Bossy Mayor Bloomberg Seeks NYC Ban on Large Sodas

New York City’s mayor Mike Bloomberg may be laissez faire when it comes to the city’s big business interests, but if you want to have a cigarette or buy a large soda, then he’s all up in your shit.

The city controversially banned smoking in a large swath of outdoor places late last year, and now Bloomberg is coming for your Pepsi. The nanny state mayor is sticking his bossy nose into your fast food meals and theater-going experiencing, deciding that because sixteen ounces of soda is sufficient for him, everyone else should never want to consume an ounce more of soda despite the fact the other eight million people living in New York City don’t have tuxedoed butlers to drive us from destination to destination and rather have to rely on the city’s sweltering and swamplike subways to get places.

Yeah, sixteen ounces of beverage may seem like a lot, but if you’ve just had to spend an hour on a 90+ degree F train and run up and down several flights of stairs on the filthy platforms then screw you if you want to tell me how much soda to drink. Anyway, Bloomberg thinks he’s all of our dads, and the New York Times quotes the mayor as indicating that New York City residents totally want him to tell them how much Coke is too much Coke:

“Obesity is a nationwide problem, and all over the United States, public health officials are wringing their hands saying, ‘Oh, this is terrible,’ …New York City is not about wringing your hands; it’s about doing something. I think that’s what the public wants the mayor to do.”

Basically, any fountain soda would be affected by the proposed ban- a ban thought to be likely to pass since the Board of Health has to vote on it for it to go through, and guess who appointed all those guys? Soda trade groups are opposed to the ban, telling the Times:

“The New York City health department’s unhealthy obsession with attacking soft drinks is again pushing them over the top. It’s time for serious health professionals to move on and seek solutions that are going to actually curb obesity. These zealous proposals just distract from the hard work that needs to be done on this front.”

The New York City soda ban could go into effect as soon as March, and diet sodas wouldn’t be affected by the draconian rule.