Diet Laws

I am all for improving America’s diet.  I just don’t think the government needs to be so heavily involved.  As a physician, it should be us giving the advice but I admit that I don’t think we have all the right answers yet.   Are grains the problem?  Has fat been maligned for the wrong reason?   I agree that that trans fatty acids are bad but will saturated fats make a comeback?   Processed food is a major culprit but how do we get it out of the common person’s diet?  The WSJ did a nice piece entitled the Tax Code Diet.  Check it out.  The editors have issues with a government-led diet transformation “across all levels and sectors of society” where we turn over a large part of fiscal policy to a scientific committee. The panelists want to expand farm subsidies—entitlements for plants and animals—to include fruits and vegetables. As the article says, they would have done “far better to endorse an end to subsidies for row crops like corn, which become low-quality calories via refined starches and high-fructose corn syrup.”   I really can’t see how the government can eat for us and when politics and new diet regulations come together only bad things can happen.  That scares me.