Dr. Luise Light
Former USDA Insider Declares War on Government Food Guidelines
“One thing I learned working in the government was that there are no gratuitous acts. Actions and reactions are designed to control the agenda, limit public access to potentially dangerous (to lobbyists) information, and protect under-the-radar arrangements between commercial interests and government agents,” says Dr. Luise Light, former USDA nutrition director who offers a basic, balanced, and user-friendly nutrition and food plan that cuts through the confusion and controversy of the latest commercial diet fads, federal food guidelines, and the big food lobbies. Her ten simple eating rules are adapted for a wide variety of nutritional needs-including weight loss, fibromyalgia, diabetes, high blood cholesterol, gastrointestinal disorders, among others.
Is it any surprise to learn that American consumers are being conned by the USDA? Dr. Luise Light's book, What to Eat; The Ten Things You Really Need to Know to Eat Well and Be Healthy, reads like a detective novel, exposing scathing secrets of corporate and government malfeasance. During her career as the nutrition director for the USDA, Light witnessed the blatantly cozy relationships that existed between the USDA and the food and agricultural lobbies and lobbyists. Not only did she witness the cover-up of an important study describing the connection between nutrition and a major chronic disease, she also witnessed dangerous changes that were made to the 1992 US Food Pyramid in order to satisfy corporate interests rather than to protect our health. In fact, she warned the USDA that the changes would cause an epidemic of obesity and diabetes.
Eating well is the solution to many of the health problems we face today, says Light. Buy this book and become part of the growing consumer lobby that is rising up and reclaiming what is rightfully ours - nourishing the food. our mothers and grandmothers grew up on.
Pam Killeen reviews Dr. Luise Light's new book,
“What to Eat; The Ten Things You Really Need to Know to Eat Well and Be Healthy”
Is it any surprise to learn that American consumers are being conned by the USDA? Dr. Luise Light's book, “What to Eat; The Ten Things You Really Need to Know to Eat Well and Be Healthy,” reads like a detective novel, exposing scathing secrets of corporate and government malfeasance. During her career as the nutrition director for the USDA, Light witnessed the blatantly cozy relationships that existed between the USDA and the food and agricultural lobbies and lobbyists. Not only did she witness the cover-up of an important study linking diet with a major chronic diseases, she also witnessed dangerous changes that were made to the 1992 US Food Pyramid de in order to satisfy corporate interests rather than to protect the public'sour health. In fact, she warned the USDA that those very changes would cause an epidemic of obesity and diabetes, a warning that looks more like a prophesy, today
.
“One thing I learned working in the government was that there are no gratuitous acts. Actions and reactions are designed to control the agenda, limit public access to potentially dangerous (to lobbyists) information, and protect under-the-radar arrangements between commercial interests and government agents,” Dr. Luise Light
In her new book, Light uncovers explains the connection between nutrition and many of the life-threatening, widespread chronic diseases prevalent todaytoday. Now that she is no longer held back from exposing the truth, she lists describes the numerous illnesses that are connected to what she calls, “nutritional malaise,”
including memory loss, loss of balance, depression, sadness, anxiety, pessimism, “road rage”, low energy, “mind freeze”, eye strain, generalized aches and pains, migraines, abdominal discomfort, headaches, frequent colds and flu and massive weight gain. According to Light, these are all indications of “biochemical chaos” that can be corrected with good nutrition. The choice is clear -- you can start following aeating a nourishing balanced diet, based on real food, or you can let your symptoms progress and develop into more diredevastating chronic conditions such as, heart disease, obesity, gastrointestinal disorders, diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, osteoporosis, asthma, arthritis and many others.
Light has her own testimonial to share about her struggle to regain her health after collapsing with a chronic, disabling illness. Her very inspirational story helps to reinforce her message about the interconnection between nutrition and physical and mental health. Her story will resonate with many individuals who are struggling today with Irritable Bowel Syndrome, hypothyroidism, depression and related unexplained, massive weight gainproblems.
Even though the book tackles a very serious subject, Light manages to come imbue it withthrough with humor, pointing out the irony of the conventional medical cover upapproaches. “Don't worry about your diet, we have a pill for that,
!
” we're told. Light's book offers real practical solutions advice not placebos to cut through the confusionthe many consumers who are confused
about what's good to eat.
Light assures you that you're not alone if you're having problems understanding the convolutedvery cryptic messages in of the government's Dietary Guidelines. the current Food GuidelinesShe offers simple but easy to understand science-based guidelines of her own, such as these three (out of ten) lucid examples, along with the rationales behind them:
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Eat a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables.
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Eat whole-grain pasta, rice, breads, and cereals.
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Eat certified organic foods.
Also, sShe gives providesyou guidelines and her own food pyramid, which is much easier to understand and follow than those of the one published by the government. Her book is loaded with solutions to what the USDA should have solveddidn't offer in their own Food Guidelines Pyramid issued in 2005.this year. You will learn how to transition to real food in her chapter, “Your Diet Makeover Tool Kit”. And, if you're at a loss for how to prepare real food, she also has several, quick, idiot-proof, delicious recipes in her chapter, “What to Cook”.
Although her book gives a detailed, easy to grasp account of the problems inherent in the American food system (pesticides, GMO's, acrylamide, MSG, processed foods etc…), she also manages to focus on simple, straightforward and realistic solutions
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from what to stock in your larder, to a week's worth of menus, meals and recipes, and practical tips on eating on the road and dining out. Light assures us that real food is not only more nutritious than food out of a box or bag, it tastes better and is more pleasurable and satisfying. Food is meant to be enjoyed, she reminds us.For example, we can reclaim real food by spending our food dollars on locally and organically grown food. She also offers a network of solutions for what can be done to get real food back into the schools and on children and teens' plates.
If you're wondering how our food system deteriorated to the current level, you'll be asking the questions that Light asks and answers in her book, and then wonders,, What to Eat; The Ten Things You Really Need to Know to Eat Well and be Healthy.
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“Why isn't national nutritional improvement getting as much of our attention as a space launch or fighting terrorists?” As a nutritionist she's as upset and disappointed with the situation as you are. She points out what you can do about it on a personal and community level. Get involved, she says, to protect and preserve your health and your communit
y
ies. Many people are doing just that. Much to the dismay of highly paid lobbyists, efforts are underway to get the junk food out of schools. Some schools are even feeding children fresh, home cooked, organicwhole foods
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! Imagine that! Despite the myths, children will eat and even come to prefer delicious fresh foods, simply prepared, and reject factory-made fast foods, given the chance, Light tells based on her experience.
For seventy years, the USDA has stood by the theme that “All food is good food”. As more and more chemicalized foods line our supermarkets shelves, it is less and less true. Light's book is a very explicit fresh and reasoned account of why this concept is flawed and why we need to go back to the basics, choosing whole nutritious foods instead of synthetic designer food products that are designed to live on a shelf for seven yearss.
This book will give you chills but also give you hope that you can eat better, feel better and finally, get straight talk about nutrition.
While dietary habits have changed considerably over the years, it was Davis who reminded us that nutritional truths have not changed since the days when our Paleolithic ancestors dined on wooly mammoths, berries, roots and leaves, yet, now, despite our advancement in medical and food sciences, the truth about nutrition continues to be ignored. Yet nutrition is the daily medicine our bodies need to rebuild and repair us at every moment and stage of our lives.
In this modern world where fast is considered good and supersized is even better, it is once again time for America to hear the voice of a nutrition expert reminding us of long-ignored truths - that whole, fresh, local foods and real foods are basic to an optimum state of health. Dr. Luise Light is the owner of that voice this time.
In her critically needed book, based on her years of study, Dr. Light spells out the simple, logical steps for planning an optimal diet. The book also contains clear-eyed critiques of popular diet fads as well as the chemical soups and batters that masquerade as “food” on store shelves. Is one calorie the same as every other calorie? In this entertaining and informative book, Dr. Light says no, we're fooling ourselves if we think so, and goes on to tell us why that's so and what we can do to help ourselves.
In this book you will learn the true story of the original Food Guide Pyramid that Light and her team of nutrition experts created for the USDA, only to see the new guide deliberately and dangerously changed before being given out to an unsuspecting public. You will learn for the first time the story of Dr. Edith Weir, a USDA scientist and analyst, who produced a 120 page report for Congress on the benefits of human nutrition research for human health, a report that “disappeared” and was never released to the public. Says Dr. Light, “Weir demonstrated rather dramatically that improper or inadequate nutrition was responsible for seven out of ten of the leading causes of death and disability in the United States. But that was a finding inconsistent with USDA's priorities.”
The book also contains the true events of a national nutrition scandal witnessed first hand, and the real truths that underlie a healthy eating approach that can peel off the extra pounds, strengthen your heart, your bones and your digestive system, without special pills, potions and eating regimens. It should be in every home in America.
What to Eat: A Review by author and journalist, Mary Sparrowdancer:
It has been half a century since Adelle Davis, America's beloved nutrition guru, first called on us to delight in good eating--building our health as we enjoyed good meals. Davis' voice rang out with common sense as well as up-to-date science, telling us that the basics of nutrition have somehow been lost in our increasingly industrialized, very fast, and inevitably, very fat world.
What to Eat; The Ten Things You Really Need to Know to Eat Well and Be Healthy, shows us that before we say grace over our meals, we should have a good idea of what we are about to bless. While a sandwich of fresh, wholegrain, home-baked bread, organic vegetables and a piece of organic meat might have delicious and healthful ingredients that can be counted on one hand, the staggering number of ingredients in a fast-food cheeseburger (sans vegetables) may include up to 113 different pesticide residues, chemicals, industrial fats, corn syrup, and a dozens of other synthetic ingredients most humans cannot spell much less digest properly, ingredients humans never consumed before the current era..