Fast Food Addiction=Sad Food Choices

I could only shake my head in astonishment at what I was hearing! I  had to keep remembering to close my mouth as I was sitting there with it just hanging open in disbelief! Here is an example of the food mentality all too common today with children.

A woman and her two adopted children:  she’s in her early 60′s, they are in their early teens. All are (no surprise) overweight, one of the girls who is quite short, probably under 5 feet, is well over 100 pounds over weight.  The other is a bit taller and probably close to 75 pounds heavier than she should be.

I listened in horror at this story.  Because their food is charged to a credit card, last month the food expenses were about $1800.00.  Four hundred dollars of that was spend at McDonald’s.  Some days they eat there 2 or 3 times a day. Their other favorites are Burger King, Pizza Hut and Wendy’s.  The girls eat no vegetables; the Mom doesn’t cook because she’s too busy.  Their beverage of choice is sweetened ice tea.  They buy 5 pounds of sugar a week for the tea.  Yes — you read correctly:  five POUNDS. With the exception of a Sunday dinner, there don’t seem to be any other homemade meals that are served.

The sad thing is they don’t seem to care.  THIS is food to them! They laughed at the whole thing;  howled as they told the story! The long-term consequences of this is absolutely frightening!  The Mom is compounding her medical problems by eating this diet.  The girls are surely headed (if not already) for diabetes, heart disease, cancer, stroke, high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries and other ailments cause by fast food or a diet lacking in essential vitamins and minerals. They get no exercise at all.

Neither of the girls knows how to cook even a simple meal.  They aren’t inclined to learn, either.  Why should they… when McDonald’s, Wendy’s and Burger King are so readily available?

Part of this is from advertising, part from convenience.  Mickey D’s (and others) with their campaigns and never ending product offerings have hoodwinked these woman, and millions like them. They’re TOLD it’s good food.  They’re promised that their fast food has gotten healthier, but HOW can this be healthy when the meat comes from animals treated with antibiotics, growth hormones, fed offal from dead chickens and processed in a way that could essentially make them sick from fecal contamination? Then there are the additives and chemicals used to make the buns, flavor the meat, breading and make up the ‘ice cream’ and flavor the shakes.  What about the pesticides that the cows and chickens have eaten on their grain or are in the vegetables (what little there are) on the sandwiches.  All ingredients in these meals undoubtedly come from fields treated with pesticides and herbicides such as Round-Up and are probably all made from GMO crops!

I later told the Mom and IF… for ONE MONTH… they ate real food, no fast food and used a sweetener such as stevia for their tea… that they all would lose weight, probably without exercising. Their calorie intake as it is right now must be thousands of calories a day…, never mind the salt, sugar and fat consumption! Of course, they’d have to be willing to TRY new food such as eggs, fruits, breads, grains, beans, salads and consume far less meat and processed food.  Their tastes at present are addicted to fast food and it’s a sad testimony.

Is it too much to make a simple breakfast between the three of them in the morning?  How difficult would it be, with all of them participating every evening, to make a home-cooked meal?  Is it so impossible to cook something beforehand, freeze it and have it on a night when they might be in a hurry to be elsewhere?

I still say it:  required reading in schools should be “Fast Food Nation”  by Eric Schlosser and Morton Spurlock’s “Don’t Eat This Book-The Supersizing of America”.  Required movies should be “Fresh, The Movie” and “Food, Inc”

Kids like these are heading toward health problems and an early death. Their generation is the first one that studies show,  that may not outlive their parents.  Already rampant are health issues never seen before in their age group.  These two girls are very likely to have a major health event such as a stroke, cancer of some kind or heart attack by their 40′s or 50′s.

It’s their food choices, bite at a time, that will doom them!

Heenes:Reality TV Wannabes: no profits!

Richard and Mayumi Heene are scheduled to go to court for their “Balloon Boy” hoax.  They face tens of thousands in possible fines and even jail time.

One investigator said that the judge should also prohibit them from profiting on the escapade in book,  movie or TV offers.

I agree.

If you read the article in the AP today, lead investigator, Bob Heffernan suggests the same.  These people not only exploited their own children, but the made false reports to law enforcement officials and the FAA. The U.S. Forest Service in Colorado got involved as did the National Guard, which sent helicopters to track the balloon.  Two adjoining counties had overtime expenses for their sheriff’s department.  In the skies over the area commercial aircraft had to be rerouted.

Never mind the anguish of Mr. Heffernan, who had to go tell the Heenes that their son was not in the balloon and presumed dead! To quote Mr. Heffernan in the AP article:

“I wish I could make you realize the anguish I had when I went into that room,” Heffernan said. “To have the Heenes start the grieving process with me trying to comfort them and give them some hope. Then to find out later they were just acting.”

The Heenes also caused anguish for all concerned:  the entire rescue team and everybody who watched it unfold on the internet or TV!

In the past there have been rulings on potential profits made from book or movie deals from other crimes.  With the fascination of reality TV and a ‘get rich quick’ and the ability for one to have the ’15 minutes of fame’, judges might do well to prohibit profiteering.

Just like the Salahis, the White House gate crashers – whose reputation and financial stability is in question – let’s not let these two crimes start a wave of ‘Reality TV Wannabes’ making money just because they got some attention!

White House Gate Crashers: Looking for Buyers

As quoted by the AP’s write David Bauder 2 hours ago:

“NEW YORK – The couple who crashed President Barack Obama’s first state dinner are peddling their story to broadcast networks for hundreds of thousands of dollars, a television executive says.

The executive, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the network does not publicly discuss bookings, told The Associated Press that representatives for Michaele and Tareq Salahi contacted networks to urge them to “get their bids in” for an interview. The executive said the Virginia couple was looking for a payment in the mid-six figures range.”

Tell me this whole thing wasn’t planned by the Salahis!  Their 15 minutes of fame has turned into an hour now.

SHE wants to get on the  Bravo reality TV show, “Real Housewives of D.C.” I would hardly call her a ‘REAL” housewife of D.C.  She’s gone beyond ‘real’.

THEY are in debt to the six figure range, involved in  16 lawsuits which could cost them another 6 figure sum.

They chickened out of a Larry King Live interview, probably knowing that Mr. King would rip them and their plot to shreds.  I guess it’s on to “Oprah” next.

 

Wanna Get RICH? Smoke Cigarettes

This morning on the news blips it was announced that a Florida woman was awarded 300 MILLION by a jury in Miami.

TRUE:  Philip Morris intentionally hid the dangers of smoking from the American public.  This was inherently wrong and deceitful.  They should be punished for these actions.

However, I have one problem with this:  smoking is an individual choice.  People choose to continue smoking after their first cigarette…., dizziness and puking aside.  Even though their body is trying to tell them that what they are doing IS poison, they do it anyway.

Some people have an easier time quitting than others.  I was lucky;  I stopped and never picked up another one.  Of course, I had some help too – I couldn’t breathe and was suffering from what the doctor termed as ‘reactive asthma’.  I had to make a choice between smoking or breathing.  I chose the latter.

Ms. Naugle unfortunately was not like me.  Despite several attempts, she finally quit after over 25 years.  Sadly, today she is crippled by emphysema, unable to walk but a few steps before getting out of breath.  Her plight is a testament to the millions of ex-smokers, myself included, who have suffered permanent damage from smoking.

Yes, I firmly believe that Ms. Naugle should be compensated, but $300 million – which I am sure she will not get after legal fees and other encumbrances to the amount -  is a bit out of line.  True – she suffers daily and probably will have a much shorter life had she not smoked for so many years.  As Richard Daynard, professor of law at Northwestern University said, “Large verdicts encourage other large verdicts.”

This goes back to another rant that I posted on lawsuits.  “Stupidity Clause in Lawsuits” and the page on “Why The Responsibility Rant?”

It breaks my heart that there are millions like Ms. Naugle, but it also goes back to responsibility;  I do not negate her condition, and Philip Morris needs to be punished.

Now someone needs to take on the food companies because they are equally responsible for poisoning the American public!

Nuff said!

Conservative Christians STILL Believe Obama Is A Muslim

Following is a sad and scary testament.  I received this message from my conservative Christian relatives.  It was sent to them by their equally biased friends.

Check out this latest picture from yesterday, Veterans Day 11/11/09  at the Ceremony in Arlington National Cemetery. I don’t know whether the National Anthem is being played, or the Flag is going by, or WHAT, but EVERYBODY in the picture is either saluting or has his hand over the HEART.  All except ONE…….Guess who.?

The previous sender wrote:

I guess a Muslim’s sign of respect is folded hands over your crotch.  How in the hell did the American people elect this guy to the highest office after only 150 days in the Senate, never having run anything except maybe a rally and having lived so many years overseas.  Are we really that stupid?  This had better be a one term deal and the Senate and the House damn well better turn Republican or at least Conservative in 2010.

To which I replied:

True, you don’t know what’s going on in the picture and seeing at the President isn’t a Muslim and knowing what I know about them, I highly doubt that ‘the Muslim sign of respect is hands folded over your crotch.’  Politics in this country has no place for the radical conservative Christians who want to force their limited, bigoted,  racially stereotyped views on the rest of the country. Unfortunately for them, Christianity is NOT the only religion so get over it!

Never underestimate the narrow-mindedness of the human race

These sad little people are just an example of a dangerous aspect of American life:  Christian conservatives.  They actually BELIEVE that President Obama is a Muslim!  DUH!  Mr. Obama was BORN in the UNITED STATES of AMERICA and HE IS A CHRISTIAN! His father may have been from another country and Mr. Obama could never have run for this nation’s highest office if he were not an American citizen. Even if he was a Muslim by faith – what would that matter? Ooohhhh noooo…, to THESE people, that would have meant he was a terrorist!

These people are horrifically narrow-minded, biased, brainwashed and terribly uninformed.  From what I’ve heard, thousands of people still believe in that old rumor started during the campaign that Obama is a Muslim….. that he has a secret agenda to allow the terrorists to come in and take over the government and kill all the conservative Christians.

These same people voted for John McCain probably because of Sarah Palin’s conservative Christian blubberings, figuring she she, as VP, would liberate this country and establish a Christian-based conservative government.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO SEPARATION OF CHURCH and STATE?

Why do some factions of our population believe that their limited, racially biased,  dangerous fundamentalist views  should be imposed on this entire country?  Are we not a nation of many cultures?  Are not some of these cultures non-Christian?

These people follow a religion based on a game of Biblical “Post Office”,  read their Bibles, quote scripture,  and blindly take    e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g     literally as if God said it in the New York Times yesterday.

They are dangerous.  Their limiting agenda is dangerous to the freedom of all the citizens in this country.  Their supposed ‘values’ which embrace religious persecution and racism,  threaten the entire democracy on which this nation stands.

They are as dangerous as any other fundamentalist group bent on forcing their will on anybody else who does not agree with them or share their religious beliefs.

Texting for Jesus

As if spam on our e-mails isn’t bad enough, or telemarketers, now I’ve got the JESUS FREAKS sending me text messages!

Why don’t these people leave everybody alone?  Why do they think that it IS God’s will that they convert every last human to believe in something that supposedly happened two thousand years ago.  I say ‘supposedly’ not because I don’t doubt that Jesus did exist, rather I question what has been written about him for it’s accuracy.  As explained in my previous post, “WHAT’S IN YOUR BIBLE?” it’s all hearsay!  How do we know something actually occurred?

Well, it pissed me off to the extent that I called my cell carrier.  I am not a text person – see no reason in it…,  and don’t do it.  I put a block on all text msgs to my phone.  I have told all my friends not to text me, so they don’t.  Why should I have to PAY for text messages from someone else;  someone I don’t even know?

Yeah…, Jesus died for MY sins?  Oh, ‘cmon!  He didn’t die for anybody’s sins, you fools!  That’s just the guilt trip the church has cooked up to scare everybody and keep them in line.  That goes with the ‘devil’ stuff, too.  The ‘devil’ is only the ‘darkness’ in man; lower tendencies.  No, you blithering brainwashed idiots – Jesus did not DIE for ‘YOUR’ sins or those of anybody  else.  He was an example, just like other teachers:  Buddha, Mohammad and on down the line. He wanted to show the possibilities of man, not his own superiority!

Don’t try to show this stuff down my throat.  Believe what you want to believe but keep it to yourself.  I have no use nor patience for those who think it’s their job to ‘save’ others.

I don’t need saving from anything, thank you!

Random Rantings…..

Drive up window up selling….. Never MIND you have to deal with the totally annoying recorded monotone, sticky sweet  announcement…” Good Morning – would you like to try our Texas toast Breakfast?” before you get to talk to a live person!  Frigging gag – NO!  Then I order… A, as in  ONE, bacon egg & cheese biscuit and   a-l-w-a-y-s    add…”and that’s IT” (emphasis on the IT!) but they always ask “Would you like to make it a combo?”  Did I SAY I wanted a combo? No – I didn’t and I don’t feel like adding another thousand calories to my already fattening meal.

Pull ahead, please…. Sometimes there’s a snafu and you have to wait for your order so they ask you to pull up. Never fails….. some idiot thinks that pull up means to move up just far enough to get away from the drive up window.  Doesn’t matter that the guy behind you, or anyone else for that matter – can’t possibly get around you to get out.  This happened this morning.  The guy  two cars up, some old dude, just pulled forward about 5 feet and stopped.  The dumb ass in front of me obviously forgot that cars (usually)  come with HORNS.  A friendly tap would have let pops know he needs to move his Buick Roadmaster up another 10 feet.   The dude in front of me is just  sitting there and I’m ready to lean on the horn ’cause BOTH of these people left home without their brains!  ‘Course, Pops probably has an excuse – old age.  Could be stupidity, though!

WHY do we need 40 different kinds of Crest toothpaste? The next time you go down the toothpaste aisle, count how many different varieties of Crest there are.  Talk about trying to please everybody…. or -  trying to convince us that we NEED it.

We don’t.

It’s stupid!

Green Cars: It Takes The Little Guys To Do It

The ‘Big 3′ in Detroit are crumbling.  After years of dragging their feet, buying off Washington and sleeping with the oil lobbyists, the empire is coming down.

In an interesting article on the hottest cars at the 2009 New York Auto Show, it’s the green start up companies who are coming out on top!  The Big 3 are outnumbered by innovative small companies; dozens of them with guts enough to take the dream off the drafting board and make it into a car.  As a result, this country will have more choices for cars not seen since about 1910!

Innovation is born of hard times.  Some of these tiny companies feel, as I do, that the government mandated 35 mpg for cars is ridiculously low. One would think that since the gas crisis of the 1970′s (which I remember vividly) would have spurred the industry to new heights.  Nope – the government, the automakers and the oil industry and God knows who else, continued business as usual and now the oil producing nations have got us by the short ones!

WHY has it taken the ‘little guys’ to be the ones to bring this to the forefront?  Why NOT Detroit?  WHY?  Because the OIL INDUSTRY does not have them in their pocket.  They aren’t buddy-buddy with the lobbyists!  They have the balls to do what should have been done 35 years ago!

Environmentally, we are one step from disaster.  With climate change wracking every part of the Earth, pollution, waste and degradation of the planet rampant, things MUST change.

The auto industry needs to get out of its own way: get serious instead of shoving out ‘quasi-green vehicles’! There is SO MUCH MORE that can be done and should be done NOW…. not in 10 or 20 years!

So, let’s say HOORAY to these brave LITTLE GUYS for stepping up and being a hell of a lot greener than Detroit.

Tellin’ It Like It Is

I’m just tellin’ it like it is for me and maybe for a lot of other folks, too.  THANKS for the cudos to those who have written saying they like the post.

As I said in ‘About’ – I’m not going to pull punches.  If I want to rant on the slugs who collect welfare, who have no right to, or spread the knowledge I’ve gained on the food industry – hey – I’m just writing here.  Hopefully somebody will listen.

If what I write   b-o-t-h-e-r-s you, well then maybe you need to look at yourself.

If the stuff about food or chemicals upsets you, perhaps it’s time you learned something.  I sincerely HOPE that I can get you to put down that diet soda, and toss that microwaveable meal in the trash.  Maybe the next time you want to eat out you’ll opt for a healthier choice than the drive thru at Wendy’s, KFC, Hardees, McDonald’s or Burger King! When you’re thirsty you’ll realize your body wants water – not - poison-in-a-can: SODA!

I hope I’ve rattled your cage about pesticides and chemicals.  It ain’t pretty, but YOU PEOPLE have to GET YOUR HEADS OUT OF YOUR BUTTS about pesticides.  We ALL have to do our part.

If you go to blame someone else for something that’s happened, you might remember my post on stupid lawsuits.  Slap yourself one upside the head  because you’ve probably been a dumb ass anyway. The world does NOT revolve around you and as Mick Jagger once said…, “You can’t always get what you want.”  Here in the U.S. you’d never know it, though!

So – off to another rant.

Rock on, fellow ranters!

L-O-V-E Those ARTIFICIAL SWEETNERS? Things You Should Know!

What does DDT, FORMALDEHYDE, CHLORINE and a host of other chemicals have in common with artificial sweeteners?

Plenty!

How about the fact that Splenda more closely resembles the DDT molecule and that CHLORINE molecules are added to make the sweetener. The folks who make it will tell you that it’s made from sugar.  Well, it IS, initially, but the chemical changes that make it into SUCRALOSE  – which is a chemical formation and NOT real sugar is NOT FOUND IN NATURE!  Don’t be fooled by the name.  Additionally, your body does not have the ability to metabolize this chemical because it is artificial!  It is a CHLOROCARBON,  which causes shrinkage in the thymus, calcification in the kidneys.  If you get kidney pain after using this product, STOP using it at once. Nice, huh? It is also a fat soluble substance and remains in the body for a long time.

Did you know that scientists were creating an INSECTICIDE when Splenda was ‘discovered?’

People gobble Splenda ridden products and think nothing of it.  THIS IS NOT FOOD YOU ARE EATING - it is ARTIFICIAL INGREDIENTS something your body CANNOT PROCESS.

For more history of artificial sweeteners read this.

Personal note:

I ran the gamut of artificial sweetener use.  Grandma was into healthy eating and – we didn’t know any better then – she used saccarine.  I used that till the 70′s.  Then I used Sweet-N-Low… but…  when I started getting severe pain in my kidneys after using it, I started to wonder.  A friend who was an editor, and was currently on the health editing desk – alerted me to the dangers of S&L waaaay back then.  I stopped using ALL artificial sweeteners and have not had any pain since then.

Moms-to-be:  Please, PLEASE do NOT eat foods with artificial sweeteners.  Do not think you are doing your baby a favor by trying to ‘diet’ while you are pregnant.  EAT REAL FOOD – not ‘plastic, poison, artificial’  food!

For God’s sake (your BABY’S sake – really)  don’t drink soda, either.  That is one of the MOST poisonious things you can ingest and your baby is getting it, too.

Find out what IN your food, folks – because it probably is making you sick!