Acknowledge the corn

Muhtar Kent, the CEO of Coca-Cola, has an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal arguing that Coca-Cola is not making Americans fat and therefore shouldn’t be the target of an excise tax. One of his points is:

Sugar-sweetened beverages have been singled out in spite of the fact that soft drinks, energy drinks, sports drinks and sweetened bottled water combined contribute 5.5% of the calories in the average American diet ...

I certainly agree that singling out soft drinks for a supposedly health-driven excise tax is a shaky proposition. I do, however, have a quibble with one of Mr. Kent’s facts: Coca-Cola is not a sugar-sweetened beverage.* I wish it was.

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* At least where I live. I have heard rumors that Costco stores in Southern California carry sugar-sweetened Coca-Cola imported from Mexico.