The Council Knows What’s Best For You
In an effort to save society and better the community, Councilmembers Campos, Williams, and Chu have taken it upon themselves to try and impose a one-year moratorium on the construction of fast food restaurants in San Jose. “Obesity is a huge problem within our society and among children,” Campos was quoted as saying.
Mayor Reed responded, “I don’t think this is the way to solve our obesity problem . . . I happen to like McDonald’s salads, and I don’t think we should be telling our residents where they can and cannot eat.” (Mercury News, 8/15/08)
The Kindergarten logic here is that if there are fewer fast food restaurants, people will suddenly become more self-interested, will consume less “unhealthy food,” and devote more attention to the wellbeing of their children. Please.
If we want the members of the city council to legislate health initiatives, let’s get real about it, let’s go all the way! Impose a $20 per-pack tax on cigarettes. Fine bartenders $5,000 every time they serve a patron more than two drinks. Require that everyone in the City of San Jose join a gym and prove that they work out at least three times a week. Prohibit left turns on all San Jose city streets.
On the one hand, these sorts of attempts at legislation are just silly stuff. On the other hand, they are serious and a bit alarming. Elected officials are not supposed to freelance. They are supposed to take their instructions from the people.
What do you call people who take it upon themselves to discern and deliver what’s “best for you?” Nannies? Elitists? Pests? Dictators?
Hey, at least we’re “less extreme” than San Francisco:
http://www.reason.com/news/show/127481.html
This chest-thumping, momentarily-libertarian, wild west approach to the issue is getting really tiresome. Stop acting like this is the next step towards 1984.
Oh, but folks lately I have been spotted
With a Big Mac on my breath
Stumbling into a Colonel Sanders
With a face as white as death
I’m afraid someday they’ll find me
Just stretched out on my bed
With a handful of Pringles potato chips
And a Ding Dong by my head
#2- Chest-thumping, wild west approach? Give me a break. What happened to individual responsibility?
Let me guess, your well thought out nuanced position is that the rest of us are just too stupid to decide for ourselves?
I agree. The city council shouldn’t be spending time on stuff like this. Instead they should be spending time deciding what kind of stuff people can look at on the internet in libraries.
The Center For Consumer Freedom http://www.consumerfreedom.com/ has soom good articles about food nazis:
http://www.consumerfreedom.com/issuepage.cfm/topic/26
What’s the real purpose behind this “let’s save them from themselves” bullshit. It is all about making news by folks with very limited intellectual resources. They think they can get famous by some poorly “thought out” goodness gambit. Leading the way to salvation gets you re-elected, the first thought the usual hack politician has upon winning an election. The only problem—the voters are so stupid they may buy it.
Or, it could be a labor-backed strategy to organize fast food workers. With Campos and Williams it is always a possibility. George Green
We certainly have precedent for this.
We make cocaine and heroine because people can’t be trusted to moderate their own consumption or expenditure.
The only difference between one and the other is killing yourself quickly and killing yourself slowly.
Just being Devil’s Advocate here.
I think preventing fast food chains from opening in San Jose is good for two reasons. First of all it puts the residents and the City on the right track towards a healthier living for Children and Adults alike. But I don’t see that as the biggest reason to prevent Fast Food or Chains in General to open in San Jose. How many Fastfood or Chain Restaurants do you see in San Francisco?, Berkeley?, Palo Alto?, or Los Gatos?. If San Jose wants to be considered one of the great cities in the United States, then we need to upgrade our dining scene. We need to continue to encourage local residents to open restaurants in San Jose and we are not supporting them by allowing Taco Bell, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Applebee’s, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Subway, Chevy’s etc to open. Limiting the Amount of Fast Foods chains is the first step for San Jose to become a Culinary Destination.
Alright, if you want to gorge on cheap culture, please move somewhere else. It’s obviously all the same to you anyway, so it shouldn’t matter.
Just eat it, eat it, eat it!
Have some more yogurt, have some more spam
It doesn’t matter if it’s fresh or canned.
Have a banana, have a whole bunch
It doesn’t matter what you had for lunch.
Have some more chicken, have some more pie
It doesn’t matter, if it’s boiled or fried.
You better listen, better do what you’re told
You haven’t even touched your tuna casserole
You better chow down or it’s gonna get cold!
So eat it! Eat it, eat it, eat it!
Get yourself an egg and beat it!
I for one like the proposal. There are way too many fast food restaraunts in San Jose. Its hard to find a decent meal in some neighborhoods. And I don’t think the three councilmembers who are proposing this are trying to tell me what to eat. I live in walking distance to a McDonalds and a Jack in the Box. If this policy passes, I’ll still be able to walk over to either and stuff myself with high fat crap. And I’ll still be able to choose not to.
Robert, I respect your choice not to eat fast food. I just resent a bunch of government meddlers telling me what I can eat.
This is rediculous to be sure. FFF said it very well. The obvious targets are corporations and their lack of unionization. Her goal is to seek a soft target and strike swiftly in an effort to say she is “doing something for the children.” Very transparent IMHO.
IF Nora really cared about children in San Jose she would be doing a helluva lot more to protect them like banning all alcohol, cigarettes, butter and lard sold throughtout San Jose. Look at the raw matterials, not the delivery system. Their logic is so fubared up its hard even to argue back at them. Good luck Chuck with this one.
Is fast food really that worse than the food you might order at a more respectable (in Campos’ eyes) restaurant like Denny’s? Last time I checked most of the food at many sit down restaurants had enough fat and salt to clog the cleanest arteries. If Campos, Williams, and Chu want to meddle with restaurants, let’s see nutrition information prominently displayed so eaters can make an intelligent choice.
Leaving aside what are undoubtedly the key points of this issue, those being nannyism and council priorities, there is an additional question of whether the council-nannies have aimed at a legitimate target.
I understand that there is widespread agreement on the evils of fast food, but from a scientific perspective the availability-level of the restaurants can only constitute an indisputable obesity factor if there are no alternative dining choices. If all available food suppliers were fast food restaurants then the link would be apparent. But here, where abundant choice exists and includes restaurants offering foods from the entire nutritional spectrum, poor choice-making is not only the obvious factor in the obesity issue, it may be that it is the only factor.
There could be a fast food joint on every corner in town, but if the public chose not to eat fast food then the restaurants’ availability-level couldn’t be a factor in the public’s health. But what if everyone in San Jose chose to eat fast food, but limited their patronage to two meals a week, being careful to account for the fat and caloric content of their orders in their weekly total? Would the restaurants then be guilty of harming the public? I don’t see how: two reasonable meals a week are unlikely to hurt anyone other than those who are otherwise eating recklessly. The likely reality is this: it is entirely possible for a community to provide enough business to keep itself and its fast food industry healthy.
That it doesn’t happen, that a measurable percentage of the public doesn’t eat fast food and that the industry cannot rely on serving the entire population, but must instead count on an identifiable demographic to buy its products, demonstrates that it is an industry whose bottom line is serving its customers, not testing the willpower of people who prefer other options. In this, the fast food industry is no different than a number of other businesses: gyms that serve people who exercise; clothing shops that serve the fashion conscious; cosmetic surgeons who serve the vain. Unless the council believes that by allowing the unrestricted spread of gyms, clothing stores, and plastic surgeons it can change San Jose’s many fat slobs into handsome and fit fashion plates, it needs to back away from the idea that legislation can ever be the cure for bad decision-making or out-and-out gluttony.
Why does everyone assume that fast food means chains?
There isn’t much nutritional difference between a carne asada taco and McDonald’s hamburger.
Are we going to have a one year ban on opening taquerias, too?
Or is the government going to tell me that it’s ok to clog my arteries, but only if I eat the right type of food…
#4: I’m just reasonable enough to know that fast food is not being banned outright. This is a limit on future growth. It’s no different that not wanting another god damn Wal-Mart.
So once the ban on fast food outlets goes into effect, will people have to drive more to get to their food of choice? Won’t that lead to “global warming”.
Or will the city provide vouchers to help the fast food disenfranchised eat healthier? Or is this ban to be yet another example of “let them eat quiche” liberalism?
I’m guessing the city will be following up the ban on fast food outlets with price controls to keep the “healthy” food outlets from raising their prices.
I have total confidence in our city council’s ability to pull this off.
If this is the best Nora can do to show she is “higher office” material, then I hope she enjoys being out of elected office soon.
Perhaps this nonsense was best summed up many years ago by the late Victor Buono:
Lord, my soul is ripped with riot,
Incited by my wicked diet.
We are what we eat, said a wise old man,
And Lord, if that’s true, I’m a garbage can!
I want to rise on Judgment Day, that’s plain,
But at my present weight, I’ll need a crane!
So grant me strength that I may not fall
Into the clutches of cholesterol.
May my flesh with carrot curls be sated
That my soul may be polyunsaturated.
And show me the light that I may bear witness
To the President’s Council on Physical Fitness.
At oleomargarine I’ll never mutter,
For the road to hell is spread with butter.
And cake is cursed, and cream is awful,
And Satan is hiding in every waffle.
Mephistopheles lurks in provolone,
The devil is in each slice of bologna,
Beelzebub is a chocolate drop,
And Lucifer is a lollipop!
Give me this day my daily slice –
But cut it thin and toast it twice.
I beg upon my dimpled knees,
Deliver me from Jujubees.
And my when days of trial are done
And my war with malted milks is won,
Let me stand with the saints in heaven
In a shining robe – Size 37!
I can do it, Lord, if you’ll show to me
The virtues of lettuce and celery.
If you’ll teach me the evils of mayonnaise,
The sinfulness of hollandaise
And pasta a la milanese
And potatoes a la lyonaise
And crisp fried chicken from the south!
Lord, if you love me, SHUT MY MOUTH!
Steve # 13 proposed:“let’s see nutrition information prominently displayed so eaters can make an intelligent choice.” It’s already on all the food we buy is stores, Steve; and that hasn’t stemmed the obesity tide.
Food only part of obesity problem”
http://www.consumerfreedom.com/print.cfml?id=581&page=oped
Hey, let’s take it all the way. We don’t need to put a moratorium on new fat food restaurants. Let’s just prevent fat people from patronizing them, because, after all, we know what’s best 4 U.
We start by hiring fat monitors for all shifts at all “fat food” outlets. Phaedra will like that, since SEIU will organize them all and there’ll be lots of dues money to spend on labor-friendly initiatives.
We can’t have fat police, since police benefits and pensions are way too high. We’ll have fat monitors who refuse entrance to any fat food restaurant to anyone who they deem in their absolute discretion to be TOO DAMN FAT.
Just think—in a year everyone will be svelte, diabetes will cease to exist in SJ, heart disease rates will crumble, and there’ll be hundreds of physicians on welfare, since we’ll all be so damn healthy that no-one will need to see a doctor. But then, so will the owners and workers of from all the fat food restaurants; but that’s just acceptable collateral damage, right?
Let’s go, SJ City Council. We can FINALLY get one up on SF for correctness and humanitarianism. It’ll make Gavin’s Sanctuary Program For Convicted Felon Illegal Aliens look like a kindergarten experiment in social engineering and political correctness.
YYYEEESSSSS!!!
Novice,
Your comment about fast food customers having to drive further for their fatburgers got me thinking about other potential consequences of eradicating those businesses from the city.
—What would happen to all the burger flippers? Would they go on unemployment, back to Mexico, or is there some great need somewhere for their specialized McSkills?
—Where would fast food consumers get their meals? Would they pack their own lunches, break their budgets on better restaurants, or take to grazing the chip racks, deli aisles, and ice cream freezers of convenience stores?
—What would the loss of these businesses have on tax revenues? Will the city be forced to institute a nutritious food tax? Or maybe tax health club memberships?
—Besides their menu items, fast food restaurants provide their customers restrooms, protection from the elements, and convenient trash receptacles. Could the city afford to pick-up the slack and provide facilities at every public square, park, and patch of shaded lawn for the tens of thousands of new brown baggers?
—Fast food restaurants provide young people with the work experience necessary to qualify for better jobs. Where would they get their ground-floor experience? Maybe picking up the litter of brown baggers?
—What would be the nutritional effect on the young, two-income families who often rely on fast food for dinner during the work week? Will boxed macaroni and cheese and hot dogs really constitute an improvement? Is it even reasonable to expect that parents who’ve seldom found the time to cook nutritious meals will, with the disappearance of these restaurants, suddenly find the necessary time?
The city council has it backwards; they need to implement a 1 year moratorium on fat kids and adults from moving around new fast food restaurants.
JMOC and Steve,
The city eerrr LABOR couldn’t force a fat person ergency ordinance because they would need the police to cary it out. But have you seen any of our cops!? They all have bellies that hang down to their toes! Them forcing Fat persons out would look like a Sumu Wrestler Orgie.
It seems that many subscribe to the philosophy that if a problem cannot be fixed easily, it’s pointless to try at all. So what if fast food is only part of the obesity problem? Seat belts don’t ensure your survival in a car accident, but they sure help.
JMOC is also still operating under the impression that fast food is being banned entirely, not just slowed in its expansion. Luckily, he and Pete Campbell can now legally marry each other in the Church of Thick-Headed Paranoia.
The problem is that people DO want more WalMarts- the stores are full.
Fast food restauraunts seem to have quite a few customers, too. Someone must want KFC nearby, too.
Popeyes chicken coming to downtown soon! wooohoooo! (not!) Good call!
“the desires that people express in polls are often at odds with the preferences they reveal in the marketplace. If customers really clamored for posted calorie counts, restaurants would provide them voluntarily.”
http://www.nypost.com/seven/08202008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_menu_mandate_flim_flam_125230.htm
Nam Turk in Eastside doesn’t get that if you start with this proposed “slowing of fast food expansion,” the food nazis will want to come back with more and more draconian regulations until we’re living in a place where government tells us what to eat. Things are already going in that direction and it’s time to push back.
Proposals like this provide a very scary look into what some people want to use our government for.
The issue is not that big of a deal, the thought process is.
Nam Turk-
Who said that the anti-regulation folks don’t want to do anything about obesity?
I’m all in favor of adding enough park space that kids and adults can easily get some exercise. While we’re at it, make sure the pools and community centers stay open.
It’s just a different approach.
30: So what you’re saying is that rules always and absolutely lead to more rules? Well, we don’t exactly have anarchy right now, so you’re telling us that we’re currently on our way to total dictatorship? Interesting…
31: That’s more a treatment to a problem than prevention. Excuse me if I don’t like roundabout routes. How about this: having fewer restaurants will make people walk further to get to the ones that already exist. That’s the best of both worlds, no?
#14: I think you are on target, mostly.
Is it fair to target fast food restaurants with a moratorium, yet give RDA money to chain restaurants with unhealthy choices?
If the council wants to improve public health, add some bike lanes so that people can bike without getting pushed off the road. Then they can choose to go to McDonalds or to Good Kharma.