Archives for November 2011

On the surface, this is a story about food and obesity. Underneath, though, it’s a much deeper story — about science, economics, prejudice and how humans arrive at their version of truth. It’s complicated and messy, but the lessons are applicable across the board — including in politics.

Over the last 50 years, it’s become medical wisdom that eating fat is a very bad thing. It causes obesity. It clogs arteries. It causes all sorts of problems. But what if there’s no proof of that? What if every study ever attempted to prove it had done the opposite or been inconclusive? Science writer Gary Taubes says that’s the case.

Taubes researched the history of the recommendations against fat and the various efforts to prove that approach is the right one. He also looked at the competing theory about obesity, heart disease and other health problems — that they’re caused by sugar. His evidence will leave you wondering why you ever worried so much about fat.

His book is called “Good Calories, Bad Calories: Fats, Carbs, and the Controversial Science of Diet and Health,” but you don’t have to read the book to be fascinated by its insights, both about nutrition and about how science determines what’s true and what’s not. (If you’re honest, it might make you wonder how honest you can really be with yourself.) On this week’s episode of EconTalk, economist Russ Roberts interviews Taubes. Click “play” to listen.

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When Bill Clinton was president, he was evil incarnate to Republicans. When George W. Bush was president, he was evil incarnate to Democrats. Now that Barack Obama is president, he has become evil incarnate to Republicans. Are you seeing a pattern here?

We have an irrational natural tendency to personalize our politics. The people who disagree with us aren’t just wrong. They’re evil. And the problem with them isn’t just the ideas they represent. It’s the people themselves. Yes, we tend to make everything about the people, so we ignore the ideas that gave us those people.

The same system that produced Clinton as president also produced Bush and Obama as president. Ultimately, the men who’ve been elected president are pawns of one basic idea — the idea that if we get “the right man for the job” and give him power over us, everything will be just fine. That’s delusional. The problem isn’t the individuals. The problem is a system that’s based on a false premise.

Getting rid of Obama as president isn’t going to fix the things that conservatives are so worried about. Hating him might help them release some anger in the meantime, but it’s useless in solving the problem. The same was true of all of the irrational insults that were hurled by the progressive left at Bush when he was bumbling through his two terms. I oppose what each man stands for, but I know the underlying system is to blame. It’s only by changing the system that we can ever produce different results.

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You’ve probably seen this picture or seen video of the same scene. Campus police at the University of California at Davis blasted pepper spray at peaceful student protesters Friday. Many people are outraged. Many are calling for the firing of the officers. I’d like to step back and take a broader perspective with three points.

First, this incident proves again that photography matters. In many places, police arrest people for taking pictures of them doing their jobs. In some places, it’s even specifically against the law. The attempts of police, politicians and prosecutors in some places to stop photography of them are wrong, whether it’s through arrests or intimidation.

If the pictures and video from the UC-Davis incident didn’t exist, this would be a non-story. We wouldn’t be talking about the issue. It would be almost as though it didn’t happen. This is why it’s important to strongly press the case that photography is not a crime. (You’ll find plenty of stories at that site of police and other public officials attempting to stop photography that they don’t like.)

Second, these sorts of incidents — and far worse — go on almost every day, but we don’t know about them because there is such a strong “support the police” culture in this country. The people who are experiencing oppression, threats and intimidation from police are mostly those who are powerless to do anything about it. They tend to be poor, black, brown or undereducated. They tend to be people who either don’t know their rights or know they won’t be believed if they complain.

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