Government Takes Both Sides Of A Sweet Issue

From The Heritage Foundation, I’m Ernest Istook.

Government does only one thing consistently—spends your money.

In New York City and around the country, federal money pays for advertisements telling you that sugar is bad for you; it makes you fat.

Congress provided the funding for those ads. Meanwhile, Congress keeps passing laws that protect the sugar industry—the law keeps out foreign competition so American sugar interests make more money. And billions of dollars in Food Stamps can be spent on soft drinks, candy, and fattening snack foods. Proposals to say you can’t buy those with Food Stamps are always voted down by Congress.

So government policy is to protect sugar, to buy candy and soda with Food Stamps, and then run ads urging that you stay away from them. Instead of spending money on all of these things, wouldn’t it make more sense to spend money on none of them?

From The Heritage Foundation, I’m Ernest Istook.

[audio:http://trns.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Istook1059–Government-Takes-Both-Sides-of-a-Sweet-Issue.mp3]

Ernest Istook
Ernest J. Istook Jr. brings extensive congressional experience to bear on public policy issues as a Distinguished Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. He also hosts the talk radio show “Istook Live!” from Heritage’s Robert H. Bruce radio studio. Istook served 14 years in the U.S. House of Representatives before joining Heritage in 2007. Follow Ernest on Twitter @ErnestIstook

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