by Jim Lakely
Our friends at theIndependent Women’s Forum sent a letter the other day to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack expressing concern about the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee becoming overly ideological.
Brace yourself: The guidelines recommend taking great care to feed humanity while being mindful of the carbon footprint consuming food requires … no matter the cost.
IWF Senior Fellow Julie Gunlock wrote at National Review Online about the food nannies our First Lady has decided to direct:
Every five years, a committee of officials chosen by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reviews the federal dietary guidelines. This committee, called the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, is mandated by Congress to work on “providing nutritional and dietary information and guidelines for the general public . . . based on the preponderance of scientific and medical knowledge currently available.”
In other words, these are the government-fat-camp counselors, and they’re here to tell you what to eat.
Gunlock notes the sketchy track record of the federal food police. Once they advocated a food pyramid that since 1992 was heavy on carbs. But under the guidance of our First Lady, we moved to the “Choose My Plate” program, which was high in vegetables and fruits, lean proteins, whole grains, and healthy fats. Writes Gunlock:
The new plate was met with much optimism. Celebrity chef Padma Lakshmi gushed that the new plate was a “triumph for the first lady and the rest of us.” Marion Nestle, professor of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at New York University said, “The new design is a big improvement.” Others suggested the plate would finally knock some sense into us piggy Americans and make us eat better and lose weight.
Of course, reasonable people realize this is ludicrous because what normal person says, “You know, I really need to eat better. I think I’ll go check out the USDA website for diet info.”?
Only Washington bureaucrats could be oblivious enough to miss the utter uselessness of the DGAC. Only they could be unaware that the United States has a thriving, $60 billion diet and exercise industry (not to mention a whole host of independent bloggers) that already provides people with a variety of choices and advice on how to get fit and eat nutritiously. The DGAC members must avoid grocery stores altogether because if they did ever stand in the checkout lane, they’d be bombarded with magazine headlines promising guidance on dieting (along with pictures of bikini-clad hard bodies).
Great point by Gunlock. Liberals have zero faith in the public to make the right choices — and an equal lack of recognition that the free market endlessly urges Americans to shape up. But nothing matters to a liberal unless the government urges/mandates it.
Gunlock watched the live feed of the DGAC event so you don’t have to, and noticed something that caught her attention — and should have yours:
Kate Clancy, billed as a “food systems consultant” (yeah, so am I!) came to the podium and explained that the DGAC must integrate environmental concerns into the guidelines. As her speech went on, I heard phrases like “environmentally friendly food choices” and making “low impact food choices” and looking at things with an “ecological perspective.” Her point was clear: Americans must not only make nutritious food decisions, they must make environmentally responsible food decisions even if that means Americans’ food costs increase. And food prices most definitely will go up if her recommendations are included in the final guidelines.
The liberal elite shops at Whole Foods (despite it being headed by a libertarian), so everyone else should too!
While Clancy doesn’t say we have to swear off meat altogether, she envisions a population that procures protein from local sources, only buying line-caught fish, grass-fed beef, and organic milk. Again, she makes no mention of the added costs associated with this Whole Foods-style food shopping. Which should make us all wonder, do these folks understand that the highest rates of obesity are suffered by those who live under the poverty line? This administration, which portrays itself as looking out for the poor, might want to reconsider making recommendations that will needlessly hike the prices of healthy food for that very demographic.
Sure. That will happen. As soon as kids all across the country stop dumping their First-Lady-approved lunches into the garbage.
When will we be free of the food nannies? Maybe when we all agree to compost the crappy food they demand we eat.