The People's Republic of Philadelphia now taxes the consumption of sugar.  Yes, sugar.  As in glucose, fructose, sucrose.  You know, the essential fuels for all animal life.  Those guys.

The leftists who govern Philadelphia would say they are taxing only the excessive consumption of sugar, but then again, how does that determining go?

Leftists love centralized planning.  It is in their DNA.  The fact that it was a monumental, epochal failure in the Soviet Union or more recently Venezuela need not concern us, I suppose.

I would like to point out, as a local Philadelphian, two likely unforeseen consequences of this latest enlightened, progressive means of running a failing city.  First, the consumer purchases now being made just outside city limits are booming.  It's a grand time to own a store just outside city boundaries.  Now, this not only cheats the city out of tax revenue, as soda (and other sugar-containing food/drink) sales in the suburbs skyrocket, but it also greatly heightens the carbon footprint of the urban dwellers who drive to the suburbs to make these purchases.  Oh, except for the very poor who have no cars and are stuck with paying the outsized tax.

And then as a corollary, the retail stores within the city limits suffer, their sales declining as shoppers, once setting foot in suburban stores, decide to do all their shopping there.  This trend works against the acute need to place affordable quality stores in the proximity of the urban poor shopper.  (Wait, wasn't that a big initiative of our previous first lady?)

The Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China were often given to constructing monumental civic work projects, like mammoth dams on rivers.  These were often part of highly touted Five-Year "Plans" to improve the economy, generate power, increase farm output, and generally create heaven on earth.  When you look at the aftermath of such projects, you often find environmental disasters.  Google the Aral Sea if you don't believe me.

A people who are too poorly informed to learn from history will truly be doomed to repeat it.  This is happening in a small manner in the City of Brotherly Love.  Pray it does not happen in the United States as a whole.