Monday, November 17, 2008

A Mayor Not Worth His Salt

Here we go again-Mother Bloomberg is back at trying to insure that we all are as healthy as we can be. According to the NY Post, the target du jour is now salt: "The city has come up with a plan to help you shake your salt habit, according to New York magazine. In a closed-door gathering at Gracie Mansion late last month, health experts and food-industry representatives were told about Mayor Bloomberg's next crusade - an effort to reduce the salt in processed food by 20 percent over the next five years, the magazine reports in this week's issue."

That's what we really like about the mayor; while the city's economy's in free fall, and folks are worried about their jobs, and the ability to pay the rent, Mayor Mike's focusing on people's diet-once again trying to tell New Yorkers how they should live their lives: "City health czar Dr. Thomas Frieden went as far as saying that high blood pressure, which is linked to excessive salt, is "the greatest public-health threat facing the city." He leaned on industry groups to sign on to the plan by the end this month, according to an attendee. Restaurateurs will be encouraged to join a "voluntary" initiative and that there won't be new regulations."

No, the city's greatest health threat is economic insolvency, and an economy that is about to hemorrhage jobs; so all of Frieden's hysteria over fast food needs to be put into some kind of perspective. Those neighborhood businesses, and the jobs they generate, are more integral to the health of the city than the regulatory impositions of an out of control Health Commissar. And we know what Frieden sees as "voluntary."

It's time to get these Nannys the old heave ho; and we believe that the continued health hectoring by the mayor and his minions will speed his already beginning political decline. Clearly, Bloomberg's a mayor who's not worth his salt.