Big Government is bad…

…even if it’s good for everyone.

Check out CNN’s little piece about the Japanese fighting obesity. (It’s an older clip, and I can’t get it embedded.) In short, the Japanese government proactively attempts to get people to avoid being overweight.

If people were thinner:

• Our collective EMS back would hurt less.
• They’d be happier and healthier.
• They’d live longer.
• They’d be more productive.
• They’d see their doctors less.
• They’d take less medications.
• They’d call EMS less.
• They’d go to the ED less.
• They’d produce and raise healthier children. (And we start at the top of this list again.)

But, as I’m reminded over and over again, around here, we have a “free country” and people have a right to weigh 800 pounds if they so choose. You know, I’m constantly amused to hear what people think they have a right to do. One time, someone told me that landlords have the “constitutional right to charge whatever rent they want.”

Anyhow,

• Japan’s life expectancy: 82.6
• USA’s life expectancy: 78.2 (38th, behind Cuba, the country everyone loves to criticize)

Random old posts:

• Car seats for druggies
• What I really want
• Crazy Like Us by Ethan Watters
• EMS cliche #6
• BURN is almost here!