Let's Tax Soda Pop

Let's tax soda pop. (See here) an MSNBC article that discusses the sugar laden drink as being the main cause of obesity.

We need to tax the public until they give up on this public health threat. This is what we are doing to tobacco and the threat to the public health from sugar laden beverages should not be ignored either.

Please be quick to note that my beverage of choice, beer, should not be taxed. Turns out you are better off drinking your average beer beverage then you are drinking your average softdrink.

So it turns out drinking beer is good for you if it is drank in moderation. Now if I could just get that "moderation" part perfect!

What the heck, as long as I do not drink and drive, consuming beer to excess is probably no worse then drinking soda pop in moderation, that is as long as you are not on the Adkins diet! Even then some beer advertisers claim that if you drink all of their beer you want, you can do so with zero carbohydrates!

OK, let us tax Coca-cola, Pepsi-cola, Kool-aid, and all of these other purveyors of sugar laden beverages. Childhood obesity is on the increase as reported (here). The REAL threat to the health of our children does not reside with the tobacco industry inducing our children to smoke. It lies with all the parents who are raising little fat kids.

This will still be an American free society. If parents want to raise little fat kids by pouring soft drinks down their throats they will still be allowed to do so. However we should make it more expensive for them to follow this behavior that threatens the greater public health by imposing taxes upon them.

Once we have succeeded in taxing soft drinks out of existence, the next stop is taxing pre-sweetened breakfast cereals and donuts to the point they too are unaffordable. Here too in a free society you can consume them if you want, we are just going to make it unaffordable for you to do so.

Meanwhile, those of us who continue to live "healthy lives" within the ever changing definition of just what exactly a "healthy life" is are going to pay for everything we want from the taxes we are going to get from those of you who refuse to conform.

Just be forewarned. Do not try to include beer in this definition. We are willing to give up soda pop, we are willing to give up sugar pops. But if you dare to include beer, well you are going to have a real problem. Grin.