Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Palin's Anti-Anti-Obesity Stance...

Michelle Obama's "Let's Move" campaign is nothing new.  Bill Clinton campaigned on Nickelodeon in 2005 to promote physical fitness and healthy nutrition to children, only a year after his quadruple bypass surgery.  George W. Bush urged Americans to improve their health through exercise, proper diet, and regular doctors visits.  Ronald Reagan issued an Executive Order on Physical Fitness and Sports in 1982 "in order to expand the program for physical fitness and sports."  The program that he referred to is the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, which has been around since 1956. 

From 1989 until 1993, Arnold Schwarzenegger was appointed as Council chairman, and traveled to all 50 states to personally advocate the importance of daily physical education in American schools.  Was this considered "interfering with parental freedoms," or "big government telling us how to live our lives"?  Imagine any of George HW Bush's critics complaining about the Council on Physical Fitness, and how Arnold and Bush were "telling us how to live our lives."



But suddenly now, Sarah Palin seems to have a serious problem with Michelle Obama's "Let's Move" campaign.  In a twisted misunderstanding of the campaign itself, Palin has labelled Obama's efforts as an attack on personal freedom.  I don't even really want to quote the dumb bitch.  All I can say is WHAT THE FUCK?  I can't wait to hear this rhetoric thrown my way sometime soon by a fat, bible thumping conservative who can't wait to defend his/her right to commit gluttony...

And just before I blow my top, along comes Mike Huckabee to calm me down and remind me that Evangelicals aren't always irrational about the same things.  From politicsdaily.com:  "With all due respect to my colleague and friend Sarah Palin, I think she's misunderstood what Michelle Obama is trying to do," Huckabee said. "Michelle Obama's not trying to tell people what to eat or force government's desires on people. She's stating the obvious: that we have an obesity crisis in this country."  It's great of Huckabee to side with reality here, and his comments will definitely prevent many Evangelicals from falling for Palin's divisive tactics, but don't forget that Huck believes that Dinosaurs and humans roamed the earth together.

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