can get into. For all we know catastrophic insurance was an option.
Just because it is a choice you don't like doesn't mean you don't have a choice. You ALWAYS have a choice,
Talk about bending over backwards to try to fit your own viewpoint into a word definition, sheesh. So using your definitions, if Charles Manson escaped from jail and kidnapped you and gave you the "choice" between strangling you, and shooting you, you shouldn't really complain about being murdered because Charlie is "nice" and gave you a "choice"? It seems you can't see the forest through the trees.
And yet, ANY PERSON, regardless of insurance or socioeconomic status, is able to walk into an emergency room in America TODAY and receive full treatment without concern over the final cost.
Hahahah! Wow.. do you really believe that emergency rooms are really a good form of healthcare? The truth is that treating people in an emergency room is far more expensive than it would have been to treat someone BEFORE the problem got so bad they had to go to a emergency room. Your statement just astounds me in its ignorance. From a vaccination and public health standpoint and spread of disease standpoint ALONE it's idiotic to have an underclass of people with limited access to healthcare. Ever heard of herd immunity? Vaccines aren't 100% effective and never will be. Much of the protection you receive from life threatening illness is from other people being immunized against the disease. Having un-vaccinated people in the population is like having dry kindling in a forest. It only encourages disease to start and spread like a wildfire. There's a ton of reasons why Emergency only healthcare is simply idiotic. Do you really think that all illness is emergency only? You don't even have to be compassionate here. Your own greed and self interest can guide you away from this very stupid form of healthcare, if only you'd be a bit less ignorant.
Sounds like an imperfect, but otherwise pretty good system to me. Why trash it?
Spoken by someone who's obviously in the 95% of the 85%, and has never had a life threatening illness. Did you understand that many people covered by health insurance go BANKRUPT who when they get a major illness like cancer and the health insurance provider cancels their policy?
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