“If you want to look at why people are fat today, it’s pretty hard to identify a contributor more significant than this meteoric rise in cheese consumption,” Dr. Neal D. Barnard, president of the physicians’ group, said in an interview.
Generally choices about consumption are made by the individual, and we give advertisers free reign to push people to consume most any product. Does that change as soon as the government gets involved as advertisers? Should the government be required to do all it can to promote healthy consumers? If so, it would be unethical for a government program to advocate for increased cheese consumption, but then dairy farmers would be abandoned by their government.
I think that a lot of this would be solved if government marketing boards were made private. Right now a number of crops including beef, blueberries, cotton, eggs, avocados, honey, lamb, mangos, mushrooms, peanuts, popcorn, pork, potatoes, sorghum, and soy all do some of their marketing through boards set up by the government. While I don't think anyone objects to the the marketing of most fruits and vegetables, many of these products should not be a large part of a healthy diet. (Especially cotton- I really don't recommend eating much cotton at all.) Historically, the government has been part of the process, but I'm not sure why they need to continue to be. That said, these marketing orders are fully funded by the industry- it's not an issue of taxpayer dollars being used against taxpayers. If we are looking to save money and make the government speak with one voice, the only way to do that is to cut nutrition programs. I personally support research and the spread of information about how to live a healthy life, so I guess that's why I'm not a Tea Partier!
