Who chooses what you eat?

This is Mike... I haven't posted for a long time, but I'm going to try to get back at it again.  I may ruffle more feathers than my sweet wife... but here we go.  :-)

I was listening to the radio this evening while waiting on the aforementioned sweet wife to finish shopping at the mall.  The news person was doing a special report on breakfast cereals.  He was lamenting about how much sugar (and probably high fructose corn syrup) is found in the common breakfast cereal.  It was stated that over 40 of the products on the shelf have more sugar in one cup of cereal than three Chips-a-hoy cookies. Wow.  One product mentioned, Honey O's or something like that, has more sugar in one cup of cereal than a Hostess Twinkie!  Now that is gross.

This is a legitimate concern and frankly quite a disgraceful performance by the major food companies of America.  However, the unspoken tragedy is that people are buying these products and eating them without thought or care for what it does to their health.

This news person then went on a tirade about needing the federal government to intervene in this situation.  He lamented how the current regulations "have no teeth" to enforce the rules against marketing sugary products to kids.  The fact that three times more children are obese today than just one generation ago was declared to be a travesty of justice!

Do you ever talk back to your radio or TV?  I do sometimes.  I wanted to say, and probably did, WHERE ARE THE PARENTS?  I don't know about you, but I have no interest in the the federal or state government regulating the food industry any more than they already do.  They are already doing a lousy job (in my humble opinion, more on that in the next post), so what makes us think it will get better with more rules?  The lobbyists for "big food" are firmly in control of these agencies, the new rules simply harm the small local producers and keep their more wholesome products out of the hands of the consumer.  Rules that often make it illegal or at least difficult to procure "real food".

So in summary, it is your choice.  Big brother is incapable of doing this for you.  YOU must choose your food carefully.