Commentaries

June 03, 2009

 Commentaries is where Minnesota Public Radio welcomes your thoughtful opinion about current events and issues. Commentaries are like letters to the editor. To be considered for publication, your commentary should be issue-related, clearly written, and follow our Terms of Use. New insights into ongoing topics are especially welcome. Not all commentaries received are published. For topical interaction with others, visit the discussion groups.

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Obesity and the marshmallow conspiracy

I wonder if the food I am eating today is still the same food I was eating yesterday. For instance, I remember when a marshmallow was a marshmallow, do you? Have you tried to roast a marshmallow lately, good luck? What has happened to the good old marshmallow, the same thing that has happened to most of our food.

When we were not paying any attention they took the marshmallow out of marshmallows but kept the price moving gradually upward. What is in the marshmallow today? Artificial color, artificial flavor, corn syrup, dextrose, gelatin (cow hooves), modified corn starch, sugar and tetrasodium pyrophosphate, sounds like a gut bomb to me. It still looks like a marshmallow, tastes like one and they still call it a marshmallow but it is obviously not.

This kind of slow changing of ingredients has gone on throughout the food industry even the foods considered good for us such as corn syrup in canned soups and meats; I am reminded of the Trojan horse here. The food industry's major concern is shelf life and marketing a lot of their junk to us, not what happens after we eat the stuff. Now suddenly everyone is noticing that gee, we have an obesity epidemic and a whole lot of other epidemics.

Medical science's weak answer to the obesity epidemic is genetics, so they can research it and make more drugs. But wait a minute, how does the genetics of an entire country change in a matter of years? [MPR News: U of M study: Hungry teens at higher risk of obesity] I am sure that many doctors care about this but does the medical industry care? Many people I have talked to blame the obese person saying, "They eat too much and they are lazy." One-third of the country and growing, I don't think so.

Paul Blake
Maung, Phetchabun Province, Thailand


Communities count on law enforcement to protect

I have so many questions. [MPR News: Fong Lee's family angered by verdict] Who holds our law enforcement responsible for their actions? Who questions their motives? Who tells them that they still have to abide by the laws they protect and that they are not above them? Is it us the public? Is it the judicial system?

At this point whatever system is in place to check and balance this group of individuals seems to be completely ineffective. I lost my faith in law enforcement several years ago when my cousin was shot and killed in a very simalar manner in San Diego, California. The insanity of even thinking a community can heal after something like this shocks me. How can anyone ever heal from the loss of a young life taken unjustly while their killer walks with a slap on the wrist by the very people that are in our community to protect us?

Jennifer Wagner
Burnsville, Minn.


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