Somehow, it's Boosh's fault.Posted on 01/02/2005 12:04:52 AM PST by neverdem
The DemoRats have accused Republicans of trying to cut school lunch programs for the "poor"... looks like we were doing those poor fat slobs a favor.
Unless you try, say, cooking from scratch.
Somehow this must be Bush's fault.
Don't forget Halliburton and Don Rumsfeld.
All of our family's food is cooked at home, other than going to a restaurant for the children's birthday, where we eat escargots, shrimp, fish, etc. Other than that, we live on pork, steak, mashed potatoes, asparagus, brocolli, gravy, eggs, bacon, whole milk, orange juice, tomatoes, roast beef, gravy, butter on rolls, pancakes and gravy.
Just normal stuff.
And none of us are FAT.
Somehow, it's Boosh's fault.El Wrongo. It's because we are "stingy?" LOL
Beans, homemade tortillas, tuna salad, pasta and sauce...lots of things are cheap and healthy. When you spend 16+ dollars on a family of four for one meal at a fast food joint, and then realize that $16 can buy a load of groceries for a few meals...apparently lessons in budgeting are in order for these folks. It just seems like laziness.
BTW, you mentioned gravy three times. Is it a beverage or a side dish?
You know, you're on to something. If my 6 year old had a relentless request for shrimp scampi, it would be met by peals of laughter, an effort to contain myself, then a hand on his shoulder and a "Great! Are you buying?"
Something that's not exactly hidden in this article is that for many families, either there isn't the time, or someone doesn't want to make the effort to actually cook food.
I have to admit that when I get home from work, the last thing that I want to do is actually make a healthy meal. But to say that fast food is cheaper than eating "real" food is silly. Sure, fast foods loaded with empty carbs and calories seem pretty cheap, but they're really not. What they are is quick and easy to serve and gulp down.
I know for a fact that in 30 minutes or less, I can make myself a healthy meal for the same or less than I would spend at a fast food restaurant. The problem is being willing to put in the effort.
Mark
It isn't necessarily (and often isn't) cheaper in the short run. In the long run, it's infinitely cheaper, b/c it prevents serious health problems. As for making time for cooking, it's a question of making health a priority. For most American families, it doesn't become a priority until someone develops a serious health problem. "Because I would not stop for death, He kindly stopped for me..."
My scorn is not for the fat people depicted in this article; rather, my scorn is for all the skinny, busy-buddy liberals who look at poor people and focus on medical problems they may have...down the road. Liberals support the welfare system and oppose school vouchers, yet they worry if a seven year old is fat because someday she may get diabetes. I'm not saying it's healthy to be fat, just that there are more pressing problems for most poor people than their cholesterol.
I really don't think we are in the middle of an obesity crisis.
Sure, some kids are a little bit overweight, but some kids have been overweight for a long time.
I think it comes down to personal responsibility. You should have the freedom to be overweight, but when you have consumers threatening to sue companies like McDonald's for making them fat, we have a major problem. THAT is the crisis, not the obesity.
Now McDonald's has gotten rid of super sized meals. I enjoy super sized meals and they got rid of them. It was a real bargain at only 39 cents extra. I blame it on the food nazis.
''You can have my parking space, my office, I don't care, but I will never negotiate the kids. Those children's lives are my responsibility. Not only academically -- their lives physically are in my hands.''
This form of Socialist Humanitarianism has become the new religion among the intellectual elite.They have devalued children into spongy blobs,severed parental responsibility,destroyed families,fostered drug use,squandered government resources,encouraged sexual deviancy, and are determined to remove God from all public locations.
Also, the changes in the amounts and types of foods available in the grocery stores (frozen pizzas, prepared packaged foods, breads, pastries, etc.) have greatly increased carbohydrate consumption overall. Also, the profile of the types of fat consumed in the modern diet (more hydrogenated fats and chemically processed vegetable oils deficient in Omega 3 fats) is drastically different from the fats consumed by our grandparents and is probably contributing to health problems. Even meat foods and eggs available to us today do not have the same nutritional value (such as Omega 3 fat content) as they did in the past due the changes in what animals are fed. And yes, despite the assertions of many commenters on this thread, carbohydrate based foods bought at the grocery store cost less than meat and vegetables and are quicker to prepare and take less cleanup time.
Cooking all the meals "from scratch" for a family requires a lot of planning, shopping, preparation and cleanup time. And don't forget, one must also have the knowledge and cooking abilities to prepare good tasting food, an interest and talent that seems to be in short supply in modern families. To do this job cost effectively requires constant monitoring of grocery store sales and prices and shopping at several stores. If you are really interested in improving nutrition you might even seek out organic or locally grown fresh vegetables, something that is harder, takes more time and costs even more. I remember going to a local vegetable stand close to our home with my mother twice a week or more to get fresh vegetables in suburban Houston in the 1960's, something that is not available to many people today.
No one wants to address this fact but there are serious consequences for families and society in general to eliminating the at home, full-time caregiver and the obesity problem, in my opinion, is just one of them.
And they are doing all of this with the help of thier "pobrecito" friends at the NYT...who somehow think that the Left wing agenda was bloodied but still flying after the election. Wrong.
When I was a child, nearly all the women who had borne children were fat and if anyone lost weight or was a normal weight, it was said that, "She/he looks bad." Some children were fat, but in those days children had little choice in food matters. At our home we had cornflakes, biscuits loaded with lard, sausage, gravy and eggs for breakfast, along with honey, jelly and fried apples. For lunch and dinner, the fare was always some variation of ham, fried chicken, fried potatoes, green beans, soup beans and always, cornbread. We did drink a lot of milk, straight from the cow. I was a chubby child, but when I was fourteen, a nasty bout of measles following chickenpox took that "babyfat" off and it has never returned..As an adult, 5'4", I weight between 110-112. Children today do not have to suffer the ravages of childhood illnesses that we did or even the bouts of bronchitis, pneumonia, flu, etc., thank God. They also do not get the exercise we got because we did not have TV and video games to render us sendentary. We also could walk to the home of a neighbor without the fear of abduction. Mom's who work need some help and most of them get that help from the fast food restaurants. They come home to chaos if they have school aged children. Everyone is tired and sometimes hours of homework remains to be done, along with laundry, paying the bills, seeing to baths and whatever is needed to function at work and at school the next day. Mothers, especially, are perpetually fatigued and it is understandable and rational for them to choose the purchase of fast food as a low cost way of conserving their time and energy. The liberals who pound on this issue are not really looking for answers because most of them probably do not have children. They are looking to blame someone they can sue for the problem. Education is needed as is the case with all human problems. For Christmas, I gave the older children in our family a child's book on nutrition which was written in an entertaining and inspirational way. Many children will respond with a desire to eat well if they can understand how different foods are used by their bodies to help them grow and stay healthy and well.
Good points.
Thanks.
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