Let's Move: The Deceit Campaign

  Kids should get more exercise. 
  There should be more access to physical exercise in the school day, even as budgets are being cut.
  They shouldn't spend hours and hours in front of the computer/tv/video games. 
  They shouldn't make a practice of eating Cheetos while chugging Coke while reaching lazily for the remote. 
  They should make a habit of getting exercise through team sports, personal discipline and routines.
  This is all true, as obesity across the globe becomes a problem.
  Now the First Lady's Let's Move campaign is taking a tack that is unacceptable. The government is urging mothers to use deceit to get kids to exercise, rather than establishing good role models and enforcing actual patterns of behavior.
  How long will deceit last as far as forming young adults who respect physical exertion? Once Mom is gone, the deceit is gone and thus the exercise.
  What needs to happen is that parents take back the authority in their homes so that children will know what an acceptable lifestyle is.
  In audio found here, Michelle Obama, referring to this government advice as "cute tips," complains that African American neighborhoods are especially susceptible to lack of exercise because 
1) African American kids are afraid to go outside  
2) African American children have no access to team sports   
3) African American children have no sports leagues   
4) there's no safety net for children in African American communities. 
  One can only imagine what conflagration would have erupted if Laura Bush had addressed fat caucasian children exclusively, referring to "we." There was a hope at one time that the President of the United States and the First Lady would see all races as one American family. 
  It is true that African American communities face difficult circumstances that other communities do not necessarily, but the root causes of those circumstances are never discussed. During the Great Depression, families black and white, faced poverty together, united in providing for the family. Unfortunately the welfare state has encouraged single parent homes, dependency on federal aid and inferior public education. Just watch "Waiting for Superman" or "The Lottery" to see that many impoverished families want a different future for their children than the one assigned to them by living in Harlem.
  (Apparently Michelle Obama also does not know that many sports leagues are dominated by excellent African American athletes or that much of law enforcement is taken up with patrolling dangerous neighborhoods or that there are groups like Neighborhood Watch around to make sure disreputable people don't take root.)
  So here's one of the PSAs that you'll be seeing on tv soon. 
  In this one, Mom pretends that the power went out to get her kids out to play. She doesn't shut the television off or tell them to, but rather just smartly turns a fuse off. How clever.

  Lest you think we're being too critical, let's look at another PSA you'll be seeing soon, in which Mom deceives her child, knowing full well that her wallet is sitting on the counter next to her, into running around the house looking for it. Here it is:

  Many of the PSAs involve Michelle Obama in high dudgeon and lip gloss, hectoring the public to get out of the house, go to the park, play hockey.

  Look, it's laudable to live a healthier lifestyle. It's not even a bad idea to have PSAs that encourage this. But the government is getting too involved in personal choices; providing 3 meals a day for inner city families completely removes the responsibility for parents to feed their children, even in these days of generous welfare and food supplementary aid. 

  Making it too easy for people to be dependent. 

  An omnipresent Big Brother always there to pass judgment, to admonish, to direct.

  Tax dollars are swallowed into a giant government machine, which decides who will get whatever dollars back through the government's wide selection of programs. 

  Free money is thrown at certain segments of the population, who then find it easier to do nothing but wait for the next check or directions. 

  More people have trouble thinking for themselves. 

  What's wrong is this paternalistic attitude toward the sheeple who simply follow the advice, whether deceitful or honest, to do whatever Big Brother wants.

  Children should be taught discipline and lifestyle choices, not deceit by those parents who love them more than any other human beings.