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It's also possible to read the ingredients list and make your decision that way. You don't have to do it every time, just identify the brands that say things like "no added sugar"...

Actually NO -- that no longer works. Companies who try to sell you "healthy" foods want to lie to you.

There are all sorts of things that are basically pure sugar that many companies are trying to add into products with "no added sugar."

One of my favorite examples is Chobani's "natural" greek yogurt, with "no added sugar," but which contains large amounts of "evaporated cane juice" (which is... well, a very slightly different processing method to make SUGAR). There have been class action lawsuits over this, but judges have thrown them out.

I mean, it's "juice," so "evaporated cane juice" must be good for you, right? Also on the list of fun ways for companies to say "sugar" in another way on "natural, no sugar added" foods -- "brown rice syrup" or "honey" or "agave nectar." Wow, it's made with "brown rice" -- must be good for me! "Nectar" -- wow, that's like a good fruit juice, no?

No matter that these things are basically 97%+ sugar and the only reason they are added to anything is as a substitute for sugar so that businesses can claim "no sugar added" on their labels and sound "healthier."

Just to be clear -- most flavors of Chobani yogurt contains more sugar per ounce than Coca Cola. That's what a "no sugar added" label gets you these days.

No, we just need a greenhouse module for the ISS that will use natural light to grow vegetables. Then they might want to edge into the protein realm. Though it will be a long time before we will be able to have cows in space (cue the trolls!) the vegetable module could raise these:

http://www.foodnavigator-usa.c...

I have tried them, and they are remarkably good.

companies use all sorts of tricks to hide stuff like that. Soup companies use yeast to put MSG in Soup without reporting it (it's a by product of the yeast, which serves no other purpose).

And recently there has been the phenomenon where companies try to hide things by using confusing nomenclature. E.g., "evaporated cane juice" in products with "no added sugar." Yeah -- "cane juice" -- it must be good for you, since they call it "juice"! Well, it's just another form of sugar... processed slightly differently, but still basically sucrose.

Basically, it's just a game... try to make things sound "natural" and "wholesome" when they're basically the same old crap. Same thing goes for "brown rice syrup" used as a sweetener in many things... basically sugar. But it's "brown rice"!! (Of course, brown rice also often has elevated levels of arsenic and other things... but hey, it's "natural" and "brown," so it must be good!)

You know how we found out sodium nitrate causes cancer?

Funny that you bring nitrates up, because that's one of my favorite examples of nonsense labeling. First, we get most of our nitrates from vegetables, so worrying about the small amounts in bacon and cured meats is probably not as big a deal as people make of it. (Yes, yes... cooking does other things to the nitrates and can make them bad, but proper curing also deactivates most of them too... we could argue this all day.)

But regardless of that, my favorite misleading labeling is all the "uncured" meats you see these days: "uncured bacon," "uncured salami," etc. Yeah, except these almost always contain huge amounts of "concentrated celery juice" (or sometimes another agent) which contains more nitrates than the standard salts used traditionally to cure meat. (And no -- to those natural foods wackos -- there's no evidence to support the idea that somehow those nitrates are better for you in the concentrated celery juice... basically because "natural" celery juice has unpredictable amounts of nitrates, they need to add more of them than they would for tradition curing salts.)

People just want stuff called "natural" with "juice" and "brown X" and "natural flavors" in it. It's almost all bogus nonsense, and often you end up paying a huge premium for something that could very well be worse for you.

Moral of the story: Labels frequently don't work to tell people what's actually better. Not saying we shouldn't try to use them, but companies will weasel their way around anything to appeal to customers.

(By the way, I'm all in favor of cooking for yourself with whole ingredients, using less "processed" foods, etc. But bogus "natural foods" nonsense is bogus nonsense.)

You know what is the far most biggest problem to the environment? It is not AGW, it is the exponential population growth. There are already several billion too many of us.

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.co

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, violent Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa

The third world will carry on starving until they have enough education to limit the number of children they have

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, theocractic Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 :

The Chinese had it right with their limit on family size

Shame on you. The forced abortions, forced sterilizations and other extremely authoritarian methods used by the Chinese government are crimes against humanity.

Plus, there is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 :

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates; their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will grow from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, theocratic Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by billionaire individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa

Or cut down on population. Which is doable without resorting to war or murder (but, I repeat myself). Put the money into sex ed uncontaminated by religion, free prophylactics, and rewards for not having children. Positive reinforcements, not negative like China did.

There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates, and their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.

The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will increase from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]

The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 67/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]

Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].

And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.

Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]

African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.

Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.

Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.

1 : esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa

Per USDA figures, there were about 765 million chickens slaughtered in the US last year. The major share of the "fat" is probably the oil used to fry things. The US produces something over 12 million metric tons of fats and oils per year, about 70% of that vegetable oils. Back-of-the-envelope, 12 million metric tons of the stuff is on the order of 3 billion gallons.

Fuck you.

Corn lobby lawyers threatened the FDA, so the FDA made sure that they don't bother to give a real definition for "natural."

They deliberately said "we don't have the resources to bother to define this". They've gone back and forth since, mostly because they're under-budgeted and still don't have the heft to get into a court fight with the corn cartel's lawyers.

HFCS is less natural - requiring more chemically-intensive steps and molecular rearrangement to produce - than the "synthetic" dextrose. If you can bring yourself to call it "natural", you're either delusional or you live in Iowa married to your cousin.

Fuck you.

Corn lobby lawyers threatened the FDA, so the FDA made sure that they don't bother to give a real definition for "natural."

They deliberately said "we don't have the resources to bother to define this". They've gone back and forth since, mostly because they're under-budgeted and still don't have the heft to get into a court fight with the corn cartel's lawyers.

HFCS is less natural - requiring more chemically-intensive steps and molecular rearrangement to produce - than the "synthetic" dextrose. If you can bring yourself to call it "natural", you're either delusional or you live in Iowa married to your cousin.

Fuck you.

Corn lobby lawyers threatened the FDA, so the FDA made sure that they don't bother to give a real definition for "natural."

They deliberately said "we don't have the resources to bother to define this". They've gone back and forth since, mostly because they're under-budgeted and still don't have the heft to get into a court fight with the corn cartel's lawyers.

HFCS is less natural - requiring more chemically-intensive steps and molecular rearrangement to produce - than the "synthetic" dextrose. If you can bring yourself to call it "natural", you're either delusional or you live in Iowa married to your cousin.

Look - if you're one of the morbidly obese, YOU caused your own health problems, not me, not someone else. And as the doctor pointed out in one of the links, the people who died in their hospital from H1N1 were huge, with the health problems that go along with it - if H1N1 hadn't gotten them, something else probably would have within the next 6 months, but it's no surprises that fat slobs are at higher risk.

Everyone else is sick and tired about how so many of the uber-fat, rather than actually trying to shed their excess poundage, want "handicapped status." That's as ironic as someone killing their parents and then asking for mercy because they're an orphan. Want 2 seats on the plane? Pay for them. After all, when you want 2 extra-large pizzas, you pay for both of them.

It's the same with smokers who get cancer and then say "It's not fair! Why me?"

Part of the blame for the epidemic of obesity has to go to food producers who use too much HFCS, just like part of the blame for cancer has to go to the cigarette companies, but they can't claim victim status when they're both the principal architect and a willing, informed participant in bringing about their own situation. This is not something they don't have control over. If they aren't willing to control what they put in their mouth, then they have to accept the consequences, and one of those consequences is higher mortality from any opportunistic infection.

What are they waiting for? A vaccine to cure obesity? Obesity isn't a "disease", though watching the morbidly obese at feeding time WILL make many sick. We see it often enough in restaurants - 4 people come in, somehow manage to sit on the chairs without breaking them, and proceed to eat everything in sight. First thing people do is look in the parking lot to see if there's a car with [$INSERT_EVEN_FATTER_STATE] license plates.

It's having a "spill-over effect" on the general population. Too many of us have forgotten what a person who's not overweight even looks like. Saying "I'm not fat" when they're sedentary, their BMI is over 25, and their waste is bigger than their chest. Yeah, riiiight. Or saying "You need to put on some weight" when the person's BMI is over 25, and they really could afford to lose (and are trying to shed) a few pounds.

H1N1 isn't a serious threat. HFCS, obesity, tobacco - THOSE are threats that make H1N1 look like a case of the hiccups.

Death toll from obesity catches up with tobacco http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Financial-Industry/Death-toll-from-obesity-catches-up-with-tobacco
Smokings Global Death Toll tp:wwwcbsnewscomstories20030912healthmain572833shtml

Almost 5 million people die because of smoking each year.

And now H1N1 is FINALLY sending us the common-sense message that those extra pounds, even if they don't make us officially "morbidly obese", put us at risk

The past four deaths have occurred in the past week, as hospitals in the valley report being inundated with patients with flu-like symptoms and doctors race to understand more about the new virus.

Most ICU patients have been overweight, he said, which is puzzling: Their weight isn't causing other health conditions that the federal government says puts people at higher risk of severe influenza complications, such as cardiovascular disease or diabetes, he said.

"I really don't consider being overweight a disease, at least in the patients we're seeing," Dean said. "It's not like they're so [obese] they've gone into heart failure. Somehow, the disease is striking them."

So, they're not "that" fat, but they're big enough that they obviously got more than a few bowls of Crisco in common. Why is this so unexpected? We've been saying for decades that extra pounds are a health risk.

Evidence that eating foods with more sweeteners leads to greater obesity, which in turn leads to diabetes? Do I really need to cite studies for something so commonly accepted? Okay, here's a good start:

http://news.healingwell.com/index.php?p=news1&id=521780
http://healthlink.mcw.edu/article/941223597.html
http://www.healthsystem.virginia.edu/uvahealth/adult_diabetes/obover.cfm

I'm not saying that all type 2 diabetes is caused by obesity---it is well established that this is not the case---but it is well established that a fair percentage of people with type 2 diabetes became diabetic after gaining weight and that these people often cease to be diabetic after surgical intervention to forces weight loss. That's about as clear an establishment of causation as you can get.... The causative mechanism is even somewhat understood at this point.

Or did you mean the proof about the preservatives?

http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Science-Nutrition/FDA-re-opens-probe-into-benzene-contamination-of-soft-drinks

Follow the links from there for loads of info on this subject.

It is fairly well established that sodium benzoate when combined with ascorbic acid (sorry, wrong acid in my previous post... my bad) releases benzene, which is a well known carcinogen.

Word to the wise: if you're buying soft drinks or fruit juices preserved with sodium benzoate, be sure to drink them immediately. Don't let them sit on the shelf of your home. What you don't know can kill you.

Well, the numbers may be inaccurate, but this is what I came up with from searching the net:
US corn production (2003/2004): 259.273m metric tons here
US sugarcane production (forecast FY 08): 3.388m metric tons here
US sugar beet production (forecast FY 08): 4.549m metric tons here
I don't profess to know anything about economics and how supply and demand affect how much of each crop is produced/available for use in fuel, so draw your own conclusions, or provide an explanation if you are so inclined.

Well, the numbers may be inaccurate, but this is what I came up with from searching the net:
US corn production (2003/2004): 259.273m metric tons here
US sugarcane production (forecast FY 08): 3.388m metric tons here
US sugar beet production (forecast FY 08): 4.549m metric tons here
I don't profess to know anything about economics and how supply and demand affect how much of each crop is produced/available for use in fuel, so draw your own conclusions, or provide an explanation if you are so inclined.

"Vegetable oil" is a synonym for "heavily processed, hydrogenated oil which will kill you but makes good financial sense to the corporatised US food production industry"

It is poisonous bloody stuff. If you want to know why America (in particular) and western nations (in general) are all suffering out of control obesity and diabetes epidemics you need to look no further than the replacement of natural oils (peanut, coconut and butter), with so-called "healthy" polyunsaturates. Countries like India uses huge amounts of butter (ghee) and coconut oil and you don't see them with rampaging blood sugar levels, heart disease and all of the other side effects of eating crap like "Crisco" and margarines.

Ask yourself why these types of oils never spoil? If you leave margarine out of the refridgerator for a week, does it go off? Why? It doesn't go off because it is not bio-degradeable. If it is not biodegradable, then how is your body meant to metabolise it? Of course it can't, so what it does is "put it aside" and get on with the job of digesting everything else. After sufficient time of course your body will have put enough fat aside that you become fat. Fat builds up around the pancreas and voila, you've got diabetes.

So why do we eat this crap? Because US food interests want you to. The problem for US business interests is that most natural oils such as peanut, olive and coconut/palm oil are not produced in the US. The US does produce gobs of corn and soy however, not to mention that canola rubbish. The problem is that these crops do not produce much edible oil naturally, it has to be processed out of them. Another problem is that the resulting oils are quite unstable, meaning they react to oxygen (oxidize) quickly and spoil. This is a problem for the manufacturing, distribution and retail industries however, who really like long shelf lives and cheap storage (non-refrigerated). So what the industry does is to hydrogenate their oils, which means superheating the oil and passing it through hydrogen to fuse hydrogen molecules to the receptors that would normally fuse with the oxygen. This makes for an oil that is extremely stable but an unfortunate side effect is that it also becomes virtually undigestable. Sure you can eat it and you won't turn blue and die in a week, but then the same can be said for smoking too. Remember how corporate interests insisted that smoking couldn't hurt you until only a few years ago? Well the edible oil industry is no better than those criminals. They too use bogus science and massive amounts of money to produce a steady stream of lies and bullshit regarding the health benefits of eating processed vegetable oils. This began during the thirties and over time it has worked so well that the US is now the most overweight and unhealthy nation on earth, with other western nations scrambling to follow suit.

Now they want to stick that crap in chocolate. It's getting to the point that you wont be able to buy anything that isn't filled with this rubbish.

Essential reading:

The Oiling of America
http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/oiling.ht ml

Other good sites;
http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=73 471-trans-fat-interesterified-fat-cvd

http://www.thescreamonline.com/essays/essays5-1/ve goil.html
http://www.nexusmagazine.com/articles/DiabetesDece ption.html
http://www.jctonic.com/include/healingcrisis/12Hyd rogenatedoil.htm

Meanwhile, people all around the world are sick, malnourished, and dying.

Did you know that in the US, half of all the food we produce goes to waste?

It's a myth that people are starving because they don't have sufficiently magical crops to grow. There is far more than enough arable land to feed everyone in the world fully. What's lacking is the infrastructure, education, and technology to create and manage good farms. These things cannot be genetically engineered, and they don't need to be.

As long as the third world is being actively exploited by first world nations, multinational corps, and corrupt local governments, there will be starvation - with or without GMOs. The GMO debate is just a convenient way to distract people from the fact that we have had the capability to feed the entire world easily for decades now, and choose not to.

Although GMOs will not solve world hunger, they do have a fair possibility of exacerbating it, by destabilizing ecosystems. Introduce any crop radically different from what normally grows in an area, whether it's genetically engineered or even just a natural crop from a different continent, and you're setting yourself up for potentially disastrous trouble.