That headline is why I’ll never, even if broke and starving, eat Libby’s Potted Meat Food Product. Raiding a Safeway for munchies at 3AM one weekend, one of my hooligan friends suggested I read the label on the little can he was holding up. I did, and then immediately committed that one ingredient to memory, even though I don’t really know what it is, to remind me to never never never ever eat Libby’s Potted Meat Food Product.
See, even when semi-wasted at the tender age of 21 in the wee small hours of the morning, I can read and remember stuff and maybe even make something like a sensible decision. A few years later, I saw on TV exactly what partially-hydrogenated oils were, and right then and there swore off of most junk food, most of the time. They may be yummy, but those trans-fats — well, they’re pretty gross.
But this is what grownups do: We see things; we learn things; we make decisions.
But that’s not good enough for the FDA, which is going to war against trans-fats whether you like them or not:
Under the proposal, which is open for public comment for 60 days, the agency would declare that partially hydrogenated oils, the source of trans fats, were no longer “generally recognized as safe,” a legal category that permits the use of salt and caffeine, for example.
That means companies would have to prove scientifically that partially hydrogenated oils are safe to eat, a very high hurdle given that scientific literature overwhelmingly shows the contrary. The Institute of Medicine has concluded that there is no safe level for consumption of artificial trans fats.
“That will make it a challenge, to be honest,” said Michael R. Taylor, deputy commissioner for foods at the F.D.A.
They’ll outlaw yummy things because they know better than you. And besides, since ObamaCare and Medicare and Medicaid put all of us in this together, we can’t be allowed to take our own risks — they’ve been collectivized. When we’re all wards of the state, the only ones allowed to be grownups are the politicians and the bureaucrats.
Apropos of nothing, I’d just like to remind you that the Left loves accusing the Right of being “paternalistic.”
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