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Healthy Food is Hard to Find in Barry Farms

Letters to the Editor: The Washington Post Katherine Mangu-Ward made several valid points in her Oct. 16 Outlook piece, “5 Myths about healthy eating.” However, the notion that poor families lack access to nutritious foods is not the stretch she makes it out to be. Take, for example, Barry Farms, in the District’s Ward 8. In many […]

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Silly Government, Parenting Is for Parents

Published in The Hill, 10/12/11 http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/education/186979-silly-government-parenting-is-for-paren There has been ample debate lately about who is really committed to making our children healthier. The argument goes something like this: If food manufacturers were seriously concerned about children’s health, they would make parents’ jobs easier by getting rid of the cartoonish characters they’ve used since the 1950s […]

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Smart Government and Childhood Obesity

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PUBLICATION: A Question of Smart Government and Understanding Childhood Obesity, Poverty, and Access to Healthy and Affordable Foods Download the Executive Summary here (PDF Format) Download the Paper here (PDF Format) Download the Press Release here (PDF Format) About the Smart Government Project This publication is a product of the Bernard Center’s Smart Government Project. […]

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Food Marketing Is Not the Answer to Obesity

Letters to the Editor: the Washington Examiner While childhood obesity is a serious problem, food marketing is not the culprit. Parents are ultimately in control, and this week’s announcement that McDonald’s is offering a slimmed-down version of the Happy Meal is a great example of that fact. Apple dippers have been offered since 2004, and […]

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The Slippery Slope of “Voluntary” Guidelines

As parents across the country prepare to send their children back to school, the all-important question, “What should I put in the lunchbox?” looms.  And the federal government just might have something to say about that. For example, you might not want to pack PB&J. Although it’s a perennial favorite of kids and parents, an […]

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Food Ban Would Be Costly, Absurd

Letters to the Editor: The Washington Times am in total agreement with Beth Johnson’s Aug. 8 Commentary column, “Enough to make you lose your appetite.” Proposed restrictions on food marketing, designed by a government interagency working group, have little, if any, rationale considering the food they would end up targeting. Focusing entirely on sodium, potassium and […]

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Obesity Problem Is About Personal Responsibility and Access

Published in the Huffington Post, 8/3/11 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michelle-bernard/post_2273_b_917283.html Regarding Kristin Wartman’s August 1st column, “Food Industry Would Prefer to Regulate Itself,” Ms. Wartman casts the food and advertising industry as the callous, corporate villain for a problem that, in truth, is really about personal responsibility and access to healthy and affordable foods. First though, a little […]

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Setting Industry Guidelines for Marketing Junk Food

Letters to the Editor: The New York Times To the Editor: Mark Bittman criticizes the food industry’s opposition to proposed interagency guidelines on marketing to children, and calls self-regulation “self-serving.” In reality, these guidelines are so overreaching that they triggered bipartisan opposition from the most divided Congress in recent history, with Republicans and Democrats sending […]

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MSNBC: Childhood Obesity, Advertising and the IWG

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Bernard Center president & CEO and MSNBC Political Analyst Michelle D. Bernard joined MSNBC The Dylan Ratigan Show to discuss childhood obesity, advertising, and the proposed recommendations of the Inter Agency Working Group (June 30, 2011).

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