This liability waiver includes an agreement not to haul your host into court on the basis of:

1.      Failure to provide nutritional information on a color coded label to denote calories, fat, carbohydrates, sodium, trans fat, local eating, or approval by a New York Times food snob;

2.      Failure to warn of potential for overeating because food tastes too good and is provided at no cost;

3.      Failure to offer “healthier alternatives” or vegetarian “Tofurky”;  and

4.      Failure to warn that eating too much and not exercising enough may lead to obesity.

During this season when food cops, public health zealots, and trial lawyers are using junk science to ban or restrict food products, the Center for Consumer Freedom believes that Thanksgiving should remain a holiday for giving thanks, carving turkey, and indulging in a bountiful harvest.

“Dinner hosts should be able to serve that second helping of turkey and stuffing and offer a bigger slice of pumpkin pie without the fear of being sued,” said CCF’s Senior Research Analyst J. Justin Wilson. “With this signed waiver, you can leave the trial lawyers and ‘food police’ out in the cold. That’s something we can all enjoy this Thanksgiving.”

Download your copy of the liability waiver here: http://www.consumerfreedom.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/ThanksgivingWaiver2012.pdf

Baum and Chou’s research finds that changes in food costs and the increasing prevalence of restaurants over the past 30 years are not linked to rising obesity rates. This flies in the face of health activists and politicians looking to address obesity rates through government regulations such as fast food zoning laws, placing grocery stores in food deserts, and taxing products like soda.

“Health zealots and legislators like to place the blame on corporations for perpetuating a so-called ‘toxic food environment’ that hampers Americans’ ability to shed pounds,” said J. Justin Wilson, CCF’s Senior Research Analyst. “However, this new study demonstrates external factors like at-home food prices or fast food locations are not the culprit for America’s burgeoning bellies. Lack of personal responsibility is what is making us overweight, and as this study seems to substantiate it will take personal responsibility to get us out of this mess. Fundamentally, the key to maintaining a healthy weight has always been striking a balance between calories in and calories out.”

Socio-economic factors that did lead to a statistical change, albeit slight, in America’s weight gain include less physically demanding occupations and urban sprawl. Modern-day conveniences such as taking a bus to school or working at a desk for eight hours decrease the number of calories exerted. However, even these factors are small players in obesity.

“The push to single out and regulate products or companies in an attempt to solve the ‘obesity crisis’ fails to acknowledge the myriad factors and personal choices that contribute to weight-loss,” continued Wilson. “Creating one-size-fits-all policies that ignore the importance of personal responsibility will do little to curb obesity rates.”

ActivistCash.com, a project of the nonprofit Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF), released a study conclusively demonstrating the bias and partisanship of the so-called Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). The analysis can be found on the newly unveiled website CrewExposed.com. CREW is often described as a “nonpartisan” and “watchdog” organization by the media, but it has a long track record of singling out Republicans for criticism and turning a blind eye to Democrats. Examining the activities of CREW since its founding in 2003, CCF discovered that:

• 76 percent of the complaints CREW filed with the Federal Election Commission were targeted at Republicans and right-leaning groups; only 10 percent were filed against Democrats and left-leaning groups (the other 14 percent were either bipartisan or nonpartisan);
• 100 percent of complaints CREW filed with the Internal Revenue Service have attacked conservative nonprofit organizations and Republican members of Congress;
• Between June 2003 and September 2010, CREW requested 67 investigations by the Department of Justice; two-thirds targeted Republicans, while only 10 percent went after Democrats;
• In addition to receiving money from George Soros’s Open Societies Institute, CREW has received funding from the SEIU, Democracy Alliance, and other groups that strongly support Democratic politicians. CREW also has a history of attacking organizations that oppose the goals of their funders.

The Center for Consumer Freedom’s executive director, Rick Berman, released the following statement regarding the new analysis:

CREW is little more than a front group for big liberal money. Given CREW’s history of attacking the nonprofit status of groups they deem too partisan, perhaps it’s time someone started asking questions about CREW’s political activities.

To view the full report – which also details the partisan employment history of those who work for and founded CREW, including executive director Melanie Sloan – go to CrewExposed.com.

Three examples of nutrition battles in recent years should serve as cautionary tales in the debate over education versus control.

Two leading anti-obesity campaigners, Yale University's Kelly Brownell and Harvard's David Ludwig recently declared: "For some of the most important public health problems today, society does not have the luxury to await scientific certainty."

These academics want to use public policy to make us lose weight — even if the consequences of their proposals aren't fully understood and might even backfire.

One idea sprouting up in state legislatures everywhere is the "soda tax." Advocates reason that raising the price of soda will reduce our consumption of calories, causing widespread weight loss.

A fountain of research, though, shows that taxes won't cause people to lose weight. A Duke study released in December, for example, found that substantial taxes would only result in people consuming 7 fewer calories per day — a trifling amount.

Even Brownell admits that "nobody has been able to see how people will really respond under these conditions." That's hardly a vote of confidence in his pet policy — yet he demands that states adopt it.

And consider the emerging War on Salt. Loved by chefs, salt is derided by public health activists who see it as contributing to hypertension and other health disorders. The Institute of Medicine called for mandatory sodium reductions last year, and New York City started a voluntary (for now) program encouraging food makers to reduce the amount of sodium in their foods.

Ironically, the editor of the American Journal of Hypertension says that sodium reduction is an "experiment on a whole population" because there's not enough scientific research to know what will happen. It's feasible, for instance, that people will simply eat more lower-sodium food to reach the same sodium level they were eating before. This, of course, could cause people to get fatter. Oops.

And while a medical director at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention claims that it's not prudent to wait for more sodium science before acting, the record speaks differently. Alderman noted recently that nearly half of a set of 9 studies found no association between sodium intake and health.

Nutrition science is always changing, and it's hard to set broad public policy when its underpinnings can fall away with a moment's notice.

Consider the case of trans fats. In the late 1980s, the activist group Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) attacked restaurants' use of beef tallow because it was high in saturated fat. Restaurants switched to using oil containing trans fats.

At the time, CSPI defended trans fats, saying "All told, the charges against trans fat just don't stand up." But just a few years later, CSPI was demonizing trans fats based on new scientific claims, a campaign that ultimately resulted in busy-bee bureaucrats getting involved.

Marion Nestle, a former federal Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee member, admits that "whether the evidence is good enough to recommend population-based dietary changes comes down to a matter of subjective judgment."

Public health activists want to substitute their judgment for yours and soften evidentiary requirements for making public policy. There's a difference between educating Americans — such as requiring calorie counts on menus — and claiming that said education will be effective when it won't. (Recent research failed to find that menu labeling would reduce the amount of food people ordered, despite activists' predictions.)

There's nothing wrong with teaching Americans about what the latest science says. But it should be up to us to take or leave government recommendations. The last thing Americans should be is puppets of nutrition masters.

If you didn't spend your evenings last spring familiarizing yourself with British slang, here's a rundown: Oliver went to America's fattest city, Huntington, W.Va., and tried to reform school food by replacing pizza, chicken nuggets and chocolate milk with healthier options like roast chicken and unflavored milk.

The result? Kids scrunched their noses at the changes, rejected the "revolution" delivered to them on a plate and brought less-than-healthy food from home.

But Oliver's failure in West Virginia hasn't deterred him from a second season.

Neither has the fact that that the school system apparently doesn't want his "revolution." The Los Angeles Unified School District kicked Oliver out after two weeks, terminating his filming permit. Oliver is now left as a sort of community agitator to promote healthier selections at restaurants.

Oliver may well be a good chef, but he's not much of a policymaker. If there's one takeaway from the show, it's that it's truly a microcosm of our nation's public policy debate over food and obesity.

Oliver's approach to food reform was to swoop in from across the Atlantic, make healthier, albeit less appetizing, food and expect everyone to go along with it.

But any attempt to reform school lunch has to meet three criteria: Being tasty, healthy and inexpensive. It's easy for food to fit two of these categories. Having a food that fits all three is far more difficult. Oliver's system exemplifies this dilemma.

His school food in season one was probably healthier — meaning fewer calories. And in season two, he's already suggested that a fast-food burger operator swap out milkshakes for yogurt smoothies.

These changes are probably both healthy and tasty. But both fail the dollar test.

L.A. schools called the Huntington district that experienced Oliver's cafeteria menu makeover last year. Sources there told them that the Huntington schools were operating in the black before Oliver came, but were losing money after he showed up.

And in the first episode of season two, a drive-thru restaurateur told Oliver that the plan to add healthier options would result in food that was simply too expensive to be competitive.

Oliver's failure — which is likely to continue throughout the season — is due to his approach that doesn't offer new food that is affordable, tasty and healthy. (Not meeting this criteria will result in failure. After Chicago schools tried making lunches healthier this year, they saw a 5 percent drop in lunch sales as some kids found the new fare "nasty" and stopped eating it.)

Oliver's food philosophy is strikingly similar to the trendy beliefs espoused by food writers like Michael Pollan. If people only got rid of "processed" foods, if they only starting cooking themselves, if they only bought "organic" food from local sources, the narrative goes, they would be healthy.

But too often this simple vision succumbs to the law of unintended consequences. Oliver, for example, wants to banish flavored milk from schools. One survey found that students drink 37 percent less milk when flavored milk isn't an option — missing out on many nutrients. That's likely one reason administrators in a suburban Washington, D.C., school district recently allowed chocolate and strawberry milk back on the menu.

And considering the price premium, this isn't a feasible solution to fighting obesity. (Not to mention a multitude of scientific studies have found that organic food isn't healthier than conventional fare.) Ultimately, Oliver's attempts to tinker with food will likely be no more successful than South Los Angeles' zoning ban on new fast-food restaurants, or proposed taxes on soda as an obesity-fighting measure.

No amount of top-down regulations can create a desire to lose weight. Losing weight is a difficult process that takes a long time. People will never lose weight unless they decide they want to. Nagging from friends, family, spouses-or celebrities-is nowhere near a blueprint for success.

With the rise of shows like “Top Chef” and “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives” and Food Network recently announcing its best month ever for ratings, Americans are arguably more food-conscious than ever before.

So what to do if you’re a chef who wants to distinguish himself? Pick up your pen — or a camera crew, for that matter. Unfortunately, the result is often tasteless.

The most recent example is British “Naked Chef” Jamie Oliver, whose show “Food Revolution” started its second season. Oliver suggests that increasing rates of obesity are largely caused by our lack of cooking, and hopes that by dishing out school lunch himself, things will reform.

The irony is that the dishes Oliver himself offers up online aren’t necessarily going to flatten anyone’s abs. His beef stir fry tops out at 1,300 calories-plus. And let’s not get into the creamy pasta carbonara, which can approach a day’s worth of calories.

Now there’s nothing wrong with an occasional high-octane meal. But if you’re going to demonize school cooks for making 500-calorie meals, I expect a little practicing of what you preach.

Then there’s Mark Bittman at The New York Times. Bittman wrote colorful food columns full of interesting recipes until January. Now, he writes stomach-churning polemics about food.

One of his favorite whipping boys is so-called processed food—a category that includes TV dinners, boxed foods and apparently anything not made from a recipe in a cookbook.

Like Oliver, some recipes from Bittman’s best-selling cookbook “How to Cook Everything” are less healthy than the “processed” alternatives he demonizes. His burger has more fat and calories than a Big Mac. And many of his other entrees, like chicken parmesan, have more calories and fat than their frozen dinner counterparts.

Last but not least is the Godfather of foodie culture, Michael Pollan. He’s a bestselling author and de facto philosophical leader of the “foodie” movement in which Oliver and Bittman serve as proselytizers. He advises not eating anything with more than five ingredients, and to not eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize.

It’s easy for celebrity food pundits to tell us we should buy “local” and “organic” and “free-range” — or my favorite, “air-chilled.” But for many Americans, eating elite is out of their price range.

How appetizing is paying $8 for a dozen eggs, even in good economic times? And the “organic” crops that are a favorite of Pollan and others not only come at a price premium, but can take more land to grow the same amount of food. On a more practical matter: Pity the poor Bostonian trying to buy local in January.

We wouldn’t want the loudmouths on cable news to make public policy decisions. And neither should we want chefs — no matter how well intentioned — to dictate food policy.

They can continue teaching us how to dish up fettuccine, as long as it doesn’t come with a side of pretentiousness.

According to an Opinion Research Corporation (ORC) poll, an impressive 93% of respondents say they already reuse so-called “disposable” plastic bags for another purpose, like lining a trash can or cleaning up after their pet. This explains why 67% of Americans oppose a five-cent tax on plastic bags. Ireland actually saw a 400 percent increase in plastic bag purchases following a similar tax, precisely because consumers need and want traditional plastic bags for certain household chores.

“Attempting to demonize or tax plastic bags – as Congressman Moran is proposing – is a perfect example of feel-good policymaking that brings with it myriad unintended consequences,” said J. Justin Wilson, Senior Research Analyst at the Center for Consumer Freedom. “Politicians often offer knee-jerk responses to activist-driven junk science by banning or taxing products without giving any thought to basic human nature. In the end, the new alternative can end up being worse than the replacement."

Moran dubiously suggests that a five-cent tax on plastic bags is “earth friendly,” however, a Wall Street Journal report confirms that the alternative, fabric-like reusable bags, have a greater carbon footprint—nearly 28 times larger—as their plastic reusable brethren.

Wilson continued, “Americans have been goaded into using reusable bags by lawmakers and activists who claim they are safer for consumers and the planet. In reality, it is much more complicated.”

The poll also found that 78% of those who use reusable bags on a regular basis, do so because they believe “they are better for the environment.” However, new findings from the Environment Agency of England show a reusable bag has to be used 11 times to have a lower global warming potential than a plastic bag if it is not reused. If a plastic bag is reused for household purposes like lining a trash can or cleaning up after the dog – as 93% of those polled claim they reuse their bags for – a polypropylene reusable bag would have to be reused 26 times to equal the low environmental impact of one plastic bag.

What the Environment Agency study doesn’t take into account are the amount of resources used when reusable bags are washed, which is vital to keeping the bags safe and clean. According to ORC’s polling, 53% of Americans are unaware of high levels of bacteria found in some reusable bags, which is probably why more than half of the people who do their grocery shopping with reusable bags do not regularly wash them. This is despite the fact that a recent study from the University of Arizona found that more than half of the bags tested came up positive for coliform, while 11 percent tested positive for E. coli.

“Americans have been goaded into using reusable bags by green activist groups and lawmakers with a belief that they are better for the environment and safer for consumers, but in reality it is much more complicated,” said J. Justin Wilson, CCF’s Senior Research Analyst. “Policies that would tax or ban plastic bags are just another example of politicians and activists hastily pushing feel-good measures that create a myriad of unintended consequences.”

Today's poll comes as state and local politicians across the country are clamoring to pass legislation or regulations banning or taxing plastic bags. However, the new ORC polling shows 67% of Americans oppose a five-cent tax, while, 65% oppose a complete ban on plastic bags that would push consumers to purchase canvas or plastic, fabric-like reusable bags. These reusable bags can contain excessive amounts of lead according to a recent study conducted by CCF; and researchers at the University of Arizona have found that reusable bags can serve as a breeding ground for bacteria like E. coli and fecal coliform.

“Consumers should be free to carry home their groceries in whatever bags they choose, without being forced to pay a hefty tax,” said J. Justin Wilson, CCF’s Senior Research Analyst. “Instead of banning or taxing plastic bags, lawmakers should do a better job educating the general public about recycling their plastic bags.”

The poll also found that 93% of Americans report that they already reuse their plastic bags for household tasks such as lining trash cans, cleaning up after pets, and carrying lunches. Many retailers have also established recycling centers outside of stores for used plastic bags.

Wilson continued, “Consumers don’t want to be told how they should take their groceries home. Forcing them to use lead-laden bags potentially harboring bacteria will never be popular public policy.”

Some reusable shopping bags sold or given away by stores throughout North America contain excessive lead levels above what is allowable by many state laws. Just recently, companies like Sears-Canada, CVS, and lululemon athletica recalled their reusable bags due to elevated lead levels. A newly released study ofreusable bags commissioned by CCF found that 16 out of the 44 organizations with bags tested are selling or distributing reusable bags containing lead in amounts greater than 100 ppm (parts per million), which is where many states set the limit for heavy metals in packaging. CVS and Safeway led the pack with 697 and 672 ppm respectively; both were nearly seven times the 100 ppm limit.

According to a recent Opinion Research Corporation (ORC) poll, 56% of Americans are not “at all aware” that their reusable grocery bags may contain lead and bacteria, which explains why—according to the same poll—68% of reusable bag owners have either never washed their bag or only washed it once in the last year.

Though lawmakers suggest these bag fees will have a positive impact on the environment, ORC polling shows only two out of five consumers reuse their bag “most” or “all” of the time. Often, consumers will purchase more reusable bags (which have 28 times the carbon footprint of plastic bags) to replace forgotten bags at home. 

“Attempting to demonize or tax plastic bags—as Senator Leach is proposing—is a perfect example of knee-jerk, feel-good regulation that brings with it a myriad of unintended consequences,” said CCF Senior Research Analyst J. Justin Wilson. “Politicians often respond to activist-driven junk science by banningor taxing products without giving any thought to what people will use instead. Now, recent research demonstrates that some of these bags contain lead and can be a breeding ground for bacteria. In the end, the new alternative can end up being worse than its replacement.”