The government is indeed ready to treat junk food the same as tobacco and has even admitted it:

This quote is very telling

quote:

Ontario toyed with, but ultimately rejected, the idea of a fat tax but has banned junk food vending machines from elementary schools. In July, the province's health promotion minister vowed to target obesity as aggressively as tobacco through a number of yet-to-be revealed initiatives.

here is the full story

quote:

The amount of junk food Canadians eat, and the pounds they pack on as a result, are personal choices the government has no right to discourage -- even if it means some lives will be shortened, a Toronto audience heard Wednesday. "People may very well choose to trade off years of their life, or the possibility of disease or injury, in exchange for the current pleasure, excitement, or stress relief they get (from food)," said Jacob Sullum, a syndicated columnist and senior editor at Reason, a U.S.-based libertarian magazine. 'PROTECTING PEOPLE' "It's not for the government to say that's not a legitimate trade-off to make. Canadians need to question the idea that just because something implicates health that government intervention is justified." The same rationale that informed public health policy against smoking -- leading to higher tobacco taxes -- has set its sights on junk food, Sullum argued during a luncheon sponsored by the Montreal Economic Institute. "You're talking about protecting people from their own decisions," Sullum said in an interview before the speech. "What you put in your mouth and how much exercise you get, that's pretty personal. It doesn't get much more personal than that." Faced with a so-called obesity epidemic -- 8% of children and 23% of adults were obese in 2004, according to Statistics Canada -- provincial governments are pursuing policies to separate people from their junk food. Ontario toyed with, but ultimately rejected, the idea of a fat tax but has banned junk food vending machines from elementary schools. In July, the province's health promotion minister vowed to target obesity as aggressively as tobacco through a number of yet-to-be revealed initiatives. In Quebec, politicians are considering a junk food tax that would send a "healthy message" to citizens while helping fund athletic programs. British Columbia has shown interest in banning junk food vending machines from schools. In Britain, a sweeping ban on junk food in the nation's schools-- including chocolate bars -- was announced Wednesday. Sullum believes that while governments have every right to protect the public against health risks posed by communicable diseases and pollution, they have no authority to tell people what to eat. "It's a question of what people want," Sullum said. "What the anti-fat activists are saying is, people don't want what they ought to want, and therefore the government has to coercively change what they want." But for Toronto-area dietitian Lynn Roblin, government-directed eating guidelines are key to a healthy society. "Whatever government you're talking about, whether it's provincial or federal, they do have a role in promoting healthy lifestyles, definitely," Roblin said. Skyrocketing health-care costs are among the possible repercussions of government inaction on healthy eating, she added. "It would not be a responsible action for them to ignore this." Sullum maintains that government policy aimed at restricting eating habits is not the answer. "For some people the solution is, they prefer to be fat," he said. "That's their choice and they should be permitted to make it."

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Originally posted by jester Everything in this country is illegal.

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery…" Winston Churchill

‎"If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law" - Winston Churchill