Mr. Bloomberg,
I know that public health has been one of your biggest pet causes throughout your political career, and that you firmly believe in the power of government to solve issues like heart disease, lung cancer, and diabetes. To that end, you have banned public smoking in bars and restaurants in New York City, and later extended that ban to public parks, plazas and walkways. You also introduced a ban on trans fats in restaurants, to help keep peoples' arteries clean. Most recently, you have introduced a law, without due process in city government, that bans the sale of sodas bigger than 16 ounces in bars, restaurants, street vendor carts and sports stadiums, and you claim that this is not an infringement on anyone's rights. After all, one can still buy 20-ounce sodas in the supermarket under this bill.
Perhaps you and I have different points of view when it comes to infringement on someone's rights. I subscribe to the J.S. Mill school of philosophy, which says that one is free - or ought to be free - to do whatever he or she pleases so long as it does not harm others. To that end, I can see your justification for banning smoking in restaurants - secondhand smoke is harmful. To some extent, this also explains your ban on trans fats and your current battle against soda. Trans fats pose a significant health risk, as does the over-consumption of sugar. However, whereas Mill gives freedom the benefit of the doubt, you seem more than willing to squelch freedom whenever it doesn't fit your worldview. This is why you continually raise taxes on cigarettes and impose restriction upon restriction on the sale of alcohol; you believe that the citizens of New York City are incapable of taking care of themselves. That they are so unintelligent that you have to act as their mother and father.
Freedom includes the ability to make decisions about what one will put into their bodies, be it food, drink, or drugs like alcohol and cigarettes. When you take that freedom away, however slightly or gradually, you are setting foot on the road to tyranny, as you have done. By not putting this bill through the proper legal process, you have declared "I don't care what the rest of the city thinks; my word is law." This tells me that the power you have enjoyed for so long has gotten to your head, and that because you have stopped responding to the will of the people, you are no longer fit to lead.
Mr. Mayor, I urge you to think about this matter further, and to hold a town hall meeting about it if it matters so much to you. Even if this bill receives popular approval, you at least ought to fine-tune it such that it is neither too light nor overbearing.
Your fellow citizen,
Cameron Beaudreault
I know that public health has been one of your biggest pet causes throughout your political career, and that you firmly believe in the power of government to solve issues like heart disease, lung cancer, and diabetes. To that end, you have banned public smoking in bars and restaurants in New York City, and later extended that ban to public parks, plazas and walkways. You also introduced a ban on trans fats in restaurants, to help keep peoples' arteries clean. Most recently, you have introduced a law, without due process in city government, that bans the sale of sodas bigger than 16 ounces in bars, restaurants, street vendor carts and sports stadiums, and you claim that this is not an infringement on anyone's rights. After all, one can still buy 20-ounce sodas in the supermarket under this bill.
Perhaps you and I have different points of view when it comes to infringement on someone's rights. I subscribe to the J.S. Mill school of philosophy, which says that one is free - or ought to be free - to do whatever he or she pleases so long as it does not harm others. To that end, I can see your justification for banning smoking in restaurants - secondhand smoke is harmful. To some extent, this also explains your ban on trans fats and your current battle against soda. Trans fats pose a significant health risk, as does the over-consumption of sugar. However, whereas Mill gives freedom the benefit of the doubt, you seem more than willing to squelch freedom whenever it doesn't fit your worldview. This is why you continually raise taxes on cigarettes and impose restriction upon restriction on the sale of alcohol; you believe that the citizens of New York City are incapable of taking care of themselves. That they are so unintelligent that you have to act as their mother and father.
Freedom includes the ability to make decisions about what one will put into their bodies, be it food, drink, or drugs like alcohol and cigarettes. When you take that freedom away, however slightly or gradually, you are setting foot on the road to tyranny, as you have done. By not putting this bill through the proper legal process, you have declared "I don't care what the rest of the city thinks; my word is law." This tells me that the power you have enjoyed for so long has gotten to your head, and that because you have stopped responding to the will of the people, you are no longer fit to lead.
Mr. Mayor, I urge you to think about this matter further, and to hold a town hall meeting about it if it matters so much to you. Even if this bill receives popular approval, you at least ought to fine-tune it such that it is neither too light nor overbearing.
Your fellow citizen,
Cameron Beaudreault
Well shit. WHo would have thought that this would actually happen.
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