SACRAMENTO — \o7Sacramento \f7-- Enjoy fast food? Like to light up while you watch the waves? Forget to sock away money for your kids' education?
Some California lawmakers want to change your ways. They've planted a crop of proposals this year -- "nanny" bills, as they're called -- that would:
* Restrict the use of artery-clogging trans fat, common in fried and baked foods and linked to heart disease, in restaurants and school cafeterias.
* Bar smoking at state parks and beaches, and in cars carrying children.
* Open a savings account, seeded with $500, for every newborn Californian to use at 18 for college, a first home purchase or an investment for retirement.
* Fine dog and cat owners who don't spay or neuter their pets by 4 months of age.
* Require chain restaurants to list calorie, saturated fat and sodium content on menus.
* Phase out the sale of incandescent light bulbs, which are less energy-efficient than compact fluorescent bulbs.
The debate has commenced in the Capitol: How far should government go?
The proposals are the brainchildren of Democratic legislators. Republicans, who say the sponsors are trying to parent the whole state, are having none of it.
"Could you imagine the founding fathers dealing with -- I don't know -- wearing a helmet when you're in the buggy?" said the Assembly's Republican leader, Mike Villines of Clovis.
"We all know you can't mandate behavior; it just does not work," he said. "It creates criminals of people for things that are not criminal behavior.... You can't legislate for stupidity."
Political scientists say legislative paternalism can be taken as a sign of economic success. It's "post materialist," said Bruce Cain, director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, because such measures are about quality of life, not survival.
"These post-materialist concerns may be ahead of the curve," Cain said. "Some of the things we did that seemed kooky 20 years ago are now widely accepted."
New York City made history in December by voting to eliminate trans fat from the city's 20,000 restaurants by July 2008. Nineteen Southern California cities ban smoking on city beaches, and it's illegal to smoke in a car with children in Louisiana and Arkansas.
Australia recently moved to end the sale of incandescent light bulbs, and 15 countries ban all corporal punishment of children.
