If Coca-Cola?s legendary “Mean Joe Greene” commercial was filmed today, the Pittsburgh Steelers star would accept the child?s Coke not to drink it, but to protect the youngster from the beverage?s devastating health effects.
“Kid, get that sugary beverage away from your lips right away!”
You see, there?s a war going on, but this one involves olive oil instead of foreign oil. The enemy isn?t invading our country; it?s clogging our arteries.
Welcome to the war on obesity, spawned by a uniquely American problem: Unlike millions of people around the globe dying from starvation, many Americans are dying because they eat the wrong food, and too often, too much of it.
And, as with killers like guns, drugs and alcohol, obesity is another epidemic government is all too willing to crusade against, wielding its swords of regulation and intervention.
Last week saw an agreement brokered by former President (and former Big Mac obsessive) Bill Clinton with the nation?s largest beverage distributors. Under the deal, soft-drink companies will pull most non-diet beverages from school vending machines. At this rate, it won?t be long before 18-year-old high school seniors can pick a president, but not a Pepsi. Supporters lauded the deal as a voluntary act of altruism, but let?s be honest: Soda companies knew that this might well be their only hope to stave off tobacco-size lawsuits lurking right around the soda machine.
On the surface, the deal seems both reasonable and appropriate. Schools should not enable substandard nutritional habits among students. But, in true Clintonian fashion, it?s also a silly example of gesture politics that fails to see the forest through the trees: Students can ? and will ? obviously find their sugar fixes elsewhere, and there are plenty of other beverages ? including “sports drinks” and “fitness water” ? that pack a sizable dosage of sugar. Look out, Tony the Tiger: You?re next.
Support for this measure will only make us complacent on the more important issues (sort of like the “environmentalists” who take their recycling to the processing plant in a gas-guzzling SUV). First, why are 75 percentof our high schools, 65 percent of our middle schools and 30 percent of our elementary schools so poorly managed that they think they are left with no other option than to sign the lucrative contracts with beverage companies? Second, why are schools cutting physical education classes at an alarming rate? Third, why is obesity the government?s business?
It is true that obesity causes a spike in health care costs that all of us pay for, whether we opt for celery or cheeseburgers. But life in a democracy means you don?t always get what you pay for: Bill Gates? taxes help pay for welfare recipients. Citizens in Florida help pay for a bridge in Alaska they?ll never drive over. It takes a village, all right, even the parts you don?t use.
It?s a bad sign when, more and more, government tries to turn America into a real-life version of “The Truman Show.” Lest we forget: Freedom triumphs when even those who speak unpopular opinions, advocate kooky ideas or ingest too many trans-fatty acids instead of more chlorophyll are protected in their right to folly.
While government shouldn?t create restrictions and bans that merely put the proverbial finger in the dam ? usually under an anti-libertarian guise of “protecting our children” ? government can and should seek to educate and thereby change attitudes. That bully pulpit ought to be used to promote consumption of fewer calories and burning off more calories with exercise. If President Bush can make sure that his daily schedule includes time for exercise, he ought to make sure that the nation?s schools have enough time, too.
