Getting religion about health

What do you see as the government's duty in taking on obesity?

I think a lot of it is to create incentive, to reinforce positive behavior rather than to prohibit hurtful behavior. And here's why: Americans just don't respond to being told by anybody, especially the government, what they can and cannot do. I think Prohibition proved that. We have to create an atmosphere in which people see that being healthy is in their own best interest, and where it's financially advantageous to them, whether it's the $20 a month off health insurance or something else.

We're working on a plan in Arkansas where employees would get points for healthy choices -- everything from not smoking, exercising and maintaining normal body weight all the way to wearing seat belts. And then we would reward employees with paid days off, and maybe even cash benefits, because if they're healthy, it's actually in our best interest.

In the governor's office, we're letting employees have up to 30 minutes a day, during work, for exercise and activity. We started it in our office [after] I realized that by letting state employees who smoked take smoke breaks, we were rewarding the wrong people.

Your book is really about inspiring people to find the motivation not just to diet but to adopt a healthier lifestyle permanently. But if individual motivation is the crucial thing, in your view, how can the government help?

The oath of Hippocrates was: "First, do no harm." The first thing the government can do is just not do any harm. And frankly, it does a lot of harm when it wants to start being the sugar sheriff or the grease police; if it moves this from a discussion on healthy behaviors to a point of taking over people's lives, it's going to lose the battle, because the American people will rebel.

If you start saying, we're going to tax cheeseburgers more than we tax lettuce, and we're going to charge every overweight person more to ride on the roadways because [they're] busting up the asphalt with [their] big fat rear, it's going to absolutely be a disaster. I know I was never motivated to change because someone tried to force me. It was the least effective thing when people would come up to me and tell me how fat I was and how hideous I looked. It may have made me angry, it may have made me wish I wasn't, it may have made me want to find out what airline seat they were sitting in and go sit beside them -- but it did not motivate me to change.

But public attitudes about tobacco have changed, and hasn't that partly been through higher taxes and all the government regulations about where you can and cannot smoke, as well as the lawsuits against the tobacco companies?

I think that it has to a degree. But there are two fundamental things that are different. No. 1, government has acted more as a response to public sentiment than it has in order to create public sentiment. Government acted only when enough people said: "We're sick of this. We want clean air. Enforce clean air."

And the second thing is that there are some unique things about tobacco that are not common to food. Tobacco is the only product that we legally sell that, when used according to the label instructions, is absolutely guaranteed to kill you. Whereas food is necessary to sustain life.

People have to eat; nobody has to smoke. And then the question is: How much is too much and who gets to make the decision? I think the city of Detroit talked about putting a special tax on fast food. But what's fast food? A few minutes ago I went down to the little market a few blocks from my hotel, picked up a spinach salad and brought it back to the room to eat it. Was that fast food? It was healthy. Should I pay a tax on it just because I got it at the delicatessen as opposed to fixing it at home? That's going to be a tough one. I don't think that they'll ever be able define it and make that work. Plus, I can go to McDonald's and get a very healthy meal; sometimes I get a salad there, and it's very good. I don't have to get three Quarter Pounders.

What kind of pressure do you think government should put on business to serve healthier foods? You talked about trying to encourage them to, but you also said that the food industry is just responding to the market.

Interestingly enough, I've had several visits with major food company CEOs in the last several months, and they're already gearing up in both their manufacturing and their marketing. Food companies know that the growth of the market is in healthier foods.

So you think that the public's attitude is shifting, and that's bringing the food companies along?

I do. More and more people like me are saying: "I'm looking at that label, and if it's got partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, back on the shelf it goes."

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