Wall Street Journal Warns of the ‘All-Powerful Bike Lobby’

WSJ editorial board member calls bike sharing the work of “totalitarians.”

The esteemed Wall Street Journal -- the publication that brought you the recent op-ed claiming CO2 does not cause global warming -- is out with a hot new opinion piece on the dangers of bike-sharing.

The WSJ's latest video opinion piece, called "Death by Bicycle," features a scathing rebuke of the "totalitarians" who are forcing bicycle sharing programs on "helpless" New Yorkers.

Last week, the city rolled out its Citi Bike program for tens of thousands of members, putting thousands of new bicycles on the streets. The program has been wildly popular with commuters so far, but detractors have worried about the safety of the program and many have complained about the aesthetics of the docking stations.

And then there are those like WSJ editorial board member Dorothy Rabinowitz, who see bike-sharing as a dangerous form of freedom-destroying government intervention. Watch her comments in this interview:

Rabinowitz says she represents the "majority of citizens" when it comes to bike sharing and claims that "citizens of this city are appalled by what has happened."

However, a 2011 poll from Quinnipiac University found that 73 percent of New Yorkers supported a bike sharing program, even if it meant adding "10,000 bicycles to New York City streets and creat[ing] parking lots for bicycles."

After a week in service, New York City's bike sharing program has already sold 27,000 annual memberships, logged 65,000 trips and saw a record for most bikes rented in a 24-hour period.

But Rabinowitz is convinced that New Yorkers using the bike share are being brainwashed by the government. Here are a few of her other remarks on the program:

"Do not ask me to enter the minds of the totalitarians running this government of the city. Look, I represent the majority of citizens. The majority of citizens of this city are appalled by what has happened. And I would like to say to people who don’t live in New York -- this means something much more than the specifics of this dreadful program. It means envision what happens when you get a government that is run by an autocratic mayor or other leader and a government before which you are helpless."

"We now look at a city whose best neighborhoods are absolutely begrimed is the word by these blazing blue city bikes. All of the finest, most picturesque parts of the city. It is shocking to walk around the city, to see how much of this they have sneaked under the radar in the interest of the environment."

"If the mayor had had any guts, he would have undertaken a study…but he knew, he knew that they were against it. The bike lobby is an all-powerful enterprise."

Beware the bike lobby. They are one of the forces peddling the dastardly Agenda 21 conspiracy.