Nanny State Food Round-Up: Obama’s Food Police Both Demonizes & Endorses Cheese, Palin’s Cookies, SF Bans McDonald’s Happy Meals, Can Restaurants Ban Fat People? (video)
Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on November 11, 2010
Nanny State Confusion: Government food police both attacks and supports cheese consumption | Photo credit: Andrew McFarlane, Flickr, Creative Commons
Team Obama’s socialist-progressive “Americans are too stupid to eat what’s best for them, so we’ll be makin’ all the rules on food” Nanny State is going freakin’ bonkers. Almost as nuts as Europe.
Government’s “food police” — at local and federal levels — has been increasing, or attempting to increase, its power to ban, overtax, limit, or closely monitor more and more foods that Americans eat. That power is increasing and the list is getting ridiculously long — much of it is based on false premises, takes away parents’ rights and responsibilities, and is laying the groundwork for implementing government-mandated health care.
It’s high time to take Nanny and the BHO Food Gestapo down a few notches, patriots, before we’re told all that we can eat are liver and lentils.
Here’s an Obama Nanny State food round-up — not all have been successful, but the freedom-robbing statists will try, try, again…. this list is by no means complete.
Salt regulation and/or salt ban.
Treats at schools, such as cookies once in a while, and eliminating school parties.
Sarah Palin Brings Cookies to Pennsylvania School
Eggs.
Giving a homeless man a sandwich.
Restaurants being told to ban service to overweight people.
FOX News: Wilson v. Roth: Should restaurants ban fat people?
McDonald’s Happy Meals ban in Santa Clara, California and soon-to-be ex-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco, with other liberal cities to likely follow suit, until FLOTUS Michelle Obama and her fat-rat patrol convince Hubby in Chief to outlaw or tax the holy bejeebers out of all fast food joints.
OK, I doubt Michelle Antoinette has THAT much power (yet), but I’m sure she’s tried.
Now it’s CHEESE that’s on the proverbial chopping block, for crikey’s sake.
Although, the food police and the government are confused on the stance to take on that. Demonize or endorse?
Should they or shouldn’t they “cut the cheese”? (It had to be asked). So, heck, they’ll demonize AND endorse it.
Don’t worry, boys and girls — Michelle Antoinette Obama will flex her well-toned arm muscles and SHE’LL straighten them out.
Reported by New York Times, While Warning About Fat, U.S. Pushes Cheese Sales:
Domino’s Pizza was hurting early last year. Domestic sales had fallen, and a survey of big pizza chain customers left the company tied for the worst tasting pies.
Then help arrived from an organization called Dairy Management. It teamed up with Domino’s to develop a new line of pizzas with 40 percent more cheese, and proceeded to devise and pay for a $12 million marketing campaign.
Consumers devoured the cheesier pizza, and sales soared by double digits. “This partnership is clearly working,” Brandon Solano, the Domino’s vice president for brand innovation, said in a statement to The New York Times.
But as healthy as this pizza has been for Domino’s, one slice contains as much as two-thirds of a day’s maximum recommended amount of saturated fat, which has been linked to heart disease and is high in calories.
And Dairy Management, which has made cheese its cause, is not a private business consultant. It is a marketing creation of the United States Department of Agriculture — the same agency at the center of a federal anti-obesity drive that discourages over-consumption of some of the very foods Dairy Management is vigorously promoting.
Urged on by government warnings about saturated fat, Americans have been moving toward low-fat milk for decades, leaving a surplus of whole milk and milk fat. Yet the government, through Dairy Management, is engaged in an effort to find ways to get dairy back into Americans’ diets, primarily through cheese.
Americans now eat an average of 33 pounds of cheese a year, nearly triple the 1970 rate. Cheese has become the largest source of saturated fat; an ounce of many cheeses contains as much saturated fat as a glass of whole milk.
When Michelle Obama implored restaurateurs in September to help fight obesity, she cited the proliferation of cheeseburgers and macaroni and cheese. “I want to challenge every restaurant to offer healthy menu options,” she told the National Restaurant Association’s annual meeting.
More on the government’s cheese hypocrisy… reported by Julia A. Seymour at NewsBusters, USDA’s Obesity Irony, From Soda Taxes to Happy Meal Toy Bans, Media Feed Viewers Food Police Message:
Sometimes it would seem the point of anti-obesity campaigns or legislation has more to do with the government grasping for power or tax revenue (as with cigarette taxes and a potential soda tax, etc).
That becomes most evident when a double-standard is exposed. According to the Nov. 6, New York Times the USDA was promoting and helping companies market increased cheese consumption, “while warning about fat” in foods like cheese.
Perhaps the motto of the US Department of Agriculture should be “Do as we say, not as we do.”
Michael Moss’ story in the Times exposed the USDA’s involvement in the Domino’s Pizza turnaround. An organization called “Dairy Management,” worked with Domino’s to improve their pizzas – by adding 40 percent more cheese.
But Dairy Management isn’t some public relations firm, or food industry representative. It’s a bona fide marketing creation of the USDA. “The same agency at the center of a federal anti-obesity drive that discourages over-consumption of some of the very foods Dairy Management is vigorously promoting,” Moss wrote.
The annual budget for Dairy Management is nearly $140 million, and is paid for mostly “by a government-mandated fee on the dairy industry,” Moss noted.
In video below, Daniel Happnie goes over the new Food Safety and Modernization act – Senate Bill 510 – the bill that makes it illegal to grow food and sell it without the government hawking over you. The media is utilizing the salmonella egg scare to try and justify the government taking over and fining small farms, but not the Corporate food industrial compex.
The Real Story – Food Police? Part 1 of 2
The Real Story – Food Police? Part 2 of 2
From Doug Powers, Michelle Malkin, McNanny State Update: San Francisco Bans Happy Meals:
In the City by the Bay, if you want to roller skate naked down Castro Street wearing a phallic-symbol hat and snorting an eight-ball off a transgender hooker’s chest while underage kids run behind you handing out free heroin needles, condoms and coupons to the grand opening of the neighborhood’s newest bathhouse, that’s your right as a free citizen of the United States. But if you want to put a Buzz Lightyear toy in the same box with a hamburger and fries and sell it, you’re outta line, mister!
[...]
Far be it from me to make a suggestion to McDonalds, but if they really want Happy Meals reinstated in San Francisco, they’ll present city authorities with the ultimate dilemma: A Happy Meal containing toys promoting gay marriage.
Update: Reader Joy H. emails an idea: “McD’s sells the toy for 1 penny. You can buy a Happy Meal for $2.30 without a toy or $2.31 with a toy.
The gov’t cannot ban Mc’D’s from selling a toy as a separate item. It would be a beautiful protest by the company.”
From A World Quite Mad, The Food Police:
I always say it’s a slippery slope when you start having the government or any other organization tell us what we should be doing, believing, wearing, etc. Well, how do you like being told what you should eat? The city of San Francisco is moving toward banning toys in childrens’ meals at restaurants, if they don’t conform to a certain “standard”, because truly, as a parent, you aren’t fit to make decisions for your children. I think it’s an appalling situation when a small group of people can take all the fun out of life. I suppose that’s what happens when you found a country with Puritans. If it tastes or feels good or is fun, then by god it must be bad for you and you must be saved from yourself!
I suppose on the face of it, urging children to eat “healthier” sounds like a good thing. Except you have one problem. And that is that the government’s current suggestions for how to eat healthy are anything but. Read Gary Taubes book “Good Calories, Bad Calories”, if you dare, and you will see why. It is a book that will make you so angry you won’t be able to see straight. These “scientists”, (and I use that term very loosely), researchers, dietitians, and doctors have had evidence for the entire last century that sugar is what makes you fat and causes diabetes, and that fat is what we should mostly be eating, but since Ancel Keys decided to publish his absolutely skewed results that fat is bad for you and causes heart attacks people have cut back on the fat and increased consumption of carbohydrates, and have gotten heavier because of it.
In fact, hunter-gatherer type people who do not consume sugar and carbohydrates, and get most of their food from animal sources, have no evidence of heart disease, diabetes, or get this, cavities. I knew that ages ago and wondered why. I remember reading that paleolithic people didn’t have cavities, or dental caries, but that agricultural people who ate grains did. And people knew this a hundred years ago! And if you think about it, it makes sense. Ten thousand years ago, what do you think people ate? They ate meat most of the time. They didn’t have refrigerators or grocery stores. They didn’t wander down to the market and buy leafy greens and fruit. They only ate vegetables and fruit when it was in season, well, actually, IF it was ever in season.
In 1908, a man named Vilhjalmur Stefansson spent ten years living with the Inuit* who did not eat anything but meat (because they had nothing else) and they were all very healthy people. When he returned to New York the doctors didn’t believe him. He spent an entire year eating nothing but meat under observation to prove that it was healthy. There are also various accounts of doctors who lived among native populations in Africa and South America, who saw that the native populations did not have any evidence of any of the “Diseases of Civilization” (meaning heart disease, diabetes, etc) until they adopted a western diet high in sugar and refined carbohydrates.
After the McGovern committee on the Nutrition Guidelines in 1977, it pretty much became gospel that fat was the cause of heart attacks and any researcher who dare say otherwise was pretty much tossed out on the street. Kilmer S. McCully was one such researcher. He insisted it was an amino acid deficiency that caused heart disease. For his trouble, he was denied tenure and had trouble finding another job because Harvard had blacklisted him.
Check out the site My Food, My Choice.
From Reason magazine, Attack of the Food Police:
The governor says this would help cover “the $7.6 billion the state spends every year to treat diseases from obesity.” Reuters reports, ominously, that he “did not dismiss the idea of eventually imposing a tax on other obesity-linked foods such as hamburgers and chocolate bars.”
San Francisco Supervisor Eric Mar speaks in more grandiose terms. He said the Happy Meal ordinance addresses “a survival issue,” and proclaimed, “We’re part of a movement that is moving forward an agenda of food justice.” Food justice?
Now, there are many places where the government ought to be: between a citizen and a mugger, between the polluter and the sky, between us all and al-Qaida. But the space between a diner’s hand and a diner’s mouth is not one of them.
The nice thing about eating is that the person who makes good or bad choices is the one who reaps the reward or penalty. If I scarf a cheesecake, you don’t gain weight. And if I decide that consigning myself to the Big and Tall Store is not such a bad option, it’s not your place to stop me from doing so.
You don’t like what’s in a Happy Meal? Don’t let your kid have one.
High-calorie food is not one of those substances that presents a mortal threat to innocent bystanders. Guzzle a liter of Fanta, and you can still be trusted behind the wheel of a car. Walk by a KFC, and you don’t have to worry about secondhand fat.
True, my gluttony may cause me to end up morbidly obese and a burden on the medical system. But if that’s grounds for regulation, we will all soon be surrendering our TV remotes to the police and doing daily calisthenics under the watchful eye of commissars in spandex.
As it happens, soda taxes may affect only the people who don’t need affecting. California Polytechnic State University economists Michael Marlow and Alden Shiers, writing in Regulation magazine, noted data showing that “taxes on alcohol consumption significantly lower drinking by light drinkers, but not heavy drinkers.” One study found that a 58 percent tax on soda would “drop the average body mass by only 0.16 points”—on a scale of 30.
Restrictions on fatty food are no more promising. Suppose a 5-year-old has a Happy Meal every week (which is how often new toys appear). Economist Michael Anderson of the University of California at Berkeley tells me that while a child who dines on fast food may get a couple of hundred extra calories, that’s not much compared to the 11,000 calories she is likely to eat in a week.
Besides, people who are diverted from the Golden Arches have plenty of other cheap, tasty, artery-clogging options. “If they don’t eat at McDonald’s, are they going to go home and eat broccoli and brown rice?” asks Anderson.
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