“Last night’s broadcast of Paula Zahn Now on CNN included a debate between a staunch opponent of consumer freedom and an equally steadfast supporter, arguing over that most absurd of food police proposals: the fat tax. Veteran trial lawyer John Banzhaf led off in favor of fat taxes by talking about cigarettes, pointing out that since tobacco can be addictive … well, we couldn’t really follow the connection. Reason magazine editor Jacob Sullum, on the other hand, pointed out that a tax on fatty foods is ‘not a very efficient or fair approach to this problem’ of obesity. Sullum went on to pick apart the fat tax with this sound observation: If you impose a tax on fattening foods, there are plenty of thin people and merely overweight not obese people who eat potato chips and ice cream. They’re going to end up paying a penalty for that and that doesn’t seem fair and it’s certainly not efficient in terms of recouping the costs.” (05/31/06)