1. Obama's reading Michael Pollan, and taking him seriously. Excerpt from O's Joe Klein interview:
I was just reading an article in the New York Times by Michael Pollan about food and the fact that our entire agricultural system is built on cheap oil. As a consequence, our agriculture sector actually is contributing more greenhouse gases than our transportation sector. And in the mean time, it's creating monocultures that are vulnerable to national security threats, are now vulnerable to sky-high food prices or crashes in food prices, huge swings in commodity prices, and are partly responsible for the explosion in our healthcare costs because they're contributing to type 2 diabetes, stroke and heart disease, obesity, all the things that are driving our huge explosion in healthcare costs. That's just one sector of the economy. You think about the same thing is true on transportation. The same thing is true on how we construct our buildings. The same is true across the board.
Fantastic! Let us hope that for starters, President Obama will abandon ethanol subsidies, which he now supports.
2. We all will have lived to see the moment when a 109-year-old black woman whose father was a slave cast her ballot for the first black president. God bless America.
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I, too, think corn based ethanol is ridiculous. A prime example of expidient politics over well-reasoned policy.
The story of the 109 year old voter brought tears to my eyes. How wonderful for her and her family. The fact that this woman paid poll taxes to vote on a $20 a month salary makes me tingle inside, and makes me even more of a believer in democracy.
ADM is going to be Obama's Haliburton.
FWIW, if I look at photos of my school classmates through the 1960s and early 70s, it was very rare to see an overweight kid. Then we all grew up, became middle aged commuters, and packed on weight while nearly killing ourselves carpooling kids to soccer -- and then staying up too bloody late finishing up the day's work. At least, those of us without nannies (!).
Now, drive by my local schools and I see the number of kids who are a bit pudgy, and it shocks me.
I've had to work years to get the weight off from endless hours sitting on tarmacs, freeways, and in meetings. It's no way to live, and it disgusts me that I can't deduct health club expenses from my taxes -- if I'm at least trying to be healthy, which is a socially responsible act, then why can't the government incentive good conduct?!
To have a president of ANY party who connects the food supply, the economy, energy use, and health into one coherent theme called "food production" would be a huge improvement over the stupidity we've labored under.
This is one area where I respect Bill Clinton, Huckabee, and Obama - and my sense is that a whole lot of people need to bury some hatchets and pay more attention to the food that's making us all overweight, and the lack of parks and recreation programs that are impacting children's health and learning.
This nexus of problems should not be 'owned' by any party or politician.
Everyone needs to be talking about this, and figuring out how to see the ripple effects of our food policies.
Isn't point 2 a bit premature? Obama isn't president yet. Perhaps an edit to "first major party black presidential candidate" would be appropriate?
readeroftealeaves: FWIW, if I look at photos of my school classmates through the 1960s and early 70s, it was very rare to see an overweight kid. Then we all grew up, became middle aged commuters, and packed on weight while nearly killing ourselves carpooling kids to soccer -- and then staying up too bloody late finishing up the day's work ...
ROTL, a fair # of people gain weight in middle age.
As far as "not seeing an overweight kid," I was a teen in the 1960s/early 1970s too, and there were fat kids in all my schools, in two different cities half a continent away.
Less than we observe today, I will admit. But I think what you are seeing today is that fatter people probably have been having more children - and passing those genes on to their kids. It makes sense, as Hispanics and African-Americans have much higher rates of obesity - and far more children than whites, too.
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