Political Quotes

“Last December, an item caught my eye in the Harper's Index: the rank of baked goods, pizza, and soda as sources of calories for American children--drum roll, please--number one, number two, number three. That's how our children get most of their calories; first from baked goods, then from pizza, then from soda. No wonder we have a national epidemic of obesity for our children with lifetime health care consequences, starting with diabetes and then heart disease. It's why the military is concerned that only one in four young people qualify for military service, with obesity being a major factor in that disqualification. I salute First Lady Michelle Obama in her efforts to spotlight healthy eating, to help families give their children more nutritious choices. But we should start with what we are feeding the 31.6 million children in our schools. The administration has taken some small but important steps with the Federal partnership of this largest food program in the country to refine what the standards are for delivering this important service to our children. Well, the battle has taken a new turn, where Congress is poised to intervene to make sure that pizza continues to count as a vegetable and that we protect more French fries on the tray. Overturning this simple, commonsense adjustment for rules--which food nutrition experts and child advocates strongly support--is going to be buried in the Agriculture appropriations bill coming forward.…”