It’s impossible to pick up a newspaper or magazine without finding another story about Fox News journalist Megyn Kelly. Ms. Kelly secured her place in the pantheon of star reporters/pundits/celebrities by her fearless grilling of Donald Trump and, lately, by helping to unseat Fox supremo Roger Ailes by coming forward with tales of his sexual misconduct (which Ailes denies), to the delight of feminists of all political persuasions. None of that gender discrimination should be allowed. Unless….
Ms. Kelly generously offered “to be open-minded to Trump turning over a new leaf…”. But you know how, er, men are, “It’s tough to change a 70-year-old man,” Kelly told a New York Times interviewer. Easier, I guess, to change a 70-year-old woman. Vive la difference!
Which brings us to France, an unending source of these Gleaning and Observations. It seems that the France’s obesity rate of 10 percent (ours is 36 percent) is prompting its regulators, their pens ever-ready to write a rule to improve the lives of lesser mortals, to swing into action. According to Bloomberg, major supermarkets have been issued two million labels in a war on fat. A Nutri-score label will rate a product’s nutritional value from A for the best to E for the worst. A “sens” label will inform consumers how much of a product can healthfully be eaten, with green for “very often” and purple for ‘occasionally in small quantities.” The scheme also includes color-coded symbols showing amounts and daily percentages for calories, fat, unsaturated fat, sugar and salt.
But lovers of foie gras, fear not. Peter Turchin, professor of biology at the University of Connecticut and vice president of The Evolution Institute, reports that he visited the Foie Gras Museum in Souleilles, in the southwest of France, and learned that “‘the healthiest food that we could possibly eat is saturated fats….Getting most of your energy from fat is also the easiest way to stay lean … [because] you get satiated very quickly.” If eaten slowly, in moderate amounts, with good wine “and good conversation”, foie gras will keep you healthy. Which explains “the French Paradox”—high consumption of saturated foods, one of the lowest obesity rates in the world. But that rate is rising due, say French experts, to the fact that the younger generation is substituting American fast food for good old foie gras and its liquid and conversational accompaniments. Once again, France’s problem is our fault.
