First they came for your Big Gulp sodas. Then it was your donuts. But now the liberal elite are drawing the ultimate battle line in the sand. At the Washington Post, Laura Wellesley argues in favor of having the government “enable a change” in the amount of meat you consume. Is Ms. Wellesley a doctor? A dietary specialist? Perhaps some expert in agricultural issues? No… perish the thought. She’s a climate change specialist.

Take it away, Madam. (Emphasis added)

Meat consumption in the United States — and across much of the Western world — has reached a level that is unsustainable, both for our planet and for our health. We owe it to ourselves to make a change. Our politicians owe it to us to enable that change.

The average American eats three times as much meat as experts deem healthy, the average European around twice as much. And the emerging economies are quickly catching up: by 2050, global consumption is expected to rise a further 76 percent…

Last year, Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, published research on public attitudes toward meat eating in four of the most meat-obsessed countries: the United States, Britain, China and Brazil. Our focus group participants expected governments to educate, guide and help them make necessary changes in the interests of our health and our planet. Indeed, many of the Americans interviewed believed that their government had a duty to act.

Wellesley starts off with the usual concerns for your health. Think of the children, for God’s sake. Meat is making you too fat, contributing to heart disease and causing people’s noses to fall off. (Okay… I may have made up that last one.) And to be sure, as with everything in our lives, too much of anything is rarely good for you. But precisely how much constitutes “too much” is a matter of debate. And even if you’re over that line – whatever it may be – the responsibility for your health lies with you, not your government. And yet we’re being told that the only real solution is through government action.

Clearly the author is not simply talking about guidelines here. We already have guidelines aplenty and a constant nudging (to use her word) from the First Lady. So what is to be done beyond guidelines unless we’re talking about a mandate? God only knows how our cultural betters think the government could enforce such a thing. She repeatedly references China in the article because of recent advice they issued to their citizens, but even they only have guidelines in place. And we’re talking about a country that can throw you in jail for having too many children.

Aside from haranguing us over our decadent lifestyles, what more would the climate change contingent like the government to do? Even Wellesley isn’t willing to go so far as to call for an all out ban on meat, so how does one regulate the intake of the citizenry? Do we start issuing food rationing coupons such as the ones we had during the second world war? That would be a wonderful plan because it would immediately open the door to all sorts of black market opportunities and one more set of senseless laws for police to keep track of.

Here’s a thought. The government already puts out dietary information on a regular basis. The media covers it as required. What say we just let everyone monitor their own diet and you keep your nose out of my barbecue grill? If you want the cows to produce less methane, maybe you can buy them all carbon absorbent diapers.