you don"t need to save the crystal for a special day, even water tastes better in a "Fancy Glass"

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

obesity reports are out

I wrote a short post over on Daily Kos today about the new Obesity report that is out. In no state in the USA are the percetages lower... we are getting more and more unhealthy and overweight.

I have been having a good discussion with a friend who wonders if this is a political issue at all... I went on quite a soapbox of why this is an urgent political issue. Please check out my kos post- and poll.... and read my email soap box below...

Why is Obesity a political issue? I see it as political, because like most of our problems in the states these days, unchecked corp. interest is a large culprit. Subsidized big ag, grows 200% more corn and soy than we can use, so that gets pumped into processed food, animal feed, and high fructose corn syrup. Which keeps our food costs low, but our heath care costs high.

i see it as a political issue because we do not cover heath care or promote prevention education and information, and then we do not cover health care once people are sick, and this is largely related to diet in the usa.

food stamps until recently were not reimbursed if accepted by local farmers markets. that was a political issue

Big ag is also given all sorts of environmental leeway from the government, make it easier to grow food even if pesticides are bad for us, and we are polluting the environment. use GM even at the expense of knowing the long range effects. did you know that they suspect that gm corn is killing all the bees, which will have a huge impact on pollinating crops?

we grow and create an average of 3500 calories of food per day per person in the states. even children, and the corp. structure is set up to encourage people to consume that- via advertising, school lunch programs etc. etc. even though it is at least 1000 calaroies more than a adult needs.

Food business actively participates in disinformation campaigns. And there is no labeling or advertising oversite.

we finally stopped cigarette companies from using cartoon characters to advertise using cartoons but even though diebetes is on the rise in kids we target a lot of our processed food marketing to Kids

the list goes on and on, and it will require legislation and people powered political movements to get the word out.

Also the FARM bill is a huge part of this effort and that is certainly political. It sets up a system of food production that favors big ag, food processors, and trucking food all over the country and makes it harder to stay in business if you are a local small farmer.

anyway. all of life has some political connection, but this certainly seems like a huge political issue to me. You said it is an economic, poverty and health issue, but since all of those should be political issues, then food would be as well.

just my thoughts on it. I think by saying it is not a political issue we give our legislators a pass on concerning themselves with laws and systems that would make our food nutrious, affordable, and sustainable.

Just like our fuel consumption is Not sustainable, our current food production processes cannot be sustained into the future. we are killing our land, water supply, using fuel and killing ourselves.

last estimates were tha 33% of green house gas emissions in the usa are related to agriculture, food processes and food transportation.
1/3!

I think of it less as reaching out to people to say be involved in this Politics issue- and more recognizing that if we don't get our government to change some key pieces of legislation there is no end in site.

even if people ate smarter, getting access to good food, and getting big ag to do the right thing would require a change in laws. Remember they are also growing and shipping gm, and big ag food, and processed food all over the world, esp. to developing countries.

thanks for asking. as you can see I have too much to spout off on with all of this...
*Lauren
There is so much to say and do around this issue, and my hope is to be someone who can really engage people in a discussion of how we really are what we eat...

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