Sarasota Prof Wages Junk Food Jihad On Local Schools

Lake Erie College of Medicine, located in Manatee County (go figure!), nutrition professor, Dr. Oren Rosenthal, has declared war on the waistlines of Sarasota County school children by submitting his menu manifesto to the school board. When received with a less than enthusiastic embrace of his ideas, the good doctor took his fast-food fatwa to the streets.

Studies indicate that some 41 percent of sixth-grade students in Sarasota are, according to strict interpretation of government guidelines, overweight and Rosenthal thinks that is primarily due to the proliferation of unhealthy food promotions that abound in the school system. Like any good conspiracy theorist, he keeps the evidence in a non-descript three-ring binder, containing damning contraband like the three rolls of Smarties, three Hershey kisses, three Starburst chews and one Jolly Rancher given to his daughter upon entering first grade with the note: "Welcome to First Grade. Here's a little survival kit teacher made just for you!"

She might just as well have given her students a pack of Camels and a six-pack of Bud.

And anonymous sources indicate that this monster continues to teach our children!

The professor's Mein Kampf, Someone Is Not Doing Their Job In Sarasota Schools_ School Board Letter_2009, is a compendium of the nutritional affronts foisted upon the children of Sarasota by the school system, ie, "allowing cupcakes into the classroom for birthday parties and.....snow-cakes and hot chocolate for Christmas parties," "ice cream galas for 'A' students," "a caramel a school bus driver once gave (his daughter)(to be fair, the bus driver had found the caramel on the floor from an earlier run and considered giving it to the girl as recycling and not assisted suicide by sugar)," "coupons for McDonald's that other bus drivers have handed out," "a person dressed in a Chick-Fil-A costume was a judge at the elementary school science fair" and the indignity of his daughter's third-grade math assignment, "all of which involved theoretical M&M candies."

Rosenthal contends that had the math quiz involved broccoli and beets, his daughter would not be repeating third grade this year.

Rosenthal is calling for a 'zero tolerance' policy on unhealthy food, believing that moderation has no place in today's society. His idea of giving his children a sweet treat is watering down their juice so that it becomes mostly water "to stop their taste buds from craving sugar." Good times, indeed.

Once Rosenthal is successful in rooting out all vestiges of junk food in the schools, he intends to take his campaign of 'no fat, no sugar, no carb, no fun' into the community and into the home, vowing to rid the streets of the fast-food pushers on every corner that feed the addictions of junk-food junkies, Happy Meals be damned!



Easter eggs would really be eggs, all organic from free range chickens, no yolks, of course. The menu at summer picnics at the beach or the park would consist of raw fruit, raw vegetables, no carbs and that old standby, watered-down juice. Mmmmmmm.

Halloween? Note to children everywhere--skip the Rosenthal's place, unless you have a hankering for freshly-scrubbed carrots and chilled brussel sprouts. Turkeys everywhere would no longer fear November, since tofu turkeys would be mandated by the mad doctor of menus.

And those yummy Hanukah and Christmas treats that Grandma makes every year?

This would become Rosenthal's Public Enemy No. 1: