Thinning the Herd Is your weight the government's business?

reason ^ | Jacob Sullum's

[swarthyguy]

Ha Ha Ha, first the smokers, now the chubbies, cellfone users in cars...now its time for you!

[swarthyguy]

Ping.

[microgood]

"It's very hard to blame [rising obesity] on personal irresponsibility," he asserted at the obesity conference, sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute. "Instead of taking an individual point of view...we need to think of why the nation is overweight."

It must take a lot of electroshock therapy to make someone this stupid.

[OpusatFR]

" Given such rhetoric, his proposals are remarkably lame: more bike paths, no soda in schools, special taxes on "junk" foods, restrictions on food advertising."

I have a solution. Require that these lamo's and all other obese lawyers, politicians, and professors who are attempting to reglulate food intake to have their jaws wired shut until they reach the appropriate degree of silence I demand. There's entirely too too much noise out here and it is making people sick.

Next lawsuit, comin' up.

[Vitamin A]

John Banzhaf was my Torts professor in law school. In my opinion, basically the guy doesn't have a life. Not married. No kids. No social life. Legal activism--of the frivolous nature--is his thing as far as I can tell.

On an interesting note, one of my classmates told me he saw Banzhaf checking out a "Big Butts and Fat Fannies" X-rated video at the video store near campus. (I, of course, can't confirm the story.) I'm confused that he would now be leading the crusade against obesity. Sounds like he might actually be turned on by it. (But that's just my opinion.)

[Exeter]

"But according to Brownell...food is too cheap, too tasty, too readily available, and too heavily promoted."

So Mr. Brownell's solution is to make food expensive, bland, difficult to serve and obscure???

[ThinkDifferent]

"It's very hard to blame [rising obesity] on personal irresponsibility,"

It really isn't.

[Vitamin A]

"It's very hard to blame [rising obesity] on personal irresponsibility," he asserted at the obesity conference, sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute. "Instead of taking an individual point of view...we need to think of why the nation is overweight."

Why is the nation overweight? Well, millions of individuals making irresponsible eating decisions will make a whole nation overweight. What is so difficult to understand about that concept?

[BigLittle]

Seems he should avoid the horizontal stripes too!

[BigLittle]

.....their girth is not their fault. The problem is the "toxic food environment"

Friday Night!!! I'm headed out for some toxins; better call my lawyer.

A guy like this should hopefully fall face down into his linguine!

[Roughneck]

A few years ago I was getting a bit, ah, portly, so I decided to loose a bit of weight. Cut back on the beer after work, began to eat the vegetables and salads my wife's been putting in front of me for years. . .

Geez! I've been lookin' good now (even for an old coot), when I could have been rich from a lawsuit instead.

By the way, I still smoke cigarrettes and have noticed smokers are "bad guys" not "victims" - what gives??

[BigLittle]

"It's very hard to blame [rising obesity] on personal irresponsibility,"

It really isn't.

Henceforth known as the Brownell Poll.......

Another slice of pie Mr. Brownell?

Yes........87.9%

No.........12.1%

[swarthyguy]

>>smokers are "bad guys" not "victims" - what gives??


Some "victims" are more deserving than others.

[american spirit]

Or, it's just the long term degenerative effects of teaching the tricks of the trade to class after class of shyster attorneys-to-be.

[Salgak]

Mandated nationwide public school cafeteria food for all. . . film at 11. . .

[jjm2111]

I remember seeing a Yahoooo headline that went along these lines:

"Attention to diet and moderate excercise key to weight control, say Experts." I mean who woulda thunk it? Eat less and work out. Gee. Send someone a Nobel prize!

[swarthyguy]

So English food is part of the answer?

[jjm2111]

"It's very hard to blame [rising obesity] on personal irresponsibility,"

This man is a genius.

[Gone_Postal]

But according to Brownell, a psychologist who heads Yale's Center for Eating and Weight Disorders, their girth is not their fault. The problem is the "toxic food environment": Food is too cheap, too tasty, too readily available, and too heavily promoted. In such an environment, Brownell argues, people naturally expand, just like laboratory rats fed a cafeteria-style diet.

The problem is this fatty can't cram enough into that belly