[jocon307]

“Regardless of the specific behavior being encouraged or punished, the end-result is more government control of the way individuals live their lives.”

Yes, and I’m sure we’ve all seen enough “twilight zones” to know how that turns out

[AnotherUnixGeek]

Yes, and I’m sure we’ve all seen enough “twilight zones” to know how that turns out

Or we can look at NYC right now, and see a mayor criminalizing the sales of large sodas. This punishes the seller, but it's inefficient and rouses public anger. Government health-care enables the government to avoid the hassle and lobbying resistance involved in banning one product at a time and directly punish taxpayers who choose to have one steak too many or one Pepsi too many. It also pits taxpayers against each other in a 'if A is being penalized, B should be penalized too' contest which ends up with more and more private behaviors becoming the business of government.