A depressing story I suppose, but it shows how legislation aimed at the public good is easily undermined when doing so cuts into profits:
After aggressive lobbying, Congress declared pizza a vegetable to
protect it from a nutritional overhaul of the school lunch program this
year. The White House kept silent last year as Congress killed a plan by
four federal agencies to reduce sugar, salt and fat
in food marketed to children. And during the past two years, each of
the 24 states and five cities that considered "soda taxes" to discourage
consumption of sugary drinks has seen the efforts dropped or defeated.
At every level of government, the food and beverage industries won fight after fight
in the last decade. They've never lost a significant political battle
in the U.S. despite mounting scientific evidence of the role of
unhealthy food and children's marketing in obesity. Lobbying records
analyzed by Reuters reveal that the industries more than doubled their
spending in Washington during the past three years. In the process, they
largely dominated policymaking: pledging voluntary action while
defeating government proposals aimed at changing the nation's diet,
dozens of interviews show.
In contrast, the Center for Science in
the Public Interest, widely regarded as the lead lobbying force for
healthier food, spent about $70,000 lobbying last year, roughly what
those opposing the stricter guidelines spent every 13 hours, the Reuters
analysis showed.
