Michael Bloomberg's Authoritarian Instincts

Michael Bloomberg's Authoritarian Instincts

If the Bloomberg administration believes that salt is worth losing your freedom over, imagine what he'd have planned after a terrorist attack.

David Harsanyi | April 25, 2013

So, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg believes that the public's interpretation of the Constitution must evolve in the face of terror

attacks such as the one in Boston. "You're going to have to have

a level of security greater than you did back in the olden days,"

the man explained, "and our laws and our interpretation of the

Constitution, I think, have to change."

Of course he thinks they do. That's why we have constitutions -- so

they can be changed in tumultuous times. As Bloomberg sees it, the

first obligation of government is to keep your "children safe." How this wide-ranging duty affects other societal concerns -- liberty, cost, etc.

-- is largely irrelevant because ... well, because toddlers are cute.

Those tobacco-addicted Founding Fathers didn't have the decency to

include a single line about keeping Americans salubrious or children.

Bloomberg is an authoritarian. 

He's not an authoritarian in the way Josef Stalin or Pol Pot was

authoritarian, but every instinct tells you he's a man who would

use any power given to him to govern every aspect of public and

private life whenever necessary -- or, more precisely, whenever he

finds it necessary, which is frequently. All said, he's exactly the type

of person who makes the Constitution a necessity.

Anyone who believes your caloric intake is government's prime

concern should be watched carefully, of course; but no matter

what crusade the man's on, his rationalization for limiting

personal freedom is a dangero:p>

the next thing you know you're lspan style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 9.5pt;">are popular (smoking bans), and others are less so (limiting portion

sizes and banning ingredients), but all of them set precedents that

distort the relationship between government and citizens. The jump

from minor infringements on personal liberty to giant ones is a shorter

one than you think.

Allow a politician to tell you what your portion sizes should be and

the next thing you know you're letting Washington force you to

buy insurance you don't want.

If the Bloomberg administration believes that salt -- "the greatest

public health threat facing" New York City -- is worth losing your

freedom over, imagine what he'd have planned after a terrorist attack.

When Justice Milton Tingling struck down Bloomberg's pathetic soda

ban as "arbitrary and capricious" last year, he might as well have been

talking about the mayor's overall disposition. Bloomberg likes to act as

if he's a man free of the unpleasantness of political ideology or party.

He's the driving force behind the inane No Labels group -- which, in

addition to having no labels, has no ideas and no support.

But pretending to be without a guiding philosophy doesn't by default

make you a moderate. It can just as easily mean you support using

arbitrary and capricious power to get your way.

I suppose the one positive thing that can be said of a man who once

declared "I do think there are certain times we should infringe on your freedom" is that he's more honest than most. You may remember that Bloomberg had term limits lifted in New York City so he could run

for a third term. (Citizens simply couldn't bear to move on without him nagging them about the perils of plastic foam cups.) Understanding

New York, though, I realize that the average person rarely thinks about

the mayor, as urban life churns on despite the best efforts of its worst to be mainstreamed.

political players in the nation, to allow his radical idea of governance

to be mainstreamed.

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