Obesity

A Sliding Scale of Concern and Money Making/Legislating Opportunities! How To Check Your Health

Published by Papa Giorgio

When you walk through a grocery store and gaze upon all the damning headlines of America and American’s, obesity is one to critique a bit:

BMI does not take into account age, gender, or muscle mass. Nor does it distinguish between lean body mass and fat mass. As a result, some people, such as heavily muscled athletes, may have a high BMI even though they don’t have a high percentage of body fat. In others, such as elderly people, BMI may appear normal even though muscle has been lost with aging.  Take for example, basketball player Michael Jordan: ”When he was in his prime, his BMI was 27-29, classifying him as overweight, yet his waist size was less than 30,” says Michael Roizen, MD.

See “How Accurate Is Body Mass Index, or BMI?”

And again:

The primary reason why over 60% of Americans are “overweight” has nothing to do with fast food, cars, or television; it is not because Americans are eating too much and exercising too little; nor is it because of any “fat” gene within us; nor is it because of any clear evidence linking body weight to health. The reason why a majority of Americans are overweight is because a handful of scientists and government health officials, many with significant ties to drug companies, have arbitrarily designated “overweight” and “obese” at very low levels. These thresholds have little to do with any scientific evidence about weight and health and a lot to do with the pecuniary interests of academic researchers, government agencies, and the pharmaceutical industry. [According to the Body Mass Index — BMI] George W. Bush or Michael Jordan [in his prime] are “overweight” or Arnold Schwarzenegger is “obese,” (which they are according to our current standards), it is not because of their poor fitness or their precarious health. It is because the very people who are defining these terms stand to gain by setting a very low threshold for determining what overweight and obese should be.

See the article entitled, “The Curious Politics of Defining People by Their Weight”

Paying for Programs

Published by Papa Giorgio

“The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money [to spend].”

A quote attributed to Margaret Thatcher



HotAir notes that Michelle Obama’s pet project is being funded by money already allocated for food stamps:

When Democrats paid for their EduJobs bill last week by taking money out of the food stamp program, the media barely noticed it. Undoubtedly that has created an incentive for Democrats and the Obama administration to steal from the poor once again. This time, they will pull $8 billion already allocated to food stamps and other aid in order to fund Michelle Obama’s pet project, the anti-child-obesity bill:

Democrats who reluctantly slashed a food stamp program to fund a state aid bill may have to do so again to pay for a top priority of first lady Michelle Obama.

The House will soon consider an $8 billion child nutrition bill that’s at the center of the first lady’s “Let’s Move” initiative. Before leaving for the summer recess, the Senate passed a smaller version of the legislation that is paid for by trimming the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps.

The proposed cuts would come on top of a 13.6 percent food stamp reduction in the $26 billion Medicaid and education state funding bill that President Obama signed this week.

Food stamps have made multiple appearances on the fiscal chopping block because Democrats have few other places to turn to offset the cost of legislation.

…(read more)…

I wonder if the Democrats will count Michelle’s program a success when reports come back that obesity is down. More specificly, down 8-billion dollars because the kids went to bed hungry? I have my own thoughts on the program, but using progressive Democratic thinking on the matter (these programs are for the poor), where does this lead? Could you imagine if Bush did this? Oh wwhat a firestorm! CS Lewis was erudite enough to pen:

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. Their very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be ‘cured’ against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.” (C. S. Lewis, God in the Dock, p. 292.)