Understanding Government

The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder has an interesting look at Michelle Obama’s announced push to end childhood obesity.

I am somewhat sympathetic to the view that government warnings about the “obesity epidemic” can be seen as paternalistic and invasive. However, the specific federal programs that the Obama administration has in mind to deal with obesity are hard to assail: better food labeling by the Food and Drug Administration, making school lunch providers serve more nutritious meals, more money for nutritious food for low-income children. As Ambinder points out, some of the proposals don’t go far enough: there needs to be even more federal money to combat “food deserts,” the large swaths of the country with no available grocery stores that sell fresh produce.

I wonder, then, if might be more effective to frame the problem as one of equal access to nutritious food and healthy lifestyles. Many children — whether too fat, too thin or of average weight — don’t get the food and exercise they need to be healthy, energetic citizens. Talk of obesity might needlessly stigmatize fat children.

The Washington Post’s Jane Black reports that Dept. of Agriculture staffers want more money for its commodity food program, which gives school lunches to poor kids:

Improving the quality of food provided free to schools is important at a time when school budgets are being squeezed. President Obama has proposed an additional $1 billion for child nutrition programs, including school lunch, in his 2010 budget.

But in the face of a projected federal deficit of $1.3 trillion , even the strongest supporters of school-lunch reform say that Congress is unlikely to approve a substantial funding increase when it takes up the issue next year. (more…)