Forget Atkins--the state will make me thin!

[Ancalagon the Black]

Here's an interesting AP article about legislatures acting to combat obesity. Personally, I think that this approach is quixotic and is unlikely to succeed. If it does succeed, I think the cost will be too high. It embodies a lot of what people traditionally think is wrong with the Left--the idea that government can cure all ills.

The part of it that I do agree with is preventing disgusting "food" from being sold to kids in schools. I do think that where public schools are concerned, the state has a responsibility to provide for kids' welfare.

What do y'all think?

___

States Look to Combat Obesity With Laws

By ROBERT TANNER

AP National Writer

Fighting to shed a few pounds and control that waistline? For the soaring number of Americans who are becoming dangerously overweight, states and cities across the country want to help.

With the U.S. Surgeon General calling obesity an epidemic, legislators nationwide are offering measures to encourage healthy food choices and ban the worst temptations.

Skeptics say government should stay away from trying to legislate something as personal as what we eat. But supporters say they can't ignore a growing public health problem or how it drives the ever-rising cost of health care.

Few ideas have become law yet. But states have considered scores of bills this year that would, among other things: get kids exercising; warn restaurant eaters about fat, sugar and cholesterol on the menu; and, ban sugary sodas and fattening chips from school vending machines.

In a Louisiana experiment, the state will pay for a few government employees' gastric bypass surgery _ or stomach stapling _ to see if it reduces health care costs.

"As a country, we have to wake up. We are in an epidemic," said Nevada state Sen. Valerie Wiener, who has had her own battles with weight but now is a champion weightlifter.

She heads a state committee gathering data on obesity, and how the legislature, food companies, the health care system and schools can act. "We're all paying the price," she said.

Under the laws that have passed, states will:

_Test the BMI _ body-mass index, a ratio of height to weight _ of students in six Arkansas schools, and send results home. Pediatricians say regular tests like this should be performed nationwide to track children at risk of becoming obese.

_Ban junk food from vending machines in California. New York City, in an administrative decision, banned hard candy, doughnuts, soda and salty chips from its vending machines.

_Require physical education programs in Louisiana schools, and encourage it in Arkansas and Mississippi. Though once a staple, such daily classes are now only required by state law in Illinois; other states let local officials decide or require exercise less often.

Public campaigns aimed at getting people to change their eating habits also remain popular. Billboards across West Virginia, featuring photos of bulging stomachs and couch potatoes, exhort people to "Put Down Chips & Trim Those Hips." Houston, Philadelphia and San Antonio, Texas have started "get fit" drives.

The statistics show the need for such efforts. The number of obese adults has doubled in 20 years, and is now up to nearly 59 million people, or almost a third of all American adults.

Childhood obesity has tripled, with one child in six considered obese.

As the pounds add up, so do the health care costs, because obesity is linked to diabetes, heart disease, and deaths from cancer _ among other ailments.

West Virginia found that, for state employees, costs for obesity have more than doubled since 1995, rising from $37 million to $78 million, now nearly a fifth of the employees' $400 million health plan.

Still, some are critical both of the statistics and the proposals.

"There's a lot of fear and hysteria," said Mike Burita at the Center for Consumer Freedom, an advocacy group for the restaurant and food industry. "We're allowing government and these public health groups to dictate our food choices to us."

Among his top targets is the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group that produces a steady flow of warnings about unhealthy food, from movie popcorn to Chinese takeout.

"It's OK to have a cheeseburger and fries, but it shouldn't be a mainstay of your diet," Burita said. Exercise and education are the solutions, he said. "Kids went from playing dodge ball to playing computer games."

The skeptics are being heard. A Texas proposal to limit school children's access to snack and soda vending machines died after the state soft drink association complained. Most of the 80 or so obesity-related bills around the country also failed to pass.

"It's difficult to want to tackle something like this, something as huge as this," said Weiner, the Nevada lawmaker. She plans to bring together people from the food industry and the public health community to work with lawmakers.

The federal government is acting, too. The Bush administration urged insurance companies to offer premium discounts to people with healthier lifestyles. It has started giving grants to cities to target unhealthy habits.

More immediate changes are brewing on the state and local level.

In West Virginia, the state agency that insures public employees has started offering exercise benefits and diet counseling, in addition to the state's advertising campaign.

"If we don't get a handle on this, this generation of kids coming up will have a shorter life span than their parents," said Nidia Henderson, wellness manager at West Virginia's Public Employees Insurance Agency. "That's scandalous."

___

EDIT: Here's a link.

[luckydevil]

Peter Jennings did a special on this a few weeks ago( about obesity),

The basic capitalism is evil, government needs to intervene program. Blame corporations first parents 2nd. Screw responsibility.

The very same people who are/were behind the anti-smoking laws are behind the obesity lawsuits. It is clearly going in that direction. It is only a matter of time before this becomes a "public" health issue.

Kyle: "Isn't That Fascism?

Kyle's father: "No, Because We Don't Call It Fascism."

[Ancalagon the Black]

But lucky, isn't one of the premises behind anti-smoking laws that smoking creates a negative externality (it adversely affects people not involved in the economic decision)?

If I smoke around you, I could be giving you lung cancer. If I pig out at Mickey D's...well, I'll probably just gross you out.

[luckydevil]

But lucky, isn't one of the premises behind anti-smoking laws that smoking creates a negative externality (it adversely affects people not involved in the economic decision)?

Yes, the left likes to use this argument.

They however fail to understand that laws that ban smoking infringe on private property rights.

[Ancalagon the Black]

I actually agree that it's a property-rights infringement; I'm just pointing out that there's a difference between the two cases.

[luckydevil]

No, that is one aspect of the anti-smoking crusade.

I often hear the "public" health argument, I am starting to hear this argument used in obesity lawsuits.

[BG]

An interseting argument is the health problems this is causing which are up there with smoking. Diabetes, heart disease and liver problems are expensive to treat, thus upping premiums for everyone around. Similar arguements were made to justify anti-smoking laws.

[luckydevil]

An interseting argument is the health problems this is causing which are up there with smoking. Diabetes, heart disease and liver problems are expensive to treat, thus upping premiums for everyone around. Similar arguements were made to justify anti-smoking laws.

That too.

[BG]

That's what I said----

Oh and yeesh.....you got me I jumped the gun :doh:

[Ghost of]

Ah, once you have government "money"(OUR MONEY) involved, they always start to dominate that industry or sector of life. It's like how they threaten states to do as they will by withholding federal grants and highway money.

The REAL factor driving up medical costs is GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION--just as it has done in housing and education. That is a FACT.

But the morons will continue to crusade for more and more government enslavement of the citizenry. Because, THATS WHAT THEY WANT.

Most of these evil people(and yes, they are evil, the face of evil isn't Hitler it's the busybody middle-aged lady asking you to support another tyrannical law) really only want control over others--any given issue is not their overriding concern.

Put it this way, if some shmoe comes up to you and says "hey, I'd like abitrary power over your personal space, wealth and private life, I promise to be good" you'd probably punch him in the face. But for some reason, put the imprimatur of "government" or "law" on it and people bend to it like good little sheep.

[luckydevil]

The State is a particular type of criminal organization - one with a "mystique of legitimacy" to quote Wendy McElroy

[Ancalagon the Black]

Ghost, I thought the true face of evil was wearing a beard and a turban these days...?

Lucky, the state derives its power from the consent of the governed. If more people felt like you, we wouldn't have welfare and the like. But we keep voting for such programs. So how is the state criminal?

[luckydevil]

Lucky, the state derives its power from the consent of the governed. If more people felt like you, we wouldn't have welfare and the like. But we keep voting for such programs. So how is the state criminal?

It never received my consent, the state lives of force and coercion.

As for welfare, yes public welfare would end. Private welfare would continue.

[Ancalagon the Black]

Tacit consent isn't worth the paper it's not written on, right?

We live in a representative democracy. Its principles are stated in the Constitution. There's a process for changing the Constitution. There's a process for changing laws you don't like.

Our state isn't a fascist or Stalinist dictatorship where one person/party/group tells everyone what to do.

[luckydevil]

We live in a constitutional republic( in thoery anyway) and the constitution has been ignored for over 150 years( just about)

[Ancalagon the Black]

Ghost and Lucky, tell me--do you think civil-rights legislation was

a) a good thing

a bad thing

?

[luckydevil]

Ghost and Lucky, tell me--do you think civil-rights legislation was

a) a good thing

a bad thing

?

1964?

[Ancalagon the Black]

Yup.

[luckydevil]

The 1964 Civil Rights Act should be repealed.

[Ghost of]

It was unnecessary(as far as I can recall the specifics.) The 14th should have covered basically anything to do with the State or individual states.

BTW, Ancal, read up on Lysander Spoon. He'd argue that as no consent was given, the government has no authority over us at all. I don't subscribe(for practical reasons) to anarcho-libertarianism, but philosophically I never gave consent to my wealth being taken away by majority vote(a ridiculous concept) nor many other policies enacted by a "majority" of the people who voted at a given time.

In fact, if a majority votes to re-institute slavery, it'd be no more moral than it was before. And I'd have a duty to resist it with all my might, regardless of the baying asses who'd say "we voted--that's democracy!"

[Ancalagon the Black]

Read plenty of Lysander Spoon. One of my professors in college was the late Robert Nozick, a towering libertarian intellectual (he wrote Anarchy, State, and Utopia). That's who I got the "tacit consent" quotation from.

I think one basic difference between your view and that of many people is the conception of wealth. You say that the government "takes away" your wealth. I would say that "your" wealth wouldn't have been possible at all without certain governmental structures being in place. That's not to say the government does, or should, own your wealth--but it does argue for certain prices being paid to the government in exchange for the protections it affords.

As for the Act of 1964, I'm not sure you can say it was "unnecessary." It deals with private enterprise. You can say it was wrong, as luckydevi has. But you can't argue that it was redundant.

[Ghost of]

Ancal

Frankly, leftists who enjoy the moral lessons of Star Wars and LotR astound me. Can they not see the TRUE lessons?

Sauron and Saruman and Vader should be exemplars of the corruption of power and an alarm to all those who find the elites attempting to control them.

Liberty. Accountability. Freedom to CHOOSE the paths we take. Minimal intervention by the gangs who wear badges.

Remember, both Sauron and Vader believed in a sort of order and way--even if they only thought it could be achieved under their domination.

[luckydevil]

One of my professors in college was the late Robert Nozick

Wow, I would have loved to have been in that class

Oh and it's Lysander Spooner

[Ghost of]

The constitution does not allow the principles of free enterprise and free association to be violated. But then, congress and other branches of government have been doing that for over a century.

Is government owed a price due to contractual law, property rights and their delineation? I won't say no out of hand, but where is the line drawn, how do we decided how much is LOST by government intervention(medicine, education, housing) and how much we gain?

I'd say paying for the courts and the defense are the price we pay. Why that extends to other areas of life and certain public policies I confess I don't know.

Cool, though, that your prof was Nozick! Wow!

D'oh, SpoonER. Hmm, maybe the Coronas and the seeming better sound of Lysander Spoon hypnotized me! Oh well.

[Ancalagon the Black]

I see a lot of moral lessons in SW and LotR. In the former, there was a republican government that gave way to tyranny when the representatives ceded too much power to the executive, who insisted that there was an overriding threat that had to be responded to. In the latter, there was

1) an entire population of creatures that was defended by beings who were stronger and wealthier--the strong defending the weak;

2) a forest of treeherders that expounded--at length--about the importance of preserving the environment and of the perils of rampant development and pollution and destruction;

3) a duo (at least) of power-hungry tyrants that cared nothing for the welfare of their citizens and let them live and work in conditions of penury, while they followed the object of their greed.

In addition, there was an "elite" race that strictly dominated the race of Men; these people were "tall" and "fair." There were also evil branches of men--eg, the Swarthy Men--who were darker and shorter and far more given to evil. Don't know if I should ascribe too many notions of morality to Tolkien.