I blogged earlier about what I consider to be one of the most pernicious and least recognized aspects of nationalized health care -- the loss of inviolability as the public sphere asserts ownership over the private sphere.  

Gersh Kuntzman writing an OpEd piece in MSNBC explains his advocacy of the Fat Tax.  In language that's shocking true-to-face about public ownership of the human body:

the ...reason “they” want to go after “your” Twinkie is because “your” obesity is costing “our” system billions of dollars a year.

That's it, pure and simple.   Since the government is already so involved with health care, if you're messing with your health, then you're messing with our health system.   By assuming liability "we" are assuming responsibility. 

It doesn't help that Gersh's piece adopts that typically snooty "activist" tone of "but if you look at the statistics for XXX and the studies for YYY, it's so obvious we should do this, you idiot!"   This isn't an issue about how many impoverished, lesbian, minorities have been "left behind" by the system.   And it certainly isn't an issue of how comparatively overweight Americans are vs. our supposedly enlightened European counterparts.  

It is an issue of choosing between the lesser of 2 evils.  Classic public choice economics explains why Gersh doesn't consider the mirror opposite answer to this question -- if obesity is costing "our" system billions of dollars a year, how do retract the System to reduce this cost?