Weight loss boils down to choice

Like much of America, McDonald's is going on a diet. Cutting back. Trimming down. Holding off. Some might say that darn it, Ronald, it's about time. The fast-food behemoth's menu choices had gotten way too expansive.

Earlier this month the company announced it was downsizing its supersize choices by the end of the year. "Menu simplification," a spokesman explained. The rest of the world, however, suspects the move was more public relations than desire for simplicity. Those calorie-laden meals were garnering too much interest -- from lawyers, the food police and consumers themselves.

McDonald's announcement was followed by the federal government's "State of the Waistline," a report that should plump up the sales of even the most obscure diet book. I can best sum up its findings this way: We are a nation of fatsos. Blubber-butts. Tubs of lard.

About 130 million Americans, or nearly two out of three, are overweight or obese, and those numbers have been steadily increasing for years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As a result, obesity is on track to overtake cigarette smoking as the leading cause of preventable death.

As expected, these fat figures have touched off a debate about who is responsible for such weighty largess, and what should be done about it. Should we take personal blame for stuffing our faces? Or, are we simply the victims of a greedy industry that lures us with its mouth-watering commercials, its fat-laced offerings and its misleading labels?

Just last week, the House of Representatives voted to protect fast-food restaurants and others in the food industry from lawsuits, but the measure -- unofficially called "the cheeseburger bill" -- is predicted to die in the Senate. Apparently, our elected officials, like most of us, can't decide if common sense should be the order of the day.

It doesn't take a food scientist, though, to figure out what my 10-year-old so aptly blurted when he overhead the news from the Golden Arches: "Why don't people stop eating what makes them fat?" Then again, that would require will power, the one thing we really, really need in XXL size.

Read more...