On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 8:27 AM, G Money <gm0n3...@gmail.com> wrote: > > On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 10:24 AM, Judah McAuley <ju...@wiredotter.com> wrote: > >> >> Which is not to say I support this particular law, but rather to point >> out that "we are a free country" is kind of an absurd statement. Maybe >> this particular law is dumb, but we have plenty of dumb laws out there >> and some that are probably even smart, all of which infringe upon our >> generic notion of freedom. >> > > Yer right, it was just too lazy to type: Are we not a country of people, > many of us partially educated, who should be fully capable of deciding what > we do, and do not, want to eat?
I'm not yet sure. I'm very conflicted on the issue, actually. I am a firm believer in individual rights and responsibility. On the other hand, I've seen the American food landscape pretty utterly destroyed by corporate greed, insidious marketing and government subsidies. I see Federal and State governments are being a large part of how we got into this mess through subsidies to corn production, subsidies for Big Ag that helped destroy the family farm, a weak and actively complicit FDA that has historically given free reign to companies like Monsanto and ConAgra to do whatever the hell they want...the list goes on and on. The end result is that the deck is very heavily stacked against people who might have some passing interest in making good food choices. The information is hard to find and/or misleading (anything can use the word Natural on it) and even if you have the information, subsidies and economics of scale make it much more difficult to make good choices. So in a way, yeah, I think that people should be responsible for their own choices and have the freedom, as much as possible, to make them. On the other hand, I think that it is incumbent on Government to help provide a level playing field so that there can be genuine competition and a wide variety of options available for people to choose from. At this current point in time, there is nothing even vaguely approaching a level playing field. The Government was actively involved in getting us into the state we are in and so I feel that it has a role to play in getting us to a place where there is greater competition and more options for people who should have the freedom to choose from. Ideally, I'd like to see the federal government focus on the bigger issues of anti-trust within the agriculture/food industry, eliminating subsides that artificially decrease prices for food that isn't really even food, improve food safety and foster food security. I think that Happy Meals are largely a distraction. It makes headlines and that is somewhat useful for people on both sides, I suppose, because people pay a bit of attention that won't happen when ConAgra pays off some Senators who will prevent a hearing on corn subsidies. But yeah, can't say I get too excited about legislation over Happy Meals toys though. Judah ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:331050 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
