It never stops…
Via Time:
Sugar poses enough health risks that it should be considered a controlled substance just like alcohol and tobacco, contend a team of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).
Here’s an extract from a statement by those same researchers:
Many of the interventions that have reduced alcohol and tobacco consumption can be models for addressing the sugar problem, such as levying special sales taxes, controlling access, and tightening licensing requirements on vending machines and snack bars that sell high sugar products in schools and workplaces.
“We’re not talking prohibition…We’re not advocating a major imposition of the government into people’s lives. We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient, thereby moving people away from the concentrated dose. What we want is to actually increase people’s choices by making foods that aren’t loaded with sugar comparatively easier and cheaper to get.”
That second paragraph is a minor propaganda classic. First we have the straw man (“we’re not talking prohibition”). Then we read the soothing reassurance (“We’re not advocating a major imposition of the government into people’s lives. We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient”. That is in turn followed by language (“the concentrated dose”) that slyly demonizes the adversary, in this case by implicitly comparing poor old sugar to some sort of drug (a familiar trope, as it happens). Then comes a conclusion of truly magnificent doublespeak: “What we want is to actually increase people’s choices by making foods that aren’t loaded with sugar comparatively easier and cheaper to get.” What they “actually” mean by that is that sugar-heavy products will be made more expensive and more difficult to obtain thereby making it easier for the child-like American population to “choose” the healthier alternative.
Bravo!
The tariff-supported sugar producers and their lobbyists will cheer this proposal. I believe the sugar markup is already way out of line with other foods.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOnly the elite can govern their sheeple.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIsn't one of the two spokes-nannies for this initiative, Robert Lustig, also a frontman for the fascist Center for Science in the Public Interest?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWell, I caught myself just the other day.
I was watching TV and a commercial popped up. A bunch of people doing athletic type stuff. Very hip, very hop, very high energy and healthy looking activity. Commercial for bottled water? Gatorade? Nope. Red Bull.
So, now, this caffeine and sugar loaded carbonated drink is being marketed as a sports drink? (To be fair, in my years supporting my son's sports endeavors, I've seen numerous occasions of [bad] parents feeding their kids...preteen ones, mind you...these "energy" drinks.) Really? The substance that began its life as the secret potion behind the Dot Com/Tech Boom (nerds lived off that junk) is now gonna help you Be Like Mike?
So, yeah, I'm watching this and I'm thinking that meddling nincompoops are already saddling advertisers with all sorts of crazy regulations and laws, so, why not slap a ban on these sugar/caffeine peddlers marketing themselves as The Beverages of Champions?
Then I come to my senses and realize it is none of my business (not something we can trust Romney and his ilk to do).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWait till Nanny Bloomberg gets hold of this.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseA jelly doughnut?
Well if the gov't is paying for most of the health care through Medicare, Medicaid and the probably single payer plan (after Obama wins in a landslide), then it should have the right to govern on the front end that which costs it money on the back end. Sounds authoritative, but such is the tangled web we weave.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis really is a strange obsession considering the extent to which kids eating a lot of candy predates the obesity hysteria. When they finally get around to the realization that the problem is kids sitting on their as*es all the time, one wonders what exactly they won't advocate high taxes on? An air conditioner tax? A sofa tax? A video game tax? I suppose they find all of that preferable to actually making gym class really vigorous for fat kids.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am Cornholio!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAre you threatening me?
Somewhere Bloomberg is prancing about in his wizard's robe cackling with glee.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExcellent Mr. Stuttaford. Now please explain to me why it's not okay to tax and regulate sugar, but it is okay to outright ban marijuana and imprison people for using it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'd like a satisfactory answer to that myself. I think it's a load of crap that it's harmless to be an habitual user, but I certainly don't think that it's harmful in any way that justifies it being illegal in a free society.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI'm not Mr Stuttaford, but here are some answers for you:
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSugar doesn't alter the mental state of the user to the same extent as marijuana (and everybody knows that -- who asks, "what candy are you eating?" instead of "what are you smoking?"). Admittedly alcohol also impairs the user's ability to function, and is legal, though regulated; however, the question was in comparison to sugar.
Eating sugar doesn't pollute the immediate environment for others as smoking does -- and marijuana is worse than tobacco in that regard. (Yes, tobacco is legal. But regulated. And again, the question was, in comparison to sugar.)
Eating sugar does not lead to an increased incidence of psychosis, as several studies have shown marijuana use does.
The UCSF researchers have certainly confirmed one thing in many people's minds:
Namely, that all Federal funding to UCSF should be terminated immediately.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Sugar poses enough health risks that it should be considered a controlled substance just like alcohol and tobacco, contend a team of researchers."
Researchers. Any bets that they are receiving government grants? Does anybody ever get a grant to study NOT meddling in people's lives?
Sigh. I'm going to show my respect for these people by going right now to have a candy bar.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLet's make two lists.
When it is okay to demand I.D.: Buying alcohol, buying cigarettes, flying on an airplane, buying cold medicine, buying a Coca-Cola or a Snickers Bar, piercing your ears, buying a gun, buying almost anything at a store with a credit card or check, checking out a library book.
When it is UNCONSCIONABLE to ask for I.D.: Registering to vote, voting, applying for government benefits, getting an abortion, crossing the border from Mexico.
I'm sure there is some sort of lesson here.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseLustig and all of his ilk are charlatans who deliberately commit scientific fraud. They use studies that ignore the role of infection, in order to falsely scapegoat other peoples' lifestyles, and inflict their own on everyone. They conspire to keep the public ignorant of even the most elementary facts, such as that the death rates from heart disease have steadily declined ever since the 1960s, in order to deceive the public that there's a public health crisis, and that submitting to their quackery is the remedy.
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Their fanatical, cult-like ideology is founded on the pseudo-science of the Third Reich. The difference is that the Nazis could hide behind the excuse of ignorance, while these criminals CANNOT!
They get their funding from the government. For the government to commit fraud to deprive us of our liberties is automatically a violation of our Constitutional rights to the equal protection of the laws, just as much as if it purposely threw innocent people in prison. And for the government to spread lies about phony health dangers is terrorism, no different from calling in phony bomb threats.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot sure how much more control the formerly free peoples of the United States can take.
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