I have not yet seen “Super 8,” and I am not sure I will see it, but I found the reasoning in the following excerpt from a post over at Partial Objects quite compelling:
Published June 14, 2011
Category: Commentary
Published June 3, 2011
Michelle Obama’s MyPlate and the USDA’s Incentives
“The Dinner Plate is more accurately thought of as a diagram of agriculture subsidies. The change in the government’s nutritional guidance was part of First Lady Michelle Obama’s initiative to curb childhood obesity. But the First Lady and other at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) continue to rely on unscientific rules of thumb that believe, without evidence, that meat, particularly those meats that are high in fat like red meat, is the primary cause of obesity, and later in life heart disease and high cholesterol. The dinner plate is fully one-half carbohydrates, either in the form of starches or sugar.
The fundamental problem with both the Dinner Plate concept and the original Food Pyramid is that both came from the USDA, not the National Institutes of Health or the National Science Foundation. The USDA, the agency responsible for handing out huge government subsidies, is not likely to want to curb the population’s consumption of grains, particularly corn, which presently enjoys an enormous subsidy.”
More here.
Biggest Losers: Warren Kinsella on Canada’s Liberal Party
This Walrus article by Warren Kinsella threw me back to the two summers I spent while in college working in Ottawa for a Liberal cabinet minister who shall remain nameless:
“Campaigns matter, sure. But for the once-great Liberal Party, the 2011 election was lost before it was even called. First of all, the Tories’ multimillion-dollar anti-Ignatieff advertising campaigns, however despicable, were highly effective. By the time Ignatieff and his palace guard decided to strike back, it was too late. And, ironically, the election campaign attack ads marshalled by both the Conservatives and the Liberals principally benefited the New Democrats; disgusted voters were propelled toward a third party.
The second reason for the Liberals’ failure was the terrible strategic error of voting to defeat the government when they did. The Tories had been outpolling the Grits for months and had an overwhelming fundraising and organizational advantage. Experienced senior Liberals, like campaign manager Gordon Ashworth, pleaded with Ignatieff to wait for the political environment to become more favourable. Despite all this, however, Ignatieff pushed for an election he could not win.
The third factor in the defeat is more contentious, but just as real. When Ignatieff had a chance to effectively eliminate NDP leader Jack Layton as the only other progressive choice; when Ignatieff had an opportunity, long before the election, to craft a deal with the NDP, for cooperation, or a coalition, or even a merger, he emphatically said no. In June 2010, with his former leadership rivals Bob Rae and Dominic LeBlanc standing behind him in a House of Commons hallway soberly nodding their heads, Ignatieff declared that he wanted nothing to do with the NDP. Forming an alliance with the NDP was ‘ridiculous,’ he snorted.”
Given the results of the last election, it is difficult to believe that the Liberal Party was in power for 69 years during the 20th century.
Personally, I believe it is high time for the Liberal Party to abandon its love affair with intellectuals. Pierre Trudeau was that rare breed of charismatic intellectual. Neither Stéphane Dion nor Michael Ignatieff had charisma.