McDonalds has made alot of Millionaires..

AspenValley wrote: And I can understand why some people might want the government to intervene, even if I don't agree with them. My guess is if they don't police themselves a little better, there will be pressure to do it for them. I'm not advocating it, just predicting it as a likely outcome.

And here again is the biggest difference between those who seek to live under the republican form of government that the Constitution established and those who seek to devolve that quantum leap forward back into a form of centralized rule. I can't understand why anyone would think the power to intervene was bestowed upon the government. I can't understand why the government, whether local or federal, should have the power to decide whether or not a restaurant offers a toy along with its child sized menu offerings. Why a government, local or federal, should have the power to set limits of fat content in food served at the restaurant. That the government, state or local, should have the power to require certain inclusions on the menu offered by a restaurant. I can't understand where the notion comes from that unless the owner of a restaurant decides to offer a salad themselves that someone should think it a responsible action of government to step in and require them to offer it. I can't understand the thought process associated with someone deciding these things are a proper exercise of government power, it is a totally alien concept to me.

PrintSmith wrote: [ I can't understand the thought process associated with someone deciding these things are a proper exercise of government power, it is a totally alien concept to me.

Again, while I don't agree with it, I DO understand it. It comes from people thinking that something else (in this case corporations and insidious, relentless advertising campaigns) has gotten too much power in their lives. It might not be a proper exercise of governmental powers, but when people feel powerless, they do the best they can to fight back, in a case like this by urging the government to wield their power against it.

It's really no different than when people don't like things their neighbor is doing but feel powerless to confront him personally. Instead, they will "borrow" the power of the government by calling the sheriff every time they have a party or park an inch over the property line, or making zoning complaints or barking dog complaints or whatever else he can think of to have the government bully the neighbor on his behalf. It may not be appropriate use of authority, but it happens every day.

The problem gets to be that they think someone else has, or should have, power over their lives that it doesn't or shouldn't. What power over your life does McDonald's have by offering a toy with their Happy Meal? What control over your life have they assumed for themselves by putting slides and ball pits in their restaurants? What insidious effort is promulgated by using mascots like Ronald McDonald and Mayor McCheese to advertise their products?

I don't see the power they usurp from the individual to control their own destiny that would instill a feeling of powerlessness here AV. I also fail to see how government intervention that requires apple slices instead of french fries supplies a feeling of empowerment that heretofore didn't exist. What am I missing other than the mentality of a victim?

"Da Gub'mint" did not mandate apple slices... McDonalds opted to do that on its own as a business decision... You know--the kind of business decision that companies make every day to entice their customers to buy their products.... Nothing got usurped...

McDonald’s: Apple Slices In Every Happy Meal

MIAMI (CBS4) — McDonald’s Corp. plans to make its Happy Meals healthier across the country, including South Florida.

The company announced that it is adding apples to all its Happy Meals and launching a nutrition-focused mobile phone app as part of a broader health push.

The changes underscore how the restaurant industry is reacting to the demands of customers and regulators who blame it for health ills ranging from childhood obesity to diabetes.

But thanks for playing.

Oh please. McDonald's is simply trying to avoid having the Center for Science in the Public Interest file a lawsuit to force them to put the apples in there. Apples and juice have been offered as an alternative to fries and a soda for going on 3 years now. Only recently has the restaurant chain altered the contents so that these are no longer alternatives but included items, and it is in response to the threats of someone filing a lawsuit against them.

PrintSmith wrote: Oh please. McDonald's is simply trying to avoid having the Center for Science in the Public Interest file a lawsuit to force them to put the apples in there. Apples and juice have been offered as an alternative to fries and a soda for going on 3 years now. Only recently has the restaurant chain altered the contents so that these are no longer alternatives but included items, and it is in response to the threats of someone filing a lawsuit against them.

Wouldn't that be an example of the free market at work....not government intervention? Give the customer what he wants and you won't get sued.

Yes, and Toyota made changes to their cars to avoid lawsuits over safety... And some drug companies are forced to pull their drugs off the market over safety issues.

Get over it... It happens... There WAS NO LEGISLATION that forced them to do it... "The company announced that it is adding apples to all its Happy Meals and launching a nutrition-focused mobile phone app as part of a broader health push."

Oh please... Not everything is a "usurpation" of some bullsh*t freedom... (by the County of Santa Clara, California)...

PrintSmith wrote: The problem gets to be that they think someone else has, or should have, power over their lives that it doesn't or shouldn't. What power over your life does McDonald's have by offering a toy with their Happy Meal? What control over your life have they assumed for themselves by putting slides and ball pits in their restaurants? What insidious effort is promulgated by using mascots like Ronald McDonald and Mayor McCheese to advertise their products?

I don't see the power they usurp from the individual to control their own destiny that would instill a feeling of powerlessness here AV. I also fail to see how government intervention that requires apple slices instead of french fries supplies a feeling of empowerment that heretofore didn't exist. What am I missing other than the mentality of a victim?

Ok, I'm getting sick of this.

I have said it over and over but you just don't get it.

I explained to you how I think some people see it because you said you "couldn't understand it". But I also made a point to repeatedly say I do not agree with that viewpoint. Why do you insist on me defending a viewpoint I don't agree with? I will say it one more time....I DO NOT THINK THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE THE FOOD POLICE OR REGULATE ADVERTISING OTHER THAN TO BAN OUTRIGHT FRAUDULENT CLAIMS.

Although I would argue that advertising does indeed have power over people's lives, much more power than most even realize. A year or so I read a book on the topic (can't remember the title now) about research that shows that while people estimate that advertising effects their buying decisions very little, in fact almost all were influenced much more than they realized or admitted to. The power to influence people's life choices IS indeed power over their lives, and no, you don't have to have a "victim" mentality to see that.

The reason I keep asking is that you say you can understand the so called reasoning employed to reach that conclusion, so called reasoning which entirely escapes any effort on my part to wrap my mind around it. If you can understand such so called reasoning, I am hoping that you can explain it to me such that I might be able to understand it as well. I understand completely that you and I are pretty much in agreement that the government possesses no such powers to interfere, but I lack the understanding of the faulty reasoning behind such efforts that you say you have, which is why I am asking you to clarify how the sense of powerlessness is reached through the advertising efforts of a restaurant that is seeking to have the consumer choose their restaurant over a different one after deciding to be a consumer of such fare to begin with.

As far as I know, none of the fast food chains is capable of compelling to you be a consumer of the food that they offer for sale via employing the force of government. Insurance companies might be able to compel you in that manner if ObamaCare survives the legal challenges, but as far as I have been able to gather thus far, McDonald's, Taco Bell and Burger King don't enjoy a similar seat at the force of government table at the moment.

Let me put it to you this way. Suppose someone put up a HUGE, hideous, garish, sign advertising something you found objectionable, like maybe something like a phone sex service. Right across the street from your house. You had to see the thing every single day, whether you wanted to or not. And you found also that the same phone sex company was putting up those "unblockable" ads on your computer, so you couldn't escape it there. And constant TV ads as well. All of this was perfectly legal for them to do. Yet you hated seeing the ads and felt intruded on against your will by them.

Then one day you discover that your 13 year old son, goaded on by the constant barrage of the ads, went online and not really realizing what he was doing, ran up $500 of charges calling the phone sex line.

Would you be just fine with the phone sex companies actions, chalking it up to the wonderful principle of Free Enterprise, or would you think they had gone too far? Note that I am not asking you if you would try to force the government to make them stop the advertising. I am only asking you if you think that in such a scenario, the phone sex company had had power to negatively affect your family?