[dingnuts]

it's always been a national security issue and I don't understand why it took the election of this chucklefuck to change things

it's the same shit with high fructose corn syrup! everyone hates that shit, why did it take the Great Orange Menace (not to be confused with this website, the other Great Orange Menace) to get companies to realize that?

I know that bringing up HFCS here is a big digression; there are probably better examples. It's just another "broken clock is right twice a day" issue from the current admin that is so obviously popular that I don't understand why it was never an issue before.

[isk517]

Most likely because America has been in a political dead lock for the last 2 decades. Everything supported by one party is rejected by the other, everything that would benefit one state is a detriment to another, everything that would benefit the masses are extremely rejected by very load minorities. There is a strong man in charge pushing every button to see what happens, in the course of things it will turn out that at least one or two of them were far overdue to be pushed.

[reenorap]

It wasn't that they were fighting each other, they were working in concert with each other, like a dance. If the Dems say one thing, the Republicans say the opposite and vice versa, because they knew it would keep both of them in power. Now we have a true Agent of Chaos in charge that doesn't heed any of the previous rules and us peons will have to deal with the fallout from that. The biggest negative repercussions is that both the Republicans and the Democrats will be completely emboldened to do whatever they want now and we are going to suffer because neither party gives a fuck about us, they only care about maintaining their own power.

[jm4]

100%. The damage that has been done in just the past several months is unthinkable. It’s not going back to the old ways any time soon, if ever. The democratic republic experiment might even be over at this point.

I’m beginning to believe the best path forward is a new constitution, which is absolutely crazy because I used to believe we had an extraordinary system designed with incredible foresight. It turns out it was full of holes and we mostly got by on the honor system. Sure, there have been lousy and corrupt politicians, but we never had a truly bad actor determined to sidestep every rule until now.

[throw10920]

The problem is not the Constitution. No democratic-adjacent political system can survive the majority of its constituents being apathetic and disengaged (as is currently the primary problem. Our current Constitution was designed to assume some measure of engagement from the citizens because that's a hard constraint that bounds all democratic systems.

The problem is the citizens, which are chronically disengaged (a fact which has ample evidence behind it), not the legal framework. If you disagree, then feel free to point to a functioning democratic system at the same scale as the US that can survive 99% of its voters not caring enough to do anything more than spend 15 minutes voting once every two years, which is where we're at now.

The only way to keep a democratic government is to keep Huxley at bay.

[vharuck]

>The problem is the citizens, which are chronically disengaged (a fact which has ample evidence behind it), not the legal framework.

That sounds like a problem with the legal framework, if it relies on millions of individuals changing their personalities and priorities. That's not realistic.

[throw10920]

Please read my entire comment before responding:

> because that's a hard constraint that bounds all democratic systems.

There's no way to have democracy without an engaged citizenship.

And not only is it not a problem with the Constitution because of that fact, but it's a fact that the citizens were engaged in the past, so it absolutely is realistic.

[scotty79]

You disengage when you are not represented. And with just two parties with very rigid stances on everything very few people are adequately represented. US needs multi-party democracy. Two party system they have now is just one party system, split in half and frozen.

[SJC_Hacker]

> hen feel free to point to a functioning democratic system at the same scale as the US that can survive 99% of its voters not caring enough to do anything more than spend 15 minutes voting once every two years, which is where we're at now

What do really expect them to do ?

[drdec]

> It turns out it was full of holes and we mostly got by on the honor system.

100%. The Constitution was designed with good faith actors in mind. It was not designed in an age of gamification, in which we find ourselves now.

[scotty79]

Alternative would be one party system like China. Where you could do more but at the cost of controlling social hatred towards government. US goes easier route and controls hatred by splitting it in half directing the halves to hate each other.

[scotty79]

Deadlock wouldn't be so bad to have is US wasn't in terrible shape before. Now this bad state is frozen.

[phil21]

These two topics are not remotely the same or even in the same league.

In fact you could very easily argue that the reliance on HFCS which is native grown and keeps a huge amount of tillable land in production is a national security asset. It keeps farmers (and thus the institutional knowledge that can easily be switched to other crops in dire emergency) in business vs. importing a product from overseas to replace it.

If the argument was removing sugar from most products - sure! But it's not like "banning" HFCS is going to change anything when you simply switch it out for beet or cane sugar instead. It's the sugar, not the slight difference in molecules, that cause the health problems. The only real health argument against HFCS is that it's so cheap it ends up in everything. But that likely has more to do with the war on fats from past eras than much else.

I don't want to go too far down the rabbit hole on this topic, but in the context of national security HFCS vs. Cane Sugar is a clear win.

[kingkawn]

No, fructose bypasses the insulin control pathways and is converted almost immediately to ldl fats that deposit and cause arterial occlusion leading to an enormous amount of health problems across the country.

[jandrewrogers]

With one exception, HFCS is lower in fructose than common natural alternatives. Cane sugar is 50% fructose. HFCS used in food is typically 42% fructose. Fruit juice is extremely high in fructose, whence “fructose” got its name. The HFCS used in sweetened beverages is 55% fructose, which is only marginally higher than cane sugar.

The only way to avoid fructose is to avoid natural sugars. HFCS is created by taking a low-fructose sugar and modifying it to have fructose levels more similar to natural sugars.

[parineum]

Compared to what and by how much is HFCS higher in fructose?

[Tangurena2]

America's over-production of corn/maize is a direct result of Nixon. His administration knew how to deal with protesting hippies, but when farmers & housewives started protesting, the response was to heavily subsidize corn/maize production. With vast quantities of the stuff, companies looked to find uses for the stuff. Two books that describe the situation are Omnivore's Dilemma and Altered Harvest. The subsidies for growing maize/corn make it cheap, add in the tariffs on sugar imports and that explains why HFCS is ubiquitous.

0 - https://www.amazon.com/Omnivores-Dilemma-Natural-History-Mea...

1 - https://www.amazon.com/Altered-Harvest-Jack-Doyle/dp/0670115... This book also explains why tea is the British beverage (and not coffee), or how the Irish potato famine happened. And it explains the source of the corn blight that caused rioting farmers & housewives - texas male-sterile cytoplasm was used by all the hybrid seed companies, so a blight that affected one plant affected 80% of the US corn/maize crop.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

> obviously popular that I don't understand why it was never an issue before.

Maybe previous administrations have been economically incentivized to not fix those problems. Perhaps those previous administrations didn't have our best interests in mind.

[dwd]

From 2004...

https://inthesetimes.com/article/magnet-consolidation-threat...