I suppose I’m part libertarian, as I really object to governments trying to control the leisure activities of their citizens—always “for the public good.” While I can understand a desire to stop bad habits like smoking by taxing the hell out of cigarettes, I support that only because it raises money that should be (but isn’t always) earmarked to help cover the costs to the public of smoking-induced health problems.

Yes, I can understand taxing to help relieve the public burden of people’s smoking habits, but there’s really only one bad habit linked to lung cancer and emphysema. Things are different when it comes to diet, for there are many dietary causes of obesity and its attendant byproducts of heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and so on. Governments have tried controlling these, too, by banning trans fats (as the U. S. government is now doing for artificial trans fats) or putting taxes on soda pops with sugar, as has been done by several countries and, in the U.S., by the People’s Republic of Berkeley. Most other U.S. measures have failed, and of course the soda manufacturers have fought them.

And a recent attempt to impose a pretty stiff soda tax in California has just failed. It would have been 2¢ per ounce, which is a whopping 24 cents on a 12-ounce can of Coke, which you can buy pretty close to that price when it’s on sale. That’s a substantial tax, all because some people want to control the diets of others—especially poor people who can’t afford steep taxes.

As the Sacramento Bee reported, though, the soda tax bill in California was pulled from the legislature without coming to a vote. This is mourned by Lifestyle Nanny Jason Best at TakePart in a column with the ludicrous title of “Big Soda wins in California”

There’s little doubt that soda and other sugary beverages are at least partly to blame, however. As such, it only seems fair that they be taxed to help shoulder at least a fraction of the staggering health care costs associated with the epidemic of obesity-related disease, estimated at between $147 billion to $210 billion each year. California’s proposed soda tax would’ve been a step in the right direction. Let’s hope its supporters take heart and try again next year.

Yes, of course. So why not tax cookies, red meat, butter, candy, potato chips, Cheetos, and so on? Cigarette taxes—maybe. Soda and snack taxes—not for me! I do support getting the soda machines out of schools, which is at least a nod toward improved health, but I don’t support doubling the price of a can of soda because Leisure Fascists think it’s bad for me. After all, not everybody gets obese from drinking Coke!

I still remember two incidents that have led me to oppose this kind of thing. The first was when my mother died a few years back, and I was so upset that I bought a pack of cigarettes to calm myself. (I used to smoke a bit in college, and still have one cigarette every few months when I can cadge it, but have pretty much stopped completely over the last forty years.). A guy in line behind me at the store took it upon himself to lecture me, asking, “Don’t you know those things can kill you?” I looked at him darkly and told him why I was buying cigarettes. That shut him up.

The other occasion was when I was walking down the street in Davis, California, smoking a fine cigar that my friend Michael Turelli had given me. One person held their nose and pointed at me when I walked by, and that person was in a store behind a window. When I sat down in a park to enjoy my stogie, a cop came by and told me that I had to move on: I could smoke the cigar while walking, but not when sitting down far away from anyone else. That’s the law in Davis.

These two episodes make clear that concern for health is not the sole reason for Leisure Fascists’ desire to tax anything that could hurt you. Much of it is based on a ridiculous moral stance: the Leisure Fascists want to dictate how other people live. And once you buy into that philosophy, there’s no end to the taxes you can levy.