Sand Key Florida Blog

One of the subjects we cover on the Sand Key Blog is occasional news and trends in the purchasing, consumption and sustainability of foods and things we eat and drink. One concern restaurants and food processors are mulling over is the increased government regulation at all levels - state, local and national.

Here are a few of the proposals from around the country gaining momentum as the government targets obesity:

• Obesity is the target of many health care reformists. As a result, sugar, fat and caloric content in food have become the poster children for regulation. One of the current health care proposals floating around congress has a 5% tax on carbonated beverages.
• California is considering a tax on all soft drinks claiming high consumption leads to obesity. Obama’s administration is studying a similar approach.
• Many local governments have followed the federal government’s lead on nutritional labeling. Some have even required restaurants to post the caloric content of every dish on menus. New York is leading the way, but get ready to pay more for that anniversary dinner if restaurants have to hire nutritionists to print a menu.
• Fat of all kinds, not just saturated fats, are now being pin pointed for regulation. Most fats have about 120 calories per tablespoon. That means that anything with butter, oil and animal fats have become targets for regulation. Of course, the fact that your body MUST have a certain amount of fat content to be healthy has been obscured. Not only do the FEDS want to publicize the fat content on labels and menus, they want statements concerning the effects of over consumption of fat can do to the body.

While on the surface, many people think the efforts to tax and regulate food is good to keep America healthy. The truth is there are few people over the age of about twelve that don’t know if you eat too many high calorie foods you get fat! The point here is the constant intrusion (and taxation) of every nook and cranny of our lives. Even more daunting is the removal of personal responsibility for our individual actions.

Special Note: As this was being written an announcement came from the FDA that they will propose regulations to force oyster harvesters along the Gulf coast to pasteurize raw oysters for six months of the year. That proposal, if made into law, will mean the end to raw oysters and another fishery in Florida will die.

 The FDA cites 8 deaths that occurred in 2008 attributed to raw oysters throughout the country. More people than that died from choking on salt water taffy at carnivals and fairs! Maybe we should ban taffy. There were thousands of people who died from alcohol poisoning last year (many from drinking rubbing alcohol). Maybe we should ban alcohol - it might be interesting to see how far our government officials could support that! Sobriety may be new to them.

The depth of government regulation has to have some sanity. As government grows, so does needless regulation. Is it time the silent majority becomes a vocal majority?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 1st, 2009 at 5:11 am and is filed under , news.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.