Let Him Eat! Let Him Eat! Let Him Eat!

(Coney Island, New York) Former champ Takeru Kobayashi was arrested during this year's annual Nathan’s Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest. He ended up spending the night in a Brooklyn jail.

A contract dispute had kept Kobayashi out of Sunday’s annual Nathan’s Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest, but he showed up anyway.

“I was there as a spectator, just to cheer on my buddies,” he said through an interpreter outside court Monday. Fans chanted for him, and “in the heat of it, I jumped on the stage, hoping they would let me eat.”

His attorney, Mario D. Romano, said his client was waved up onstage after spectators began chanting “Let him eat!”

“Shortly after he got on the stage, he was grabbed from behind by officers,” Romano said.

Kobayashi was charged with obstruction of governmental administration, resisting arrest, trespassing and disorderly conduct.

Kobayashi, who’s currently living in New York, had refused to sign a contract with Major League Eating, the fast food equivalent of the National Football League. On his Japanese-language blog, he said he wanted to be free to enter contests sanctioned by other groups.

But a few days ago, he told Japan’s Kyodo News: “I really want to compete in the (Coney Island) event.”

Joey "Jaws" Chestnut won the event by chomping down 54 dogs in 10 minutes.

In any event, I suspect Mayor Bloomberg's Food Police are investigating the eating contest -- probably the trans-fat tactical enforcement squad. It does not seem possible that the blatant disregard for the obesity crisis can be tolerated many more times.

Tip: Charley Nestor