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Constitutionality of Food Labels

Henry Miller from Stanford University's Hoover Institution weights in with a letter to the editor in the WSJ in reference to my most recent op-ed.

Here is a spinet:

Jayson Lusk is correct that radical activists will likely continue their efforts to lobby state governments to require labeling of certain "genetically engineered" foods ("The Food Police Are Routed at the Ballot Box," op-ed, Nov. 20). However, whatever such requirements state legislatures or electorates attempt to impose, those efforts are destined to fail in the courts.
Federal law pre-empts state labeling rules that conflict with FDA policy, which requires labeling only if a food raises questions related to nutrition or safe use. Just last year, a federal court in Los Angeles ruled that a California requirement to label genetically engineered foods "would impose a requirement that is not identical to federal law" and would therefore be pre-empted.

He's probably right with respect to food labels.  I'm not so sure about the fat taxes which I also mentioned in my piece.  

The Ronald McDonald Rule

A reader named Karl alerted me to  a bill (H.R. 6599) introduced by  Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) in the  112th Congress.  The official name of the bill is the Stop Subsidizing Childhood Obesity Act.  

The law would:

amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to protect children's health by denying any deduction for advertising and marketing directed at children to promote the consumption of food at fast food restaurants or of food of poor nutritional quality.

I suppose it is less draconian than the ban on childhood advertisements that have been proposed by some, but I'd be amused to see the lobbying that would go on to define "fast food" and "poor nutritional quality" in the unlikely event this makes it out of committee.