Exactly...

Here's an example. MSG.

All kinds of asian restaurants advertise that they no longer use MSG. Should it be banned, instead? As it turns out, the claims of headaches, etc, have been debunked in studies.

WRT salt, the hypertension-salt link is not robust as I recall. Studies go back and forth. Thousands of them, and have yet to be really conclusive. They don't even have a certain mechanism for the claims.

There are some people who hate cilantro, for example. Turns out they have some physical taste issue that makes them hate it (they say it tastes soapy—I'm in the "loves cilantro" camp, myself). Salt may be similar (why not?). Some people—unrelated to the habit of eating salty food—might have to use more to get a response, others might be hypersensitive.

Why should a food producer have to target—by law—on set vs another?

If the government wants to tell the industries how to help us survive a few years more, by all means let them do so. The industries won't do it on their own initiative, and sure as hell they won't listen to us. Some of those food processors used to grind rats, rat droppings and whatever else into their products. Is there any reason for us to trust them at all without some measure of government oversight?

I don't see this move as another way for the government to control us as a people; it is a move to regulate how much salt goes into processed foods.

krashkart, where is the definitive proof of a link between salt and hypertension?

Not saying there isn't, but in many thousands of studies, it's still not the least certain.

That's not the only health risk with an increased salt intake. From Wiki:

I never mentioned anything about hypertension. However, it has been well established in my mind over the years that too much salt is bad for us. :)

That won't work as the food manufacturers can make more profit by filling the foods with all sorts of chemicals. In theory, everyone could forgo going to burger joints but in reality, that is not gonna happen.

Besides I feel a lost less safe entrusting my health to corporations than to governments. If I have to choose between two evils, I will lean toward government. I don't trust corporations further than I can throw em. :nope:

Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle if you want to see how much corporations care about the customer

Quote:

promote the general Welfare

Pro-mote

–verb (used with object),-mot·ed, -mot·ing. 1. to help or encourage to exist or flourish; further: to promote world peace.
2. to advance in rank, dignity, position, etc.
3. Education. to put ahead to the next higher stage or grade of a course or series of classes.
4. to aid in organizing (business undertakings).
5. to encourage the sales, acceptance, etc., of (a product), esp. through advertising or other publicity.
6. Informal. to obtain (something) by cunning or trickery; wangle.
Pro-tect

–verb (used with object) 1. to defend or guard from attack, invasion, loss, annoyance, insult, etc.; cover or shield from injury or danger.
2. Economics. to guard (the industry or an industry of a nation) from foreign competition by imposing import duties.
3. to provide funds for the payment of (a draft, note, etc.).

(Source - Dictionary.com)

Provide means to encourage a specific behavior - which is "behavioral taxes" on things like cigarettes meant to encourage - by price - people to refrain from a certain behavior - or so it is claimed. *Its really to get more money from those who they can find an excuse to tax - but thats not the point*

Protect means to defend from harm. Nowhere in the constitution does is state that government is there to PROTECT us from ourselves - it is there to ENCOURAGE us to act in certain ways it deems correct. Big difference. This action - regulation - isn't encouraging the citizenry to do anything - it is REQUIRING them - by controlling the production process - to do what government wants.

Thus its wrong.

Personally I have no issue with it - other than it violates the purpose of government.

*warning, this link has some pop-up ads, but they're not too bad*

http://townhall.com/columnists/JohnS...science?page=1


That said, everyone who wants to regulate salt can go to hell:03: Your health is your own business, not mine, and when you bring the state in you make it my business. Someone on the last page (forgot who, probably tater or Haplo) said caveat ****ing emptor. I completely agree.

Nobody has the right to dictate to me what I may and may not eat, no matter what their intentions are. My body, my choice, period. I'm a grown person with enough mental faculty to decide what is best for myself.

I use chewing tobacco. Is it harmful? Yes. Do I care? No. That's a moral choice, because it is victimless. In fact, it's even more of a moral choice because it helps support millions of workers in the tobacco industry who have families to provide for. If it weren't for government healthcare (which I don't have and will never use) it would be a perfectly moral choice for everyone. It's okay to try to convince people to stop behaviour that is harmful to themselves, but when you use state-sanctioned force, it becomes immoral by virtue of contradiction. You would use violence to prevent a person from harming himself? I laugh at the thought.

The argument of a slippery-slope has been presented and refuted, but I'll bring it up again. Regulating salt (which has already been done) is a another slip down the slope. No matter what terms the argument is presented in, you're surrendering freedom for safety. Moreover, you're surrendering the freedom of others for your own safety. At what point does this logic become ethical outside the scope of Locklean rights? Answer: It never does. In giving power to any entity for your own purposes, you're effectively giving people with agendas, just like yourself, the power to dictate your rights, and your safety. It's utter madness, and yet few see it. Today it is your job or health that is protected, and tommorrow it is whatever the people you empowered decide. It is a slippery slope.

For those of you who still consider the regulation of anything within a society to be ethical, I offer myself as a candidate for Supreme-Dictator- for-Life. My platform is that you should never have children and never marry. Such actions are proven to be detrimental to your own well-being, and as such, you should not be permitted to engage in such actions. It's for your own good, after all. I'll save you the trouble of marital difficulties and divorce and child-rearing. You'll be free of all the difficulties that come with being a sexual species. I ask only that you give me the power to enforce such a thing. Any takers? Not even the atheists who say there is no afterlife? I thought not.

There is no such thing as a risk-free lifestyle, and this is doubly true when you let other people what is and what is not in your own best interests. Take responsibility for yourself, and stop trying to pawn that responsibility off on others; they will do the same to you. If it is safety you are concerned with, you need look no further than the free market. It will address your concerns because it needs to turn a profit. Major food producers already offer a tremendous variety of low-salt low-sodium, low-whatever foods for you to choose from. They do that because people bitch about this or that ingredient or diet or whatever. Read the *******ing labels and make your own damn choices. Stop trying to make others pay for still others to choose for you.

Nobody is stopping you from eating salt Hap. To use your tobacco analogy, we're arguing to have nicotine taken out of fast food because, not only are they putting it in everything they sell, they are putting in unsafe amounts of it. If we don't have the right to demand that then we don't have the right to demand they not put ground glass or anthrax in their products either.

I don't eat hardly any fast, or preprocessed food. It's NOT in everything I eat, as I said I don't buy that crap.

Claiming the amount of salt is "unsafe" is untrue.

Eating one fast food meal every X days will not harm you. Too much WATER is unsafe to consume as well, should they ban water? To make the claim the food is unsafe, you need to prove harm from consuming ONE helping of the food, IMO.

If they want to put a warning on it like ciggs, that's fine. It's not ONE smoke that hurts you, but a habit of smoking MANY.

This is the nanny state concept personified, and I can't stand it. If people are too stupid to control what they CHOSE to put in their own body we're better off if they croak.

Again, you don't have to eat ANY pre-prepared food.

I respect the hell out of you, August, but I'm not buying that line of reasoning.

The right to demand that ground glass or anthrax be banned from products is a poor comparison. Some people actually want ground glass in their products. Looking at chewing tobacco again, the stuff has ground fiberglass in it. If it didn't it, wouldn't work. Some people also want salt in their products. It isn't yours to question why, only to choose for yourself and those you are responsible for. I won't even bother mentioning the anthrax because no company would ever put that in a product. You're venturing outside the bounds of logic, there.

The market has already guaranteed that there are plenty of products for the health-conscious consumer. Choose those products if you're so concerned. Food producers aren't putting nicotine in their products, they're putting salt in them, and there are a lot of good reasons for that. People like salt. It's also an essential dietary mineral.

If people somehow decide that they no longer want salt in their food, the market will take care of it, just as it has been doing. Don't make me choose the products you favor for the sake of your convenience.

Look at Whole Foods. The food there is significantly more expensive than other grocery stores. The place is packed, all the time. The nearby grocers have all added organic stuff, sometimes decent chunks of their stores to compete.

If people want it, it will be made available.

Was the decision to put large amounts of salt in to processed foods the decision of the consumer or the decision of the producer?

I think it was the decision of the producers.

Producers load up their foods with salt, not because that is what the customer wants, but because it preserves the food and increases the profit to the producer.

Personally, I think the best solution is to

1. Label the food so that the consumer knows what he or she is buying
2. Educate the consumer to they know the risks of high levels of salt
3. Give the consumer the choice of ordering the food with different levels of salt.

Well Lcpl and Tater I've read and respect your opinions but they haven't changed mine so we'll just have to agree to disagree. I still want my government to regulate how much salt can be added to fast food because the fast food industry has refused to regulate it themselves. To me this is not about taste or convenience but a health and safety issue, not to mention a medical issue given my heart condition.

Most prepared foods sold in the market ought to be healthy and nutritious. I don't mind certain items not being either of them as long as they are properly identified (like a tobacco warning) but there needs to be a much better balance between good food and the crap that an overwhelming majority of the fast food chains serve.