There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
You might recall back on October 8 we debated the merits or horrors (depending on your point of view) of NY Mayor Bloomberg and company barring food stamp recipients from buying soda.
My libertarian, Gadsden-Flag-loving blood boiled at the thought of turning welfare recipients into controlled chattel. Remember that in an economy like we have now not all who receive government largess are deadbeats – some have just suffered some very bad beats. I hate government control of people – even people on welfare.
Others disagreed. The taxpayer was being treaded upon. So those folks adopted a contractual view of things: If you want to dance you have to pay the band. If you want the government food stamps the government can set the rules. Otherwise, buy your own orange crush.
Today we have a related story: The People’s Republic of San Francisco has banned toys in McDonald’s Happy Meals. Their thought is that Happy Meals contain food that is bad for kids, so kids shouldn’t be enticed to bad food with a toy.
Following that logic, I propose we ban toys in San Francisco so children won’t be enticed to live there.
Seriously though (ok I was serious) my concern is the ever expanding view of government that they have the ever expanding power to decide what is good for us and control our behavior like a nanny.
Considering this one doesn’t apply to just food stamp recipients but to the rest of us as well, I don’t think there is any denying that liberals have us traveling down Hayek’s road to serfdom.
First they came for the Happy Meal, and I said nothing…
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Aug '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
It's not the first thing that San Francisco city admin has taken away from the residents of that once great city.
1. The ability to walk the streets unmolested by bums, the stench of the bums, and their assorted detritus.
2. The right to manage your own properties is gone with rent control and restrictions on the eviction of certain demographics.
3. Frequent street displays of pornography, deviant sexual practices that expose children to the worst (nonviolent but often fatal) human behaviour imagined.
No point in going on, the city is in the thrall of cultural and moral relativism that only stops with radical changes. The residents become balkanized, isolated in their own neighborhoods, businesses become more and more expensive to run which forces them to close or move. The ones that stay have to charge more and more, forcing the residents to move. City subsidies of rent never brought rates down, just quality and cleanliness as the market dynamic left the transaction without competition.
Mission, Tenderloin, Haight, North Beach all are slipping away....,
Sep '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Agree with you completely. But also, it just occured to me that these measures serve to create a controversy that will distract folks from the very real larger issues. The media can chat and debate endlessly about this, and it is important, but in place of mentioning, for example, that California is bankrupt....
I saw in the Daily Mail today that Britain's "red light" cameras are now also tracking insurance, taxes, and seat belt usage. Unbelievable!
May '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
“We’re part of a movement that is moving forward an agenda of food justice,” said San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar, who sponsored a ban on toys with meals that didn’t meet the nanny state’s approval.
Google the phrase. Boy, the stuff you'll come up with!
From Washington State: "Through anti-oppressive and anti-racist organizing we seek to challenge the global reach of the industrial and corporate-driven food system. We promote existing alternatives to the dominant model of agriculture, as we join the global struggle for food sovereignty for all!"
(http://www.seattleglobaljustice.org/food-justice/)
Or maybe you'd prefer Occidental College's "Grocery Accountability Project."
While holding your groceries accountable is an admirable idea (the Frosted Flakes have been getting away with murder), they're pushing Union agendas and free transportation to the store, all of which will be paid for without raising prices, I'm sure.
Jul '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Will they still have, um, adult toys in the Happy Meals in gay neighborhoods?
Edited on Nov 4, 2010 at 2:08pmJul '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
I had long observed that real governmental tyranny is usually at the county level, and collected a few nightmarish stories of how neighbors use the levers of county government to grief each other endlessly. My favorite were the unfortunate folks that had three dogs on a quarter acre lot (by platte, 3% short of the size lot required for three dogs). A neighbor complained about the "noisy" dogs, a canvas of the neighborhood found that no one else thought the dogs noisy. In confirming the lot size by inspection the county found another $5000 worth of code violations (the house was built around 1950) plus fines.
Throw in some legal fees, but the good news is that with a stack of neighbor depositions on the dogs behalf the judge threw out the county's case against that extra dog.
Of course, the arrival of Obamacare topped anything in my folder. Itemized list of assaults on the American family therein available on request. Who are supposed to be the haters again?
Oct '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
San Francisco can enjoy the road to serfdom/perdition as far as I'm concerned. However, if some weasel politicians ever try something like that in St. Louis, I'm going to go Dirty Harry - and I will be joining the vigilante cops from Magnum Force.
Jul '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
This is so stupid it's almost impossible to caricature.
Problem: Some parents aren't doing such a great job raising their kids.
Solution: Ban some icky commercial practice.
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
So right my friend. The lower the level of government, the more they can hurt you. It's the Township Councilman who lives across the street who votes to take your house by Eminent Domain.
May '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
The whole story is far more humorous when you consider the socio-economic profile of the supervisors and health-conscious agitators for this change and the clientele of the McDonald's that are located in the city limits. Al Sharpton was NOT agitating to remove the toys from the Happy Meals.
It's a little sinister in terms of considering where the serfdom begins: among the portion of the population least equipped through education and resources and organization to defend against it.
What is just as distressing however is the attitude it displays toward commerce. Granted the SF Board of Supervisors is an extreme example, but directionally reflective of the understanding and attitude toward commerce on the left. They want everyone to have jobs, but only approved jobs working for organic food co-ops, Google, Apple and, of course, government.
Edited on Nov 4, 2010 at 2:58pmJun '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
The situation is a lot worse than a simple ban on Happy Meals. What this shows is the ignorance of the Board of Supervisors when considering markets and price points. I was told some time ago that McDonald’s server the equivalent of one meal per week to the entire population of the United Starts. Now, Mickey D’s isn’t serving filet, what the company does is serve the best food they can at a price point. It is the price point that is important here, and it is the toy that is incidental. When I was in University I practically lived at Mickey D’s, not because I considered it fine dining, but because it was all I could afford after deducting beer money from the food budget. Odd thing is, I didn’t gain any weight, and, if my health is any indicator, I didn’t clog any arteries. What this Board of Supervisors is trying to do to McDonald’s they have already done to the real estate development industry with excessive regulation all the while demanding developers provide “affordable” housing,
Jun '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Welcome to the city that hates children. Have a tofu burger and sprouts you budding little socialists. No toys allowed in the new utopia...and smile when you eat that! Don't you know this is for the good of the masses? Want to know what Obama's socialist utopia looks like? Look to San Francisco. The city that passes a sanctuary city ordinance that is still in violation of state and federal law; an ordinance targeted specifically at McDonald’s exerting total control of what a private company can serve its customers (waiting for Big Macs and Quarter Pounders to be banned); an ordinance that prevents US Naval vessels from docking at its piers: a rampant, uncontrolled illicit drug market; and homeless people who defecate on city streets. Watch where you're walking, America.
Edited on Nov 4, 2010 at 3:28pmMay '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Man, you beat me to it! Food justice... Awesome!
There were no happy meals when I was a kid, but I remember when chicken Mcnuggets came along. The joint was packed, and they couldn't keep them in stock. That was also when parents cared about their children and a trip to Mickey D's was a treat reserved for after a big baseball game or for suffering through a visit to the doctor's office.
I think in a lot of America that's all it still is, but if you ask a liberal, it's all people eat because they aren't smart enough to know any better. I actually dated a "food activist" for a while and she was convinced that corporate ads and govt. subsidies brainwashed people to eat at McDs.
We agreed that govt. subsidies were bad, but that's as far as I would go.
Jun '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
You know what food injustice is:
When will the Board of Supervisors address the above list of food injustice problems?
Edited on Nov 4, 2010 at 5:10pmJun '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
I’m at McDonald’s one day waiting in line to catch a gut bomb before a business meeting when a guy comes in cussing. Turned out he’d been stuck in a massive traffic jam because some guy was debating taking a header off the Patullo Bridge in New Westminster, BC. The suicide wanna be had been up on top for more than four hours, so the cops asked him if he was hungry. Turns out the guy hadn’t had breakfast and it was nearing lunch. The guy behind me was livid; he couldn’t believe the cops would send someone out to McDonalds, the closest restaurant to the bridge, for burgers. The guy behind me asks his incensed pay, “Did they get him a Happy Meal?”
Jul '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Guys, guys, guys. Take a pill.
1. Yes, this is idiocy of th highest order. Pompous progressive martinets on a rampage. And a very good reason not to live in SF.
2. The beauty of Federalism is that it doesn't matter, as long as the idiots of SF do not have the power to impose their idiocy on the rest of us.
3. Maintaining the proper structure of democracy is so much more important than individual policy decisions.
Let the Constitution operate within its proper bounds. And hold your nose at the idiocy that happens as an inevitable byproduct.
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
I just watched the Hannity panel chewing this over. Somehow nobody managed to raise what seems to me to be the central question: who has the authority to determine hazardousness?
Aug '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Aug '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Compared to the other parents around me, I wasn't unusually dedicated to the cause of good nutrition for my children. My neighbor (who worked--needed to work-- cleaning houses) made whole weat bread and low sugar, whole weat muffins, grew some of her own vegetables, and took a McDonald's break with her kids less often than I did. (We ate out only at McDonald's about once every two weeks.)
I know it's next to impossible to limit teenagers access to fast food. They have sources of transportation and money other than parents. But what do we know about parents who don't make it their business to limit the amount of fatty, salty or sugary foods available to their kids when the kids are young enough to want a toy in the happy meal?
Why won't we acknowledge that the problem here is ignorant or indifferent parents?
And what is the real objective when this problem is used as an excuse to force changes on a restaurant franchise?
Aug '10
Re: There Will Be No Happy Meals Served On The Road To Serfdom, Either
Cas - And if learned anything from reading Thomas Sowell, removing the toy (which was almost certainly an ad-subsidized promo item from Disney or some such company) may raise the price of the meal.
Or am I missing something?