GET HEALTHY-DRINK MORE COKE?

August 25th, 2021

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

GET HEALTHY-DRINK MORE COKE?

The Baton Rouge Advocate reported this week that childhood obesity has tripled in the past 30 years, and that a study is underway by Pennington Biomedical Research Center to determine just where the fault lies.  The folks at Pennington just might want to get out a mirror and take a good look at their own past questionable advice.

 

I picked up a recent copy of Men’s Health Magazine with a lengthy article on weight loss based on research from Louisiana’s own Pennington Biomedical Research Center. The results were typical-eat less, eat early, breath deep, get and lots of exercise. And sugar? The Pennington study concludes that all those naysayers who express concern over the dangers of sugar are exaggerating a bit.  “The evidence is underwhelming that sugar is much or any worse than other refined carbs.”  So great news for all you sugar addictors.  Just cut back a bit on the carbs say the folks at Pennington.

There’s always been a disconnect between the accolades LSU gives itself for academic achievement and the bottom-line results that come from national rankings. Louisiana’s flagship rarely cracks the top 100 universities in the U.S., with a majority of SEC schools outperforming LSU year after year. In the 2019 university rankings by US News and World Report, LSU comes in at number 140.

But there’s always been one shining star in the LSU System — The Pennington Biomedical Research Center. Pennington has been recognized as a world leader in obesity research and disease prevention. The center’s mission statement reflects the pride it takes in its work:

“Since 1988, the mission of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center has been to promote healthier lives through research and education in nutrition and preventive medicine. As the largest academic-based nutritional research center in the world, we have the unique distinction of housing the greatest concentration of obesity research scientists.”

The center’s mission is commendable considering that the most recent statistics from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention conclude that more than one-third (34.9% or 78.6 million) of U.S. adults are obese. The annual medical cost of obesity in the U.S. is approaching $200 billion. The public picks up on any new study from Pennington Center, because of its stellar national and international reputation.

 The LSU Center released another study not too long back on why so many Americans are overweight. Pennington’s executive director called the study “cutting-edge research.” Their conclusion? The center’s press release cites “a lack of physical activity” as the main culprit. Nothing about Big Macs, fries, and sugar coated almost everything. And, oh yes — no mention at all of soft drinks like Coca Cola.

So who paid for the study? What public interest organization funded this noble effort to get our kids healthier? Why none other than, you guessed it, Coca Cola. The world’s largest producer of sugar loaded beverages wants us to quit worrying about cutting calories. Just get more exercise. That apparently is the key to losing lots of weight. Yeah, right!

The Baton Rouge Advocate’s James Gill succinctly asked: “Why do academics bother was such a charade? Give ‘em a sack full of money and they’ll solemnly go through all the motions of a quest for the truth. All together now: ‘I’d like to buy the world a Coke.’”

Back during my days in public life as Louisiana’s Insurance Commissioner, I proposed legislation that would eliminate sugar loaded soft drinks from dispensaries in public schools. The beverage alliance, including Coca Cola, strongly lobbied against such legislation, arguing that profits from these machines went to buy school athletic uniforms. So you load up the kids with sugar before sending them out on the playing field in great looking uniforms.

The front organization for Coca Cola’s money, called The Global Energy Balance Network, has issued a press release that says, “Most of the focus in the popular media and in the scientific press is that they’re eating too much, eating too much, eating too much — blaming fast food, blaming sugary drinks and so on. And there’s really virtually no compelling evidence that that in fact is the cause.”

No compelling evidence? What! There have been numerous non-biased scientific studies that repeatedly and conclusively prove fast food and sugary drinks cause obesity. To say otherwise insults the intelligence of even the average observer. Coca Cola does a great disservice by allowing their front organization to make such unfounded claims.

The Pennington Center press office told me that this study is ongoing and subject to refining as research progresses. They have their work cut out for them. To leave their initial conclusions that exercise far outweighs poor dietary choices doesn’t pass the smell test. Or for that matter, the taste test.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownusa.com. 

 

 

The Berlin Wall!

Thursday, August 19^th, 2021

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 

THE BERLIN WALL!

 

There has been a lot of publicity about the tearing down of the Berlin wall. But few people know that the wall itself was constructed 60 years ago this week.  The Russian puppet regime in east Germany were trying to start the stem of so many East Germans flying to the west.

 

I had a personal experience of traveling to East Berlin in 1962.  My application to attend Cambridge University was accepted, and I was also invited to join the U.S. track team that was touring Europe during the summer and fall of 1962. I headed to England on Icelandic Airlines (the cheapest way to get to Europe) with my track shoes, about four hundred dollars in cash, and a bundle of enthusiasm for what I hoped would be an enjoyable year abroad.

 

The highlight of the summer for me was being the leadoff runner on the American 400-meter relay team, where I handed off the baton to the world’s fastest human, “Bullet Bob” Hayes. He was the world record holder in the 100-yard dash. Our relay team also included Ralph Boston who was the world record holder in the broad jump and Paul Warfield who went on to have a successful professional football career with the Philadelphia Eagles. We competed several times a week in major cities throughout Europe, and we never lost a race.

 

Strangely enough, my track career led to the first significant political crisis I ever faced. We had a two-week break in the schedule, and the American team was going to vacation in various parts of Europe, then regroup in Bremerhaven, Germany, for our next official

 

A meet promoter approached me to run in East Berlin during the break. The promoter assured me that I would receive full expenses and appropriate prizes. There was no professional track in the 1960s, but the better runners could negotiate for their prize – a clock radio, a T.V. set, maybe a refrigerator, all of which could be cashed in after the meet.

 

I had never been to East Germany, and I figured if the promoter was willing to cover the expenses of a struggling student runner, why not go for it.

 

The Berlin Wall was still standing, and America did not recognize East Germany as a legitimate country. It was considered a Russian puppet state, and the U.S. maintained no diplomatic relations with the country. Once you crossed to the other side of the wall, you were on your own.

 

On the afternoon of the track meet, I crossed the border from West Berlin at Checkpoint Charlie, along with the agent who had arranged for me to run in the meet. (He also served as my interpreter.) It was an evening meet, and I was scheduled to compete in the high hurdles against an East German who was world ranked. The East Germans had built up the competition as a grudge match between our two countries and made it a point of honor for their national pride.

 

Our team had been competing several times a week, but the break had given me a lengthy rest from the grind of competition. I felt extra spring in my legs and anticipated a good run and victory over the East German.

 

The 100-meter dash was about to begin when my agent brought over an American who wanted to talk to me. He did not fully identify himself, but he said he was with the American Embassy in West Germany. He told me in strong terms that it would be completely unacceptable for me to run the high-hurdles race that was about to start. As a member of the American team, he argued, I was a representative of my government. Since America did not recognize East Germany, I would be giving tacit recognition to a country that the United States felt was illegitimate. He implied that by competing I could start an international incident; if I had any patriotism, I would get my gear and head back across the border to West Berlin immediately.

 

What a dilemma for a twenty-one-year-old who was simply enjoying the opportunity to travel and had no real understanding of the international consequences supposedly at stake. I wanted to run, but I certainly was not going to go against the wishes of my country. So I gathered my warm-ups and had the interpreter tell the meet promoter that I was not going to run.

 

As the announcement was being made that I would not compete, I headed for the locker rooms, which were located at the other end of the stadium, diagonally across the infield. Thousands of people in the stadium stood up and whistled loudly, which was their way of booing. I learned later that the announcer had told the crowd the American was afraid to compete against the East German. I was angry and disappointed, but I had enough common sense to change my clothes and get back across the border.

 

Many years later, I would look back on this controversy as my first political act. I guess the possibility of starting an international incident certainly qualifies as a baptism in politics.  I never went to East Berlin again until after the wall itself was torn down in1989.

 

Peace and Justice.

 

Jim Brown

 

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. 

 

 

 

DELUSION OR COMMON SENSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

Thursday, August 8^th, 2021

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 DELUSION OR COMMON SENSE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

One of the joys of my early life was to study English Literature at Cambridge in England back in the early 1960s. Nobel prize author and poet Rudyard Kipling was an early favorite. He did not bog the reader down with dense symbolism and complexity. He was easy to understand.  Born in India, Kipling was tagged as the “Poet of the British Empire. It just might be a good idea for Republicans and Democrats, who fall over themselves espousing America’s continuing role in the Middle East, to take a breather and read a little Kipling.

“Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,

Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat.”

Kipling expressed his concerns of imperialism in his book, The Man Who Would Be King, which was made into one of my favorite movies. In it, Sean Connery loses his head attempting to bring his western values to a remote mountain vastness called Kafiristan. Michael Caine is left alive to crawl back to civilization and bring the message to the West — “quit trying to convert and save us” in the Middle East.

America has commanded a major presence throughout the Middle East for the past 60 years for one major reason. No, a singular reason. Oil. It was in our economic interest to remake the Muslim world by the B and B method. Bribing and Bombing. In the 1980s, U.S. interests were served by pouring money and weapons into Afghanistan in support of Islamic radicals who were trying to expel the Russians. Then our one-time allies turned on us, and the initial seeds of al-Qaeda were sown, and America has been in a quagmire ever since.

In the last decade, we plunged into Iraq, where there was initially only a minor al-Qaeda presence. But the quixotic U.S. invasion poured gasoline onto the anti U.S. fire, causing the death of some 6700 American soldiers, leaving a country in shambles, with not one barrel of oil confiscated in this wasted effort. Then it was on to Afghanistan, and again, for no apparent reason.  (But al-Qaeda is lurking!)  Osama bin Laden is dead but his effort to bog down the U.S. in endless Middle East wars is right on target.

Writing in the British newspaper The Guardian, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad concluded, “The maelstrom of anti-western violence in the Arab world has little to do with anti-Islam propaganda. It has more to do with decades of perceived western imperialism. Barack Obama‘s Arab honeymoon was squandered by drone attacks on Pakistan and Yemen.”

Drone attacks he points out are used to get rid of the bad guys.  And yes, we need to get rid of the bad guys.  But as children’s book author Dr. Paul Craig Roberts points out in a recent Trends Journal article:

“Washington’s assaults on seven countries have blown up weddings, funerals, kids’ soccer games, farmhouses, hospitals, aid workers, schools, people walking along the streets, village elders, but the Muslims don’t mind! They understand that the well-meaning Americans, who love them and are committed to their human rights, are bringing them democracy and women’s rights. The million or more dead, maimed, and displaced Muslims are a low price to be paid for liberation by Washington.”

Do you catch his sarcasm? This is the way a delusional Washington works, The Middle East has been in turmoil for over 2000 years. And just about everyone has attempted to control this part of the world over the course of history. The Egyptians, Turks, Jews, Romans, Arabs, Persians, Europeans…the list goes on — none with any degree of long-term success.

Afghanistan has fallen into outright civil war as American pulls out after 20 years of ineptitude, while Republicans and Democrats alike are scratching the heads as to what went wrong. Meanwhile, party gridlock in Washington has brought any sense of responsible governing to a standstill.  Are we observing a freak show or what?

In the nation’s history, there has always been the loyal opposition by the political party out of power that served as a check and balance — a good thing. But there was still a sense on the part of both parties that some cooperation was needed to make progress and move the county forward. We saw such cooperation across party lines under Reagan in the 80s and Clinton in the 90s.

Then came 9/11, and after a short-lived euphoria of rallying the nation together, both parties saw an opportunity for political gain. Gridlock seeped in, and during the past ten years cooperative effort between the Republicans and Democrats has been non-existent. Over 90% of the members of congress profess to be Christians. Yet those we elected to lead have given little credence to the words of Jesus in Mathew 12:25. “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.”

This unforgiving war has cost 4500 U.S. soldiers their lives, wounded more than 40,000 of them, and an additional 45,000 troops have returned home with mental and physical problems, and cost over $1 trillion. And what do we have to show for it? Afghanistan is in ruins, and the political chaos becomes worse as each week passes.

We were conned by Republicans and Democrats alike when both parties told us our goal should be to reshape Afghanistan into America’s image, and democracy could and should be exported throughout the Middle East. Nation building in the Arab world? What a joke. We have created this monster of anarchy that seems to be spreading like wildfire.  

 The Iraq issue has been bungled from the beginning. Let’s just hope and pray that both parties will put aside their petty partisan differences and try to find some way out of this unfathomable and intolerable crisis.

From all this turmoil, there are lessons to be learned, especially for the U.S.  First, make a massive effort to become independent of Middle Eastern oil. Second, read more Kipling. In his novel, The Naulahka, he writes:

“And the end of the fight is a tombstone white with the name of the late deceased,

“And the epitaph drear: ‘A Fool lies here who tried to hustle the East.’”

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide.  You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at www.jimbrownusa.com. 

 

 

WHAT HAPPENED TO LONG VACATIONS?

Thursday, August 5^th, 2021

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

 

WHAT HAPPENED TO LONG VACATIONS?

Does anyone take serious vacations anymore? In the “good old days,” schools did not start again until the Monday after Labor Day. The last two weeks in August used to be a popular time for families to get away to the beach for a final summer fling. But not anymore. The American family vacation seems to be dying. 

In days of old, I always joined in on family excursions at summer’s end. And there was no electronic requiem involved. No cell phone rings, no email buzzes, and no laptop beeps. It was Lake Michigan in my early years, Lake George, New York in my college days, and from my twenties on it was annual summer vacations in Gulf Shores, Alabama. 

Back in the 60’s and 70s, there was no high rises on the Gulf Coast, no water parks, and a few local seafood restaurants. Just a lot of single-story beach houses with long porches facing the Gulf. There was no local phone service back then, and you had to bring your own drinking water. We brought our own sheets and towels, because the well water was full of iron and made the wash stiff. No TV and no air conditioning. 

And you know what? The whole family thoroughly enjoyed the two weeks we stayed. We talked to one another, went crabbing and fishing off the shoreline, read, took afternoon naps, and long evening walks looking for the new shells that washed up on the shore earlier that day. Maybe a trip into Pensacola once or twice for a movie. And when our two weeks was up, no one wanted to go home. 

Expedia.com’s annual vacation survey found that only 14% of Americans go away for two weeks or more at one time. And now, schools begin in the middle of August. Middle of August? Why? Aren’t air conditioning bills for schools much higher then? So what happened to the June 1st-August 1st summer schedule? No more school days were added. Kids have to cut summer jobs at resort areas short. Why the change? 

Now, if you can get away to the beach for a few days at all, you cram into one of the high rises that line the Gulf Coast beaches for miles at end. Since you stay in an air-conditioned condo, your body adapts and it’s too hot to go out to the beach. The kids all head for the mall, or a game room. Dad, and mom if she works, check into the office several times a day, and carry their PEDs and cell phones wherever they go. Electronic devices and games surround the whole family. 

Just getting away does not guarantee relaxation. It takes several days just to unwind. And isn’t life too short not to appreciate every moment, and have the tune out time with special family and friends? Maybe this longer special time has passed a lot of folks by. But I hope for me it never does. 

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Did you read where Krispy Kreme is having some difficulties and. Reorganizing their operations?? A number of stores have gone under, and sales have y fallen nationwide. Its future looks shaky at best. Maybe the concept was a victim of its own success. Stores proliferated overnight. The company just grew too fast, and carb- conscious customers backed away from the special taste of a wonderful doughnut. 

I have been a special Krispy Kreme fan for years. Those hot, out of the oven different flavors that almost melt in your mouth. And let me tell you this. I know a lot about Krispy Kremes. Like the fact that an anonymous New Orleans Frenchman sold his secret yeast-raised doughnut recipe to Ishmael Armstrong of Paducah, Kentucky, and the first Krispy Kreme retail store was opened in July of 1937 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

And the choices. There are so many to choose from. Of course original glazed, then chocolate iced, custard filled, raspberry filled, lemon filled, maple glazed, sugar coated, cinnamon bun, cinnamon twist, powered blueberry, glazed cream filled, strawberry filled, cake, powered cake glazed devil’s food, glazed blueberry, glazed sour cream, glazed cruller, chocolate iced cake, and cinnamon apple filled. Have I worn you out? Don’t tell me I don’t know anything about Krispy Kreme doughnuts. 

The real treat is to go to a Krispy Kreme shop that makes the doughnuts on site. I’ve been to one such shop, and it was a special treat. Gladys and I were on our way last year to the S.E.C. football championship in Atlanta to watch LSU beat Tennessee. We were on the I-459 bypass around Birmingham about midnight, and turned off Exit 13 at Hoover, Alabama to get gas and take a short break. There it was. The largest doughnut shop I had ever seen. We stayed for 45 minutes watching the doughnuts come out of the various ovens and down conveyor belts to the display racks. After eating a number of flavors, we took a dozen assorted with us, and I even bought a Krispy Kreme T-shirt. 

Rick Bragg once wrote that trying to explain how good Krispy Kremes are to someone who has never had one is like telling a celibate priest about young love. He sure knew what he was talking about. But like the loss of summer vacations, the flow moves on. And I’m not sure it’s for the better. I think I’ll go for a box of Krispy Kremes this weekend. For old times sake. 

Peace and Justice. 

Jim Brown 

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“I'd give all wealth that years have piled, The slow result of Life's decay,
To be once more a little child
For one bright summer-day. “

Lewis Carroll

Jim Brown’s weekly column appears each Thursday in a number of newspapers throughout the State of Louisiana. You can read his columns going back to the fall of 2002 by going to his own website at http://www.jimbrownla.com.