UPDATE: Hours after it was first reported in the NY Post, Mayor Mike Bloomberg announced he was backing off plans to limit the number of bars and stores that could sell intoxicating beverages. Wonder why?
The old adage holds true. First they came for the cigarette smokers. But you didn’t raise your hand because you didn’t smoke, right? Then they came for the people with chronic atherosclerosis, but you already limited your salt intake so you didn’t raise your hand then either. Now, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg is moving to limit the number of establishments that sell intoxicating beverages – all in the name of your health and quality of life. Bet you feel bad that you didn’t raise a stink back in 2004 now don’t you?
Granted this axiom originally applied to the Holocaust, but you get the idea.
The city’s Health Department is going to work with the “Partnership for a Healthier New York” to dramatically reduce the number of establishments that sell alcohol.
Guess where the money to fund this program comes from? The sprawling health care reform law passed in 2010 that has a grant for community “transformation.” Who knew that by “transformation,” they meant a dystopian hellscape where Big Bro Bloomberg tells you what you should or should not be consuming. Gosh, I wonder why people hate the health care law so much?
The term “nanny state” doesn’t quite go far enough – libertarians, feel free to freak out.
The official reasoning for the decision is, of course, health care costs. Alcohol-related injuries due to car crashes and excessive intake are a significant problem in the city’s emergency rooms. Intoxicating substances are also a factor in nearly half of homicides in the city.
Of course, we have a pretty good idea of what happens when the government determines just how much alcohol one can or cannot purchase:
Back then, they called it capital “T” total abstinence, but the constitutional amendment which codified the Volstead Act into law was commonly referred to as “prohibition.”
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