I am sure you have heard of laws being passed in NYC and other places that attempt to control eat habits by outlawing or placing taxes upon fatty or sugar filled food and drink.
Recently the recently deposed potentate of the Afghan theater decreed that all Burger King, Pizza Hut and other fast food restaurants would have to leave theater. This is a move this military doctor agrees with.
I am completely for the elimination of places like BK and Pizza Hut from military installations. Not only in theaters of war, but in ALL military installations. I simply don’t believe there is any reason for their existence on our bases / camps / or posts. I clearly remember the first Burger King in Fort Bliss (circa 1984). I was really amazed that a civilian food chain opened up on the base itself. I ate at it once in the 2 years I was there. I think they add very little to the morale of our troops but they do add to their waste lines. The military desperately needs to address the obesity epidemic with all the force of Shock and Awe.
I will defer to the good doctor and agree that we ALL could probably use better food choices in our lives. But I will argue the point that is doesn’t do anything for morale. Personally I enjoyed my once a week trip to the BK or Pizza Hut. It provided a change of pace to what I considered a bland selection of food items at the DFAC. It was also a welcome reminder of home (to me). If it does none of those thing for the doc, that’s fine…but to dismiss out of hand the morale argument is I believe wrong.
As for these establishments on post back in CONUS, the doctor is deceiving himself if he think all soldiers who go off post would eat nothing but salads or Subway healthy sandwiches. These establishments on post give the soldier convince and also put money into the Morale, Welfare and Recreation accounts that would just otherwise go into the profit margins of establishments off post.
He also posits that the military has a right to tell me what to eat. While I understand his reasoning, I would disagree entirely with that argument. The Army gives me a physical every year, it also requires physical fitness training and tests to insure the proper level of fitness. Are their fat-boy and girls in our military, yes without a doubt there are. But there are already programs and standards in place to help fit that, we don’t need a food nanny to loard over the rest of us in the meantime. Iraq/Afghanistan is bad enough at least let me enjoy my Whopper in peace.
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Maybe we should ban fatty foods from the care packages too, since they might hurt the soldiers’ precious wittle waistlines.
I thought by “waste lines” he meant more people were going to the shitter because of Burger King. I think that’s verifiable.
I thought – porta johns in Afghanistan?
Afghanistan is a big porta john!
URG! This makes me mad! How dare they tell these kids that go and do stuff that a lot of the sit at home and watch what happens people (THEY KNOW WHO THEY ARE) could never imagine, what to eat! This is ridiculous. Now granted I know that chow halls are not bad but cripes if Private Smith wants a Double Wopper with cheese after running five miles or after being on patrol for a month by all means he should have one. Those kids are young, they can run like thoroughbreds and they deserve to have comforts from home…and do not get me started on smoking. Guy just gets shot at by Achmed the now dead taliban loser and he grabs his pack of Marlboro Reds..I got no problem with that. GRRRRRRRRRRRR leave the kids alone doc.
Maybe the good doctor would care to visit a Proctologist in hopes of locating his head.
If the doctor doesn’t like it, perhaps he ought to consider starting his own civilian practice. I’m certain his patients will just LOVE his patrician attitude
Holy Crap. Certainly this idiot has never actually served in anything except a comfortable office. I have not served, but I would believe that these pieces of Americana would be high on the list of morale boosters, especially in remote locations where there is zero chance of getting such fare off base.
Does this A*hole actually believe that someone serving in the blast furnace of Iraq is going to get fat form a couple of trips to Taco Bell?
However, if we do have a fat Army, making them eat nothing but rubber chicken and mystery meat surprise from the chow hall will certainly cause them to lose weight.
Someone give this idiot a rifle (with no bullets) and drop him on the front lies.
I gather from his website that the doctor linked above served in the modern version of a M*A*S*H hospital, so you’d think he could balance what goes on outside the wire verses what he sees at the BK lounge at Baghram. There are more than a few folks that pork-out (excuse the pun) in the box and put on a lot of weight because they work 12 hours shifts in the command post or other jobs that don’t require a lot of physical effort. As I said before the military already has programs in place to care for the overweight…so I don’t think we need his tough love.
Oh yeah the weight programs. Seen it happen. And tehre are kids who do pork out when ghey are doing staff or post duty rather than out in the field. Hubby has seen them get more than one entre’ etc. However none of them need Doctor godlike being to tell them what they should and should not eat. Can you imagine him eating Spam during WW2? He’d eat it to..and powedered eggs? He’d have to eat all of it thats all there was.
Steph, may I borrow a “Grrrrr!”?
I hate nanny-statism horse hockey thinking like this for civilians or the military.
Yep!
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