steakWhile in Asia Hawaii last week, First Lady Michelle Obama sat down for a roundtable discussion with Ma’o Organic Farms. Mrs. Obama has made tackling childhood obesity her issue of choice, and has worked hard to ensure that McDonald’s only puts 14 French fries into each Happy Meal.

During the course of the visit, Mrs. Obama revealed that steak and arugula is her favorite meal, and that we should be feeding it to our kids in order to adjust their palates. She said, "People don't have that connection. If they get their palates adjusted to those very interesting flavors, they stay connected."

She went on to say that children in ‘underserved communities’ become overweight because they “aren’t growing up with vegetables because there are no grocery stores.”

The First Lady seems to be just a wee bit confused ... it’s over-serving, not under-serving, that causes obesity. When people take in more calories than their bodies need to function, the extra energy is stored as fat. When people do this on a regular basis, the fat builds up and eventually causes obesity. It’s not exactly rocket science.

Back to the issue at hand: Getting kids to expand their palates by feeding them steak and arugula. With what money does she suggest people purchase those goodies? Personally, my kids aren’t allowed to eat steak, because it’s a rare treat for their dad and me.

We’re too busy paying for $4 a gallon gasoline because President Obama won’t drill for oil. Our water bill has doubled over the last couple of years because liberals in California shut a huge supply of our water off. Our health insurance rates have sky-rocketed, thanks to “new regulations” as our insurer so delicately pointed out in a letter sent to inform us of the price increase.

And Michelle Obama says, “Let them eat steak??”

She is completely out of touch with reality. During this same meeting, she mentioned the vegetable garden that she planted at the White House, and how it’s supposed to be a form of education for young people, to get them to form healthy habits from a young age. This would be the same garden that she tended in her $495 Tory Burch boots, aka her ‘gardening shoes.’

It’s great to want to feed kids lovely organic vegetables and beef from grass-fed cows that were massaged daily by Japanese farmers to tenderize their meat, but that isn’t practical for most people.

If the First Lady wants to be effective in getting people to make healthier food choices, she’s going to have to get a clue about what it’s like to live and raise kids in the real world.

And if she really believes that things like soda and junk food cause obesity, she should campaign to end the use of food stamps for Papa John’s and 7-Eleven. It seems like a cruel joke to tell poor people to eat steak and arugula, then give them ‘free’ money to spend on Coke and take-out food.

 

Image via waferboard/Flickr