By Senator Rev. Rubén Díaz
32nd Senatorial District, Bronx County, New York
It Does Not Make Sense
Mayor Michael Bloomberg wants
to dictate to us how much soda we should drink. With this action
Mayor Bloomberg confirmed what I wrote a few weeks ago on one of my “What
You Should Know” columns, that some elected officials want to create in
New York a Nanny State.
For your information, in case you
did not read it before I am including inserts of what I wrote before.
You should know that some Members
of the New York State Legislature are pushing hard to prevent McDonald’s
and certain restaurants from giving out toys to children when they receive
their meals unless those meals meet certain standards.
Senate Bill 6386, sponsored by Senator
Gustavo Rivera, and Assembly Bill 7662, sponsored by Assembly Member Felix
Ortiz, both Hispanic and Puerto Rican, are calling for a law to dictate
which restaurants may or may not distribute toys or as they call them,
“incentives,” to children, especially poor children in our communities,
when their parents take them to McDonald’s or any other restaurant to
purchase a meal. Now Mayor Michael Bloomberg has join them in banning
the sale and purchase of any bottle of sodas of more than 16
ounces.
It does not make sense and it is
disturbing to see these same elected officials fight tooth and nail to
give a woman the right to kill an unborn baby, because according to them,
it is a woman’s choice to do what they want with their bodies.
Michael Bloomberg, Gustavo, Felix and others have no problem in being pro-choice
and giving a woman a right to murder an unborn baby, but they have problems
and are willing to take away the right of the mother and father or child
to eat whatever they want.
Don’t get me wrong, I believe that
obesity is a problem and that people should be more careful with what they
eat, but if people want to be fat and eat hamburgers or anything they want,
it is their right to allow them to eat whatever they want. I think that
it is a lot better to be fat than to terminate the life of an unborn, innocent
baby. Does anyone believe that people are elected into office to regulate
what food and drinks moms and dads can serve their children?
Do these same elected officials
who fight for any woman to have a supposed right to choose to kill her
unborn baby realize that they are way out of line to try to assume authority
over moms by telling them what to give her child to eat or drink?
When pro-lifers like me state the
obvious that abortion affects two lives and that the fetus is a life, and
that to crack their skulls with forceps or to use saline water to be evaporated,
the pro-choice, pro-abortion politicians argue back with that old cliché
“my body, my choice”. I’m pretty sure that Mayor Bloomberg, Assembly
Member Ortiz and Senator Rivera would stand by their side. How can those same officials
think they have the right to tell moms how they should feed their children
or what to drink?
Parents struggle to do what’s best
for their children, and at least so far, in this country parents are not
dictated to by local elected officials about how to feed their children.
If they want to cook at home, they can. If they want to go out and
eat and drink 32 ounces of soda, they can.
You should know that there are more
important issues before us in the State and City of New York, and we sure
don’t need Mayor Bloomberg, Senator Rivera, Assembly Member Ortiz and
others to divert our attention by creating a Nanny State.
I am Senator Reverend Rubén Díaz
and this is what you should know.
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Left - 80th Assembly candidate Mr. Mark Gjonaj speaks to parade goers gathered at West 192nd Street. 
Left - The beginning of the 25th Annual Peurto Rican Day Parade. 
Left - Congressman Charlie Rangel
Left - The Jose Rivera banner minus Assemblyman Rivera.
Left - is the second part of 80th Assembly candidate Mark Gjonaj's
Left - a karate demonstration by some local youths.
Both photos are just some of the action that took place on the reviewing stand as the parade went by.
