Daniel Lubetzky

The need for greater transparency in the food industry is not just in the US.

“Poor diet is associated with 1 in 5 deaths worldwide, according to a new, large study.”

Two years ago, we announced the launch of Feed the Truth, an independent organization with a mission to improve public health by making truth, transparency and integrity the foremost values in today’s food system. To uphold the organization’s autonomy, I have not been involved in Feed the Truth’s strategic planning since pledging the initial funds. However, I’m pleased to see that they are making progress by convening an esteemed board of directors and kicking off the process to recruit an Executive Director. Special interests continue to plague society by pursuing profit at the expense of public health – directly through lobbying and indirectly through campaigns that mislead consumers. My hope is that Feed the Truth will play a role in ensuring that science and facts counteract their undue influence. Wishing best of luck to the board on their endeavors!

“What we eat now is a greater cause of disease & death in the world than either tobacco or alcohol.”

The world is moving to consume more of everything, especially over processed, empty calorie foods, and the impact is staggering. We have to make a change.

Here’s a story from The New York Times that I thought you’d find interesting. Gazans and Israel could have made peace before. Now, demographic and ecosystem issues add urgency.

By Thomas L. Friedman

Princess Diana once famously observed that there were three people in her marriage, “so it was a bit crowded.” The same is true of Israelis and Palestinians. The third person in their marriage is Mother Nature — and she’ll batter both of them if they do not come to their senses.

Let’s start with Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist organization that rules the Gaza Strip. If there were an anti-Nobel Peace Prize — that is, the Nobel Prize for Cynicism and Reckless Disregard for One’s Own People in Pursuit of a Political Fantasy — it would surely be conferred on Hamas, which just facilitated the tragic and wasted deaths of roughly 60 Gazans by encouraging their march, some with arms, on the Israeli border fence in pursuit of a “return” to their ancestral homes in what is now Israel. [Read more →]

By Fareed Zakaria, Thursday, Oct. 5, 2017

“He was a sick man, a demented man,” said President Trump, trying to explain the latest mass shooting in the United States. We hear this view expressed routinely, after every new incident. But it is a dodge, a distortion of the facts and a cop-out as to the necessary response.

There is no evidence that the Las Vegas shooter was insane. (I prefer not to use his name and give him publicity, even posthumously.) He did not have a history of mental illness that we know of, nor had he been reported for behavior that would suggest any such condition. He was clearly an evil man, or at least a man who did something truly evil. But evil is not crazy. If we define the attempt to take an innocent human being’s life as madness, then every murderer is mad. If not, we should recognize that it is a meaningless term that adds little to our understanding of the problem.

Actually, the quick assumption of mental illness distorts the discussion. First, it smears people who do have mental disorders. Such people are not inherently highly prone to violence. They are more often victims of violence than perpetrators. And to the extent that some are violent, they are more likely to inflict harm on themselves. Mental-health issues are correlated to suicides far more closely than they are to homicides. [Read more →]

Loving the content shared in this postcard by my friends at Juice Press.

If you’ve ever wondered what information you’re being fed is based on fact and what’s backed by special interest groups more interested in turning a profit than nourishing your body, you’re in luck.

This morning, Daniel Lubetzky, the founder and CEO of KIND Healthy Snacks, announced the launch of Feed the Truth, a first-of-its-kind independent organization that will seek to provide some much-needed transparency in our food system.

[Read more →]