Weight Watchers Partnering With McDonald’s
March 15, 2010
Natural News
By Mike Adams
Weight Watchers has now officially endorsed Chicken McNuggets as a “healthy meal” in New Zealand, where McDonald’s restaurants will begin carrying the Weight Watchers logo on several menu items. This bizarre and inexplicable decision has now made Weight Watchers the laughing stock of the health world where nutrition and weight loss experts normally don’t use “McDonald’s fast food” and “weight loss” in the same sentence.
As The Guardian reports, “As part of the deal, which the company says is the first of its kind in the world, McDonald’s will use the Weight Watchers logo on its menu boards and Weight Watchers will promote McDonald’s to dieters.”
Nutritionists, not surprisingly, were shocked at the announcement. The idea of eating at McDonald’s to lose weight seems a bit ridiculous, and anyone who believes that eating Chicken McNuggets will cause you to lose weight is arguably one nugget short of a Happy Meal. Sometimes you just have to point out the stupidity of these things, even at the risk of offending someone who has convinced themselves that eating more Chicken McNuggets is their ticket to a slim, fit and sexy body.
Watch your weight balloon!
Weight Watchers, by the way, never actually claims that eating the foods they endorse will cause you to lose weight. If you examine it carefully, even their name isn’t really about weight loss. It’s about weight watching… as in, watch your weight grow larger by the day…
A “weight watch” is sort of like a “tornado watch” or a “tsunami watch.” You keep your eyes peeled and wait for something disastrous to happen — such as ballooning to 300 pounds while engaging in unhealthy eating McHabits based on snarfing down meat parts from factory-farmed cows raised in bovine concentration camps that might more accurately be called “Cowschwitz.”
If Weight Watchers is going to endorse McNuggets, then why not just endorse the entire McDonald’s menu and throw the logo behind Big Macs and ice cream shakes, too? It’s not like Weight Watchers is trying to “protect its reputation” by not crossing a line, you know. Once you’ve endorsed McDonald’s as “healthy” food, that line is no longer anywhere in sight.
Of course, McDonald’s products merely join a long list of questionable foods marketed under the “Weight Watchers” brand name — a brand that in my opinion has discovered great commercial success in selling the false hope of weight loss to clueless consumers who are unwilling to read ingredients lists on food labels.
Not coincidentally, Weight Watchers has now become the “McDonald’s” of the weight loss industry — and industry filled with so many scams and shams that the idea of eating Chicken McNuggets to lose weight doesn’t even seem that strange to many people.
We live in a world where corporate promotional lies are disgusting at best, and criminal at worst. We’re told that psychiatric drugs will make you happy, that chemotherapy will make you healthy and that eating at McDonald’s will make you lose weight. We’re told that sugary junk drinks will give you “energy”, that toxic vaccines are necessary for your immune system to work correctly and that buying silly pink-ribbon products will somehow cure cancer.
At the same time, we’re told that vitamins are dangerous, that sunlight causes cancer and that there’s no such thing as a cure for type-2 diabetes. Everything that’s good for you is discredited as bad while everything that’s toxic is hyped up as “healthy.”
I suppose in light of the corporate-sponsored sick-care insanity that passes for medical advice these days, the idea that eating at McDonald’s will make you lose weight doesn’t seem as insane as it really should.
But that doesn’t make it any more true.
In a world gone mad with dietary misinformation touting fictional foods, insanity can now be marketed to the intoxicated mainstream as if it somehow made sense.
… and people swallow it.
Click here for the full report
Weight Watchers Endorsement of McDonalds
March 3, 2010
guardian.co.uk
McDonald’s is hardly an ideal dining location for anyone struggling to stay slim. But the fast food chain scored a PR coup today when Weight Watchers agreed to endorse some of its products in New Zealand – a move met with outrage by nutritionists and obesity experts.
As part of the deal, which the company says is the first of its kind in the world, McDonald’s will use the Weight Watchers logo on its menu boards and Weight Watchers will promote McDonald’s to dieters.
The link-up is the fast-food chain’s latest attempt to improve its reputation by securing endorsements. In January, to the horror of gastronomes, Italy’s agriculture minister, Luca Zaia, helped launch the McItaly range of burgers. For a representative of one of the world’s greatest culinary nations to do such a thing was “a sign of the moral bankruptcy of Silvio Berlusconi’s government”, wrote Matthew Fort in the Guardian.
Several items on the fast food giant’s menu – the Filet-O-Fish, Chicken McNuggets and Sweet Chilli Seared Chicken Wrap – have been approved for the Weight Watchers diet in McDonald’s 150 New Zealand restaurants. Each meal is worth 6.5 points on the programme, which assigns points to food items and allows dieters to consume 18 to 40 points each day to achieve their goal weight.
McDonald’s New Zealand managing director, Mark Hawthorne, said: “We were able to include some of our most popular items because of the many changes we have made over the years.
“For instance, the switch to a healthier canola blend cooking oil means items such as the Filet-O-Fish and Chicken McNuggets contain 60% less saturated fat than six years ago.
Chris Stirk, Weight Watchers’ director of business in Australia and New Zealand, said the partnership between the companies reflected “part of our philosophy that you can enjoy life … while still achieving your weight loss goals”.
But nutritionists and obesity experts said the menu items were a marketing ploy to lure customers into the restaurant. “It’s all about sales,” said Jane Martin, senior adviser of Australia’s Obesity Policy Coalition. “It implies this food is healthy … when often it is high in fat and salt. Chicken McNuggets are Chicken McNuggets whether it’s got Weight Watchers on it or not.”
Sian Porter, a dietician at the British Dietetic Association, said: “This sort of initiative should be applauded, but the danger is that someone will go in, choose one of the healthier options and then think: ‘Ooh good. Now I’ll have an ice cream’, which is not the right message.”
Weight Watchers and McDonald’s in Britain said they had no plans for a similar partnership in the UK.
The fast-food chain, widely criticised for selling a high-calorie, high-fat menu that includes super-size meals, was “making every best effort to generate a change in behaviour, to create an awareness in consumers about making healthy choices”, Hawthorne said.
For the past year in the UK, the chain has run a programme linking children’s football teams with their local McDonald’s restaurant and offering them free kit and equipment.
Click here for the full report
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Today, Kevin explains how corporations are scamming you and exposes the real person behind that politician. Plus, find out why someone would take a drug that has a common side effect of cancer.
More Proof of Government Corruption
FDA’s Approval of Aspartame under Scrutiny
Obama Yet to Kick Smoking Habit
Stop Smoking Now!
They Will Not Control Us
Plus, author & fitness guru, Jennifer Nicole Lee, stopped by to explain how the Law of Attraction helped her get the perfect body. Click here to purchase her new book, The Mind, Body & Soul Diet.
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Plus, get the headlines you won’t hear from the mainstream media:
Big Pharma Researcher Admits to Faking Research!
GlaxoSmithKline Hid Evidence of Avandia Harm
Pfizer Found Guilty of Criminal Fraud
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Sodas with High Fructose Corn Syrup Cause Cancer Not Sugar
The New Definition of Child Abuse
The Most Evil Corporation
McDonalds Closing Hundreds of Locations in Japan
17,000 Harmful Chemicals Kept Secret Under Obscure Law
Chemicals Passed Through Breast Milk May Cause Cancer
Plus, Sharry Edwards, the creator of Human BioAcoustic Vocal Profiling Techniques & Technologies, gives you the inside story behind what your voice can really say about you and your health. Click here for your free personality vocal reading and click here for your free nutritional reading or call them at (740) 698-9119. Remember to mention Kevin Trudeau to get each report FREE!
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McDonalds Closing Hundreds of Outlets in Japan
February 9, 2010
Daily Finance
by Jonathan Berr
McDonald’s Corporation is closing 430 restaurants in Japan, the latest sign of the faltering economy in the Asian country.
A 50% owned affiliate will shutter the locations over the next 12 to 18 months in conjunction with the strategic review of the company’s real estate portfolio. The world’s largest restaurant chain plans to take charges of $40 million to $50 million in the first half of the year. McDonald’s Holdings Co. (Japan) has 3,700 stores.
“These actions are designed to enhance the customer experience, overall profitability and returns of the market,” the company said in a press release.
McDonald’s also is opening 90 new restaurants and refurbishing 200 in Japan. Clearly, McDonald’s is retrenching. The fast food market in Japan is bad because of the weak economy. It’s the same reason that Wendy’s Arby’s Group Inc. (WEN) said in December that it was exiting the Asian country. A Wall Street Journal editorial recently argued that “the unfolding economic crack-up in Tokyo is something to behold.” Japan has never really recovered from the lost decade of the 1990s and the current worldwide economic recession is underscoring these weaknesses. Some experts have urged U.S. officials to learn from Japan’s mistakes.
The Golden Arches has been struggling in Japan for a while. Last year, a marketing campaign featuring “Mr. James,” a geeky, Japan-loving American, was denounced as an offensive flop, according to Time.com. McDonald’s has tried to appeal to Japanese tastes with wassabi burgers, chicken burgers and sukiyaki burgers. A Texas Burger, with barbecue sauce, fried onions, bacon, cheese and spicy mustard, proved to be a hit. But consolidated sales at McDonald’s Japan fell 10.8% last year. Profit is expected to plunge 54.7% this year.
Click here for the full report.
Corporate Branding Attacks Teen Charity
January 29, 2010
Wallet Pop
By Lou Carlozo
You couldn’t blame Lauren McClusky of Chicago if she were a bit squeamish about using her last name in this story without fear of reprisal from Ronald McDonald and his legal posse.
For McClusky, 19, finds herself at the center of a thorny dispute that involves a series of charity concerts she’s put on over the past three years. She dubbed the event “McFest” (more on that in a moment) — but McDonald’s sees that as an infringement on its trademarks, something the McDonaldland lawyers refer to as “the McFamily of brands.”
These include (deep breath): McPen, McBurger, McBuddy, McWatch, McDouble, McJobs, McShirt, McPool, McProduct, McShades, McFree, McRuler, McLight — and even the prefix “Mc” itself.
“But not McFest,” pointed out McClusky, who declined to change her last name for this story. “The whole reason I called it McFest in the first place is my name.”
Her original co-chair for the first McFest also shared the “Mc” prefix in her surname, so it seemed a natural. And indeed, not a single McDonald’s attorney seemed to object in 2007 and 2008, when McClusky’s McFests raised $30,000 for the Chicago chapter of Special Olympics.
But when McClusky applied to have the McFest name protected, McDonald’s filed an opposition. So instead of donating funds from her 2009 concert to Special Olympics, McClusky’s had to hire lawyers to answer a series of administrative proceedings McDonald’s filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. To date, it’s cost her roughly $5,000 — money she wishes had gone to Special Olympics kids instead of attorneys.
The daughter of independent radio promoter Jeff McClusky, Lauren McClusky could of course just change the event name. But that would involve starting from square one in terms of the awareness and name recognition she’s already created for her concert series. “It’s hard to change the name of something that’s already established and locally known,” she said.
As for McDonald’s actions, McClusky says she’s frustrated by the company’s desire to clamp down on and in effect penalize a charity event — especially when McDonald’s supports Special Olympics as well. “It has nothing to do with food, arches or their colors,” she said. “And our M’s are pointy, not curved.”
McClusky hopes for a truce that will allow her to keep the McFest name. Still, she’s unwilling to make a corporate sponsorship tradeoff along the lines of “McDonald’s Presents McFest.” For their part, McDonald’s representatives maintained that they have no desire to squash McClusky’s charitable efforts, and desire an “amicable resolution.”
Click here for the full report
Window Cleaning Chemical Injected Into Fast Food Meat
January 5, 2010
Natural News
By Mike Adams
If you’re in the beef business, what do you do with all the extra cow parts and trimmings that have traditionally been sold off for use in pet food? You scrape them together into a pink mass, inject them with a chemical to kill the e.coli, and sell them to fast food restaurants to make into hamburgers.
That’s what’s been happening all across the USA with beef sold to McDonald’s, Burger King, school lunches and other fast food restaurants, according to a New York Times article. The beef is injected with ammonia, a chemical commonly used in glass cleaning and window cleaning products.
This is all fine with the USDA, which endorses the procedure as a way to make the hamburger beef “safe” enough to eat. Ammonia kills e.coli, you see, and the USDA doesn’t seem to be concerned with the fact that people are eating ammonia in their hamburgers.
This ammonia-injected beef comes from a company called Beef Products, Inc. As NYT reports, the federal school lunch program used a whopping 5.5 million pounds of ammonia-injected beef trimmings from this company in 2008. This company reportedly developed the idea of using ammonia to sterilize beef before selling it for human consumption.
Aside from the fact that there’s ammonia in the hamburger meat, there’s another problem with this company’s products: The ammonia doesn’t always kill the pathogens. Both e.coli and salmonella have been found contaminating the cow-derived products sold by this company.
This came as a shock to the USDA, which had actually exempted the company’s products from pathogen testing and product recalls. Why was it exempted? Because the ammonia injection process was deemed so effective that the meat products were thought to be safe beyond any question.
What else is in there?
As the NYT reports, “The company says its processed beef, a mashlike substance frozen into blocks or chips, is used in a majority of the hamburger sold nationwide. But it has remained little known outside industry and government circles. Federal officials agreed to the company’s request that the ammonia be classified as a ‘processing agent’ and not an ingredient that would be listed on labels.”
Fascinating. So you can inject a beef product with a chemical found in glass cleaning products and simply call it a “processing agent” — with the full permission and approval of the USDA, no less! Does anyone doubt any longer how deeply embedded the USDA is with the beef industry?
Apparently, this practice of injecting fast food beef with ammonia has been a well-kept secret for years. I never knew this was going on, and this news appears to be new information to virtually everyone. The real shocker is that “a majority” of fast food restaurants use this ammonia-injected cow-derived product in their hamburger meat. It sort of makes you wonder: What else is in there that we don’t know about?
“School lunch officials and other customers complained about the taste and smell of the beef,” says the NYT. No wonder. It’s been pumped full of chemicals.
There are already a thousand reasons not to eat fast food. Make this reason number 1,001. Ammonia. It’s not supposed to be there.
You can get the same effect by opening a can of dog food made with beef byproducts, spraying it with ammonia, and swallowing it. That is essentially what you’re eating when you order a fast food burger.
It’s almost enough to make you want to puke. If you do so, please aim it at your windows, because ammonia cuts through grease like nothing else, leaving your windows squeaky clean!
Click here for the full report
Doctors’ Deal With Coke Creates Uproar
November 9, 2009
Associated Press
By Lindsey Tanner
Advice about soft drinks and health from one of the nation’s largest doctors groups will soon be brought to you by Coke.
The American Academy of Family Physicians has prompted outcry and lost members over its new six-figure alliance with the Coca-Cola Co. The deal will fund educational materials about soft drinks for the academy’s consumer health and wellness Web site, http://www.FamilyDoctor.org.
Academy CEO Dr. Douglas Henley said Wednesday that the deal won’t influence the group’s public health messages, and that the company will have no control over editorial content. He said the new online information will include research linking soft drinks with obesity and will focus on sugar-free alternatives.
But critics say the Coke deal will water down the advice.
“Coca-Cola, like other sodas, causes enormous suffering and premature death by increasing the risks of obesity, diabetes, heart attacks, gout, and cavities,” Harvard University nutrition expert Dr. Walter Willett said in an e-mail.
He said the academy “should be a loud critic of these products and practices, but by signing with Coke their voice has almost surely been muzzled.”
Dr. Henry Blackburn, a University of Minnesota public health specialist, said the deal “will inevitably have a chilling effect on the focus of their message in regards to sweet drinks.”
Coca-Cola spokeswoman Diana Garza Ciarlante said that kind of criticism “misses the point of the partnership which is to provide education based on sound science.”
Dr. William Walker, public health officer for Contra Costa County near San Francisco, likened the alliance with ads decades ago in which physicians said mild cigarettes are safe,
Walker has been a member of the academy for 25 years but quit last week. He said 20 other doctors who work with his local medical practice also quit because of the Coke deal.
In an announcement last month, the academy, based in suburban Kansas City, Kan., said the new Coca-Cola-funded educational material will be posted online in January.
The idea is “to develop educational materials to help consumers make informed decisions so they can include the products they love in a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle,” the academy’s president-elect, Dr. Lori Heim, said at the time.
The American Academy of Pediatrics received similar criticism seven years ago when it allowed an infant formula maker’s logo to appear on copies of that group’s breast-feeding guide.
And the American Medical Association faced harsh reaction more than a decade ago with a plan to endorse Sunbeam appliances without testing them. Criticism forced the AMA to abandon that deal.
The Coke deal is not the only corporate alliance for the family physicians group. In 2005 it received funding from McDonalds for a fitness program. And its consumer Web site includes advertising for a variety of products, including deli meats and air freshener.
Henley said the Coke deal is worth six figures but he and a Coca-Cola spokeswoman declined to elaborate.
In a protest letter to Henley, 22 health specialists and activists questioned the safety of artificial sweeteners and urged the academy to abandon the deal and speak out against sugary drinks “in the strongest language.”
Henley said the academy regrets the resignations and hopes other members will not “rush to judgment” before seeing the new content.
Coca-Cola is among several corporate contributors to the American Academy of Family Physicians Foundation, a separate philanthropic group. These contributors include many drug companies, McDonalds, PepsiCo and a beef industry group. Henley said the academy is in talks with other foundation contributors to fund other materials for the group, but he declined to say which ones.
Click here for the full report.
