Stop Us Before We Slurp Again

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has determined that New Yorkers are not bright enough to make the critical decision of how much soda to buy.  He and the calorie cops at the New York City Board of Health are on the scene.  Clearly, New Yorkers collectively clamored, “Stop us before we slurp again!”  No sodas larger than sixteen ounces can be purchased, if Bloomberg gets his way.  All in the name moderation – and Bloomberg is all about moderation.  Just ask him.

Of course, his call for limiting soda purchases came one day before National Donut Day, where Bloomberg issued an official proclamation for New York City Donut Day.  The timing was dripping with irony, but even irony must be doled out in moderation.  (How many calories are in a half pound of irony anyway?)

But Bloomberg says he isn’t stopping anyone from getting as much soda as they want.  If someone wants thirty two ounces of soda, they can get two 16-ounce cups, or four 8-ounce cups, or sixteen 2-ounce cups, or thirty two 1-ounce cups.  Bloomberg doesn’t want to appear unreasonable.  Of course, should someone want a sixty four ounce drink…wait, let me get my calculator.

Many believe that the bigger the government, the smaller the citizen.  This is undoubtedly true.  Mayor Bloomberg also believes the bigger the government, the smaller the soda.

Not to be outdone in the moderation department, some members of the New York City Board of Health want to limit popcorn and milk.  Milk leads to milkshakes and how many milkshake drinkers could have been stopped if only they had not been introduced to milk at an early age?  But, really, I’m all in with moderation so we shouldn’t stop there – let’s ban cows.  If you want to limit milk consumption, shouldn’t you stop it at the source?  Not only that, but we can get a two-fer – no milk and no red meat.  (Actually, a three-fer, since we would also be eliminating the ozone-depleting cow flatulence.) And then, Bloomberg should ban breast milk, recent Newsweek cover stories notwithstanding.

Continuing with the moderation theme, it is clear that a large amount of popcorn consumption occurs while movie watching.  As movie viewing leads to popcorn consumption (a clear cause and effect), shouldn’t movies be banned?  And since microwaves are the primary method by which popcorn is cooked at home, those should also be banned.  Don’t you just love moderation?

Now that we’ve got that settled, I’m going to sit down and watch the movie Escape From New York on cable with some popcorn and 32-ounce soda in hand.  I live in Arizona.

Curtice Mang is the author of the new book, The Constitution – I’m Not Kidding and Other Tales of Liberal Folly. He can be contacted at www.mangwrites.com, where one can also purchase his book; or contact Curtice at mangwrites at cox.net.