Updates

So Ron Paul hasn't called me back yet. I'm kind of disappointed but I figure debating the other Republicans and running for President might be taking up some of his time. Anyway, on to what I've been working on. I talked to this manager at a health food store (I cant tell you which one for legal reasons) and he was telling me all about health drinks and not so healthy drinks. One thing that I talk about in my story is high-fructose corn syrup. He talked about how bad it is for you and the fact it's in just about every drink you can pick up at convenience stores.

HFCS is somewhat of a controversy. And interestingly enough, actually deals with my pro-hemp lobbying as well. Here's what I learned from Wikipedia. In the mid-1980's, the government started to impose tariffs on sugar. We can't really grow cane sugar here so we have to import it. After the tariffs were imposed, importers were paying twice the world price of sugar. It was also around this time our government started paying subsidies to farmers for every bushel of corn they grew. Michael Pollan said in a 2003 edition of the New York Times Magazine, "Absurdly, while one hand of the federal government is campaigning against the epidemic of obesity, the other hand is actually subsidizing it, by writing farmers a check for every bushel of corn they can grow." He is talking about how we use this corn for corn syrup, then after a scientific process which involves adding enzymes which turn the glucose (pure corn syrup) into fructose. Then more glucose is added to create a desired balance of glucose/fructose. Coke and Pepsi have about a 55/45 mix.

We use it because it is cheaper. Opponents of HFCS claim that because it is so cheap to make, it is encouraging people to buy more soda, energy drinks, etc.

So why are these tariffs in place? Is it so we have something to do with the 280+ tons we produce each year in the US? (Well its probably more now, but 280 was what was produced in 2005, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. The world produced 692 total tons that year.)

Here's a website that talks about sugar's history in America:
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/SC019

It says that it all started because the government wanted to collect extra income so tariffs were put in place for sugar. They also wanted to help farmers turn more profit.

After I had written all this, I found a report by Peter Jennings. It's pretty interesting.