A Public Outcry Usually Masks A Private

Fast Food Chains Spend A Large Amount Of Marketing To Get The Attention Of Children. People Form Their Eating Habits As Children So They Try To Nurture Clients As Youngsters.

The Executives Who Run The Fast Food Industry Are Not Bad Men. They Are Businessmen. They Will Sell Free-range, Organic, Grass-fed Hamburgers If You Demand It. They Will Sell Whatever Sells At A Profit.

One Might Expect That The Families Of Murder Victims Would Be Showered With Sympathy And Support, Embraced By Their Communities. But In Reality They Are Far More Likely To Feel Isolated, Fearful, And Ashamed, Overwhelmed By Grief And Guilt, Angry At The Criminal-justice System, And Shunned By Their Old Friends.

Future Historians, I Hope, Will Consider The American Fast Food Industry A Relic Of The Twentieth Century--a Set Of Attitudes, Systems, And Beliefs That Emerged From Postwar Southern California, That Embodied Its Limitless Faith In Technology, That Quickly Spread Across The Globe, Flourished Briefly, And Then Receded, Once Its True Costs Became Clear And Its Thinking Became Obsolete.

Congress Should Ban Advertising That Preys Upon Children, It Should Stop Subsidizing Dead-end Jobs, It Should Pass Tougher Food Safety Laws, It Should Protect American Workers From Serious Harm, It Should Fight Against Dangerous Concentrations Of Economic Power.