California Becomes the First State to Ban Trans Fats

Is Government reaching too far? see some comments (not mine!) posted on web both for and against, a good debate topic !

Some think it's great... This is good news. Since people won't take responsibility for their health yet expect Medicare to pay for years of poor, unheathy diets causing diabetes, heart disease and obesity, then its time government stepped in to manage what is available. People make bad choices hence the success of fast food restaurants. This is not controlling, this is visionary. If we are ever going to get good, affordable health care, then the first step is to eliminate the bad choices some people make by removing options. If you really wanted to 'control' people, the government would prevent obese people from eating at 'all you can eat buffet restaurants'. We're not there yet and I don't expect we will, but we can control what is on the buffet. Thanks New York and California for leading the way.

For others it's just Bull ....Just wonderful, yet another shining example of government trying to tell me what I can and can't do. Those of you that support this need to stay out of other peoples business. Only California would do something so stupid, support legalizing marijuana, but try to ban something in food. If I want to eat a ton of red meat while drinking gallons of beer smoking cigarettes covered in butter that's my business, no one has the right to tell me what I can eat or can't eat. Just remember this as more and more of your personal freedoms are taken away from you "For your own good". I mean after all, some people aren't capable of handling the effects of abortion, lets outlaw that. Meat is bad for you and cruel to the animals so lets outlaw that. You really can't seem to pick good movies so let the government decide what to watch. Obviously people can't be trusted to pick the right books so we should let the government decide that as well. People also can't seem to plan families right so let the government decide for you. And you have been picking websites that well are a little objectionable and needs to be banned...you know like they do in China.

Hmmmmmmmmmmm ... now you decide where you stand !!

"The Post-American World" by Fareed Zakaria

After its publication last month, it immediately shot to the top of the bestseller lists. It became downright trendy after Barack Obama was photographed carrying a copy while travelling on the campaign trail; maybe, the pundits speculated, this book will be a major influence on the next president’s thinking.

Seems an interesting read... but also seem quite controversial too, esp on overplaying the global impact of growth in BRIC economies.

By ‘post-American world’, Zakaria refers to the erosion of US pre-eminence as the sole superpower. The end of the Cold War and the ‘bipolar duopoly’ of the US and the Soviet Union led to an ‘American imperium, a unique unipolar world’. However, with the recent emergence of China, India and others – what Zakaria calls ‘the rise of the rest’ – the situation is now changing: ‘At the politico-military level, we remain in a single-superpower world. But in every other dimension – industrial, financial, educational, social, cultural – the distribution of power is shifting, moving away from American dominance.’

A sign of declining American influence, he writes, is how the rising countries pay less attention to the US: ‘The world is moving from anger to indifference, from anti-Americanism to post-Americanism.’

...his central point: that a focus on conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere has meant we have missed the real story – the economic rise of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) and other emerging markets. These countries now account for more than half of the world’s economic growth since 1990, and represent over 40 per cent of the world economy (measured at purchasing power parity). In 2006 and 2007, 124 countries grew at a rate of four per cent or more, including more than 30 countries in Africa.

...he goes on to claim that this is the third of ‘three tectonic power shifts’ over the past 500 years. According to Zakaria, the first was the rise of the Western world, from the fifteenth century to the late eighteenth century; the second was the rise of the US, from the late nineteenth century until about 1990; and the third is the ‘rise of the rest’ over the past two decades.

Zakaria points out that economic prosperity has brought real benefits. For example, in China alone growth has lifted more than 400 million people out of poverty. But he is quick to point out that this growth is also problematic. One expression is how increased demand from China and India has increased oil prices generally. This price rise has also filled the coffers of America’s oil-state foes, such as Iran and Venezuela. But, as Zakaria notes, ‘the most acute problem of plenty is the impact of global growth on natural resources and the environment’. He cites water shortages and climate change, among other issues.

In viewing growth as problematic and potentially destructive, Zakaria raises a common theme of our time, the longer-term consequences of economic growth upon geopolitical stability and environment.

Till the time you get a chance to read, enjoy some of video & print reviews posted below

Author's Interview Washington Post Spiked Review

What is the most likely future diet for a more-crowded planet ?

Here are some excerpts from an interesting article, on the impacts of changing diets on food scarcity.

A growing world population has more buying power. The newly affluent eat more meat. A rising share of the world’s agricultural output goes to animals. While grain supplies are more than adequate to feed everyone now, say experts, the current price spike shows that even an adequate supply doesn’t preclude hunger for the world’s poor. And in the future, a day may come when there isn’t enough grain for both humans and livestock – at least not at the US consumption rate. Add to this the environmental impacts of modern industrial-scale meat production, and many wonder: With a predicted world population of 9.5 billion by midcentury, are we all destined to be vegetarians?

Most of us are not aware of the inefficiency of converting grain to meat. A pound of beef takes 7 pounds of feed to produce. For pork, the ratio is 1 to 3; and for chicken, 1 to 2. (Cold-blooded fish, which don’t need energy to maintain body temperature, are farmed more efficiently.)

So, let's look what will happen to the way if the world start doing what we in America does :

An average American consumes about 275 pounds of meat per year, which translates to 1,765 pounds of grain. So If everyone consumed grain at this rate..... today’s 2 billion-ton world grain harvest would feed only 2.5 billion people – only 40% of the world population.

If the world ate the way Italians do – 882 pounds of grain per person yearly – we’d feed 5 billion people.

And if we all ate the way largely vegetarian India does (11-1/2 pounds of meat per person yearly, or 440 pounds of grain), our grain supply could feed 10 billion...

not sure what will happen to McDonald's ... may be Maharaja Veggie Burgers !

Check the full article here :
http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2008/07/18/diet-for-a-more-crowded-planet-plants/