Politicians Push Back on Obesity Legislation

Obesity is one of the dirtiest words you can say in Washington, D.C., these days. America is overstuffed with a massive collection of overly large individuals and that number continues to grow, particularly in children. So the federal government has been attacking the issue on a number of levels.

From First Lady Michelle Obama’s White House garden, restaurant and retail-lobbying efforts and Let's Move! initiative to the new daily-nutrition-recommendation plate (above) from the USDA, the folks in the federal government are doing what they can to help Americans know their chard from their Cheetos. Not everyone inside the Beltway agrees on how to take in the Beltway a few notches, however.

Members of Congress think the federal government is stepping over the line, particularly with the proposed guidelines “that would pressure food companies into changing their recipes or else suspending their advertisements on television shows watched by children,” according to the Washington Examiner.

The Examiner reports that 99 members of Congress have written the Obama Administration to protest what they're calling the "cereal killer" proposal. A number of freshmen Republicans sent a note to the Secretaries of Agriculture and Health and Human Services, and the Federal Trade Commission, about the proposals put forth by the Interagency Working Group.

On the Democrat side of the aisle, 34 lawmakers sent a letter on the issue as did the Center for Disease Controls, according to the Examiner. Part of the complaint is that the current proposal would “prevent even perfectly healthy foods from being marketed to children,” the Examiner reports.