Following up on an earlier post, Dr. Helen links to a startling article discussing the banning of french fries, sodas, and other "junk foods" from school cafeterias:

We've already seen action at the individual school level to ban unhealthy foods from school campuses. However, a bi-partisan group is now taking it to a nation-wide level by introducing legislation that would prohibit the sale of fatty, sugary foods like French fries and sodas in schools, not just in the cafeterias, but anywhere on the school grounds, which includes, vending machines, school stores, and even fund raising events.

Dr. Helen also links to William Saletan's article in Slate titled "Should we regulate French fries like cigarettes?"

Targeting kids is a familiar way to impose morals without threatening liberties. You can have a beer or an abortion, but your daughter can't. The conservative aspect of this argument is that you're entitled, as a parent, to decide what your kids can do or buy. That's the pitch Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, made last week in a bill to crack down on junk food in schools. The liberal half of the argument is that kids are too young to make informed choices. In this case, it's true. Studies show that little kids ask for products they see on television; fail to distinguish ads from programs; and are heavily targeted by companies peddling candy, fast food, and sugared cereal.

This stage of the fat war will be a rout. In schools, the audience is young and captive, and the facts are appalling. According to a government report, 75 percent of high schools, 65 percent of middle schools, and 30 percent of elementary schools have contracts with "beverage"—i.e., soda—companies. The sodas are commonly sold through vending machines. The contracts stipulate how many thousands of cases each district has to buy, and they offer schools a bigger cut of the profits from soda than from juice or water. Soda companies, realizing they're going to lose this fight, are fleeing elementary schools and arguing that high-schoolers are old enough to choose. But health advocates refuse to draw such a line. They're not going to stop with kids.

I'll start with an analogy to the history of regulating child smoking, (because I think junk food regulation is likely to follow a similar pattern). When I was a kid, it was a given -- a no-brainer -- that the parents were responsible for preventing their kids from smoking. Cigarettes were sold everywhere -- not only in stores, but in vending machines. I am old enough to remember when vending machines first sported new stickers which stated the following:

Sale of cigarettes to minors are forbidden by law. We support this law. Parents are urged to help prevent violations.

I know I am old fashioned, but I still think that it is the parents' responsibility, and not that of the store clerk, the vending machine manufacturer, or Big Tobacco. Yet I think many parents today who caught their kid smoking would demand to know where he got the cigarettes, and if he named a store as his source, the store would be blamed and that type of parent would see the child as a victim. That's no way to teach responsibility, but it's the way people have become. Someone has to raise the kids, so why not the government?

The rationale for prohibiting junk food in schools is that the parents have no control over their children, and thus they cannot be expected to supervise their diets. I'm not sure why, but apparently it is no longer possible for concerned parents to send their kids to school with a bag lunch.

Well, what about religious dietary restrictions?? Can Jewish parents who insist their kids keep kosher diets send them to schools where non-kosher food is served? Can Muslim parents send their kids to schools with non-halal cafeterias? The answer is that of course they can. But it is their responsibility to tell their kids what not to eat, and their kids' responsibility not to eat it.

This form of prohibition will not end in the schools, and that's because there are too many other sources of candy and junk food. Countless schools are within easy walking distance of stores. Stores sell candy, soda, and junk food. If the moral rationale is to protect children, what's the difference between banning junk food in schools, and banning it in stores? Once the junk food industry loses this first battle, attention will be turned to the stores.

"What good is it to prevent schools from poisoning our children when my child can walk across the street and buy exactly the same things in a store?"

Parents themselves will demand the new laws. And they'll reassure themselves that no one is taking away the "right of people to choose" because adults will still be permitted to buy all the coke and candy they want.

Under the theory that children must be protected, and the state must do the parenting, there is no reason on earth why stores couldn't be required to keep all candy behind the counter -- and require ID for candy, soda, snacks.

Once you concede the insane idea that it the state's job to raise children, it's as easy an argument as taking candy from a baby.

What I can't figure out is whether parental failure caused state parenting, or vice versa. (I've noticed that the more people are regulated, the more regulations they seem to demand, and the less self-discipline they have. I guess that's another topic.)