He's Gotta Be A Republican
I don't think I want to buy this guy's book about overweight people and how they can "help" themselves. He says things like "thin workers subsidize heavy ones" and that the burden is falling on the taxpayers, and it all strikes me as a little too "point the finger at the fat people" for my taste. Or how about his family values moment, when he says that "fatness is a sociogenic illness in that, like unmarried mothers, the more you have the more you get." And then somehow he ties it into national security, because Americans are getting too fat to join the army and go to Iraq. I am betting this guy has a Bush bumper sticker on his car, what do you think?
posted by mo pie at 10:38 PM
13 Comments:
What a jerk. Yes. Obesity affects national security because, um, because, um, well, because I said so!
I love the half-assed ideas these people come up with. It's pure comedy gold. Unfortunately, too many people accept this sort of crap as gospel.
You think? He is a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute. Here is what the Center for Media and Democracy has to say about Hudson: "The Hudson Institute, is a hard-right activist think tank that advocates the abolition of government-backed Social Security and an end to corporate income taxes. It also campaigns heavily on environmental issues (pro-GM, anti-organic)." Also: " shares a large number of trustees and staff with the Heritage Foundation and the Council for National Policy." and "In particular, one of its Senior Fellows, Carol Adelman, has authored a number of articles attacking the World Health Organization, and NGOs, for approving the use of generic versions of antiretroviral AIDS drugs."
Listening to this guy pontificate about ANYTHING is like listening to Tom Cruise talk about psychiatry. Not worth the time. Of course being fat is your fault! So is poverty, AIDS, lack of education, etc. Only brilliant, Not In Any Way Privileged men like him deserve anything.
HAAATE.
You know, if everyone were to gain weight then no one could join the army. Then we couldn't have any wars. I think I've just figured out how to achieve world peace! Like all good plans it involves large portions of chocolate cake and ice cream.
I actually read this book. It was pretty bad all right. He actually blamed modern cloth, like spandex and stretchy jeans, for weight gain. He advocated wearing tight restrictive clothing to help maintain weight. Corsets for everyone!
You know, when I was 15 or so, I actually thought that would work - that I'd look thinner if I bought the tightest jeans I could get into, also that it would discourage me from gaining weight.
Not so, unfortunately.
Last time I checked, the US had a volunteer military. If someone wants to go into the military and they don't meet the fitness requirements then they will need to get into better physical condition before they can enlist. If recruiters aren't meeting their quotas, it could be because of this administration's penchant for squandering the lives of our service personnel with pointless wars that do nothing to improve out national security. I'll bet this guy also advocates reinstating the draft... but not so that it would mean *his* kid would have to go.
Yes PastaQueen!
Everybody eat cake for world peace!
Alternatively, we could say that populating the world with McDonalds franchises works towards world peace, because the poor former soviet/middle eastern/third world buggers will all gorge themselves on preservatives and saturated fats and end up immobilised by their sudden obesity, weakened by type 2 diabetes and HELPLESS when the marines land to *ahem* liberate them.
The way you put it on your blog, the author's rant seems so full of every damn stupid thing I can think of!
I actually did read this book, some years ago, and y'all are dead on: flesh is sin, loss is redemption, his twenty-five pound weight loss proves that "anyone" can do it if he, or, more likely, she, just steps up to the plate and shows some (manly) willpower, and the only overweight woman to whom he'll listen is the unfortunate Rosemary Green, professional repentant-yet-perpetual food sinner. Dang, I always knew my flesh was a moral failing!
Truly, not worth the time to investigate. He should be held down and violated with croutons. The crunchy whole-wheat variety.
--Cat
I'd like to ask him how he feels about smokers, people who eat really poor diets and will get heart disease (even if they are thin), people who drink and drive, etc .. etc .. Or, maybe he thinks that it's just the fat people who bleed the tax system or make lousy soldiers.
Jerk!
E_M_F
I'm just wondering when Mo'Niques next fat chance tryouts are sorry
We skinny people DO subsidize everything for fat people. We pay more, per pound, for our airline tickets (and for LESS seat room); we pay more per meal at the buffet; we pay more for city services compared to the greater amount of garbage generated by the obese; we pay more for the extra energy needed to heat and cool the obese, and for their public transportation; and our inflated insurance rates go towards the higher costs of our growing obesity epidemic, as we exercise and eat right in order to stay healthy. I could go on. (And I'm a bleeding heart liberal!) Don't get me started about smokers!
Regardless of how you feel about this book, not all Republicians are assholes, just the same way not all Democrats are tree hugging stoner hippies.
There is too much hatred in politics, on all sides. Do your part to not spread the hate, and treat everybody as human.
Any by the way i'm a Libertarian.
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