Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for June 27, 2010

Simply a product of healthy eating, with vegetables such as ketchup, and a daily regimen of video games.

Shouldn’t take to long in basic training to turn him around to a healthier way of life, Army Strong can do it…

Hooah. Future Soldier program’ll have him within weight in a few months, then get him to OSUT….

Orion

Even the Marines couldn’t fix that one. Recruiting duty is some of the most thankless, micromanaged, pressure jobs there are where nobody’s shooting at you.

I was caught up in it for about 9 months before I managed to escape.

Still, it’s a very necessary job. Just not for me.

“Army Strong?” Looked it up. It’s the latest recruiting slogan.

“Army of One” is so 2005.

There’s strong, and then there’s Army Strong. Not to be confused with Amy Strong, who’s a set decorator for Entourage and Bones.

They can’t take the kid because he’s got joint problems, a heart condition and diabetes …..

Yeah, but look at his score on controlling the Remotely Operated Vehicles.

McDonald’s is a greater threat to America’s security than the terrorists.

The Army has been using on-line video games as a recruiting tool for the last few years. Some of them have drawn criticism for being rather gratuitous shoot-em-ups just barely this side of something like “Halo”; bleeding-hearts worry that the Army will end up getting a lot of blood-thirsty killers as recruits. Now we see the real problem: when you recruit people using a video game, you get recruits who like to play video games… oops…

Most people are failing the military physicals because people are just plain TOOOOO FFFAAAATTT!. At least I have a disability; the one person that day who failed the physical, everyone else was taken. Thought I could be a medic. NOPE, NO WAY, son.

Apartheid Rules!!! Makes things so much easier. Us and Them. What could be simpler?

GT’d probably do a pretty good job on Apartheid, but methinks he’s got more than enough material to work with focusing on the problems here in the good-ole-USA….. if only our gummint could focus that well…..

Jelly Donut, SIR!

Horasse

Apartied’s NOT an easy target?

America land of the Fat, Home of the uneducated. My Granddad was in the Navy during WWII, last week He said that America has become alot fatter and Dumber in in the last 30 years.

As a Vet It breaks my heart that ppl lap up fox news, glen beck and what ever propaganda roger Ailes feeds them.

Army of obese

Blame fatter on the parents. Blame dumber on the parents and the school system.

..a family member of mine has M.S.,but can never get an electric wheel chair at Wal-Mart because they are always being used by the overly FAT people.My question is:are these overweight human beings..real people with real feelings,addicts?Are they sick in some way-either mentally or phyisically?Are they just super lazy?A by-product of or throw-a-way society?..or..possibly..or just possibly..just folks living an alterative lifestyle?

I do know that this seemes to be a modern experinece.Growing up in the seventies,I only saw one extremely overweight person,and he had a glandular problem..could todays heavy weights be caused not only by the scapegoat McDonalds but also by additives to our foods all along the food chain?

I am not so politically correct as to think that today”s comic is not funny,(in fact,I go the other way.I believe like the great late Mad cartoonist,Don Martin.He once was quoted as saying that he didn’t care whom he offended as long as his gag was funny.’)it is funny.

Ummm..where was I now..???

If he can make him get rid of his BF, this guy will be a tank. Very good in Infantry and artillery. I worked in both and did happen to meet some outstanding tanks, but they were soon flagged.

Corporate Food in the U.S. is responsible for the obesity epidemic. They have formulated combinations of sugar, fat and salt that are literally addictive.

Most Americans can’t say “no”. And there’s ‘pushers’ on every corner.

Good luck trying to fix this one, Obama.

Willy ‘n Ethel today:

If you want to be all you can be… You have to eat all you can eat!

UH-OH! Way too much to deal with that overweight guy to join the Army Recruitment. sighhhh!

Recruitment DVDs in Happy Meals. I’m lovin’ it.

Then there are the kids who go whole hog for the fat rapper/hip-hop look, along with the music.

Average American male in 1960 weighed 163 pounds. Today the average is 196 pounds. Average height is still 5’8”.

In 1966 when I went in the Army at 117 pounds they had to put weight ON me to bring me up to the official “minimum weight” for my height (5’11”). At that time there were many considered “under weight”- doesn’t seem a problem today.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/23/trans-fat-food-industry-health-costs

In high school, I had recruiters from three different services pestering me. (The military is a great thing, and I have great respect for those who choose to serve, but if I wanted to join, I’d go to them)

The funniest one was the Marine. My height and weight didn’t come up until the second phone call. I am overweight and probably obese. His response: “… um, uh… so what are you doing about that?” We spent five minutes talking about exercise, and then he never called again.

I think our obesity problem is a matter of laziness. We are too lazy to cook our own food, too lazy to walk a half mile to where we are going and in a lot of cases, too lazy to get out of bed. Of course the portions you get in restaurants now do not help.

Diabetic nation…you betcha…sad but true! Easy target maybe but it is what it is.

cfimeiatpap’s link suggests that the food corporations profit by culling out and killing off fat people. The corporations pander to their ignorance and laziness by praising these defects as “individual choice.”

In the long run, the self-interested corporations are only doing nature’s work. Except in the case of children, why should the government interfere, any more than it did in the case of smokers? Every adult individual has a right to suicide

To adapt my favorite from the self-mocking Phillip Morris ads, “95% of those who eat fast foods will die.”

Ps. Those of you who are moved to respond to “horce manure” should look up that tag first. He’s been flagged as a fraud.

“95% of those who eat fast foods will die.” Does that mean the other 5% will live forever?

I honestly wish people would stop equating playing video games with being fat. It’s SOOO untrue. People that are fat would be fat if they played video games or not.

Eat healthy and get regular exercise. Using this idea, I actually weight LESS than I did when I was in the military! And I play video games all the time. Not so much that it prevents me from eating, because I love food, but I eat healthy. I don’t eat fast food or order out. BMI of 23, if you even know what that is.

Most people I associate with in any way, don’t play video games at all. And guess what? A great majority of them ARE overweight! Being a couch potato is still a problem.

I guess the big question now is not whether today’s youth can handle the challenge of the army, but whether the army can handle the challenge of today’s youth…

Jason Nabors. Have to remember that name; see if he turns up in future story lines.

A standard BMI (body mass index) calculator at http://www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/ shows if you are considered to be:

Underweight less than 18.5 Normal weight 18.5-24.9 Overweight 25-29.9 Obesity BMI of 30 or greater

Today my BMI is 23.4. (Two and a half years ago it was 35.4.)

I checked your calculator, jtp - I think I’ll lie and tell you my BMI was 20…

Joe-Allen said, “I don’t think that Mrs. Michelle Obama would want to be involved in recruitment for the US Army.”

Sgt. Truman may think of “the First Lady” in connection with Michelle Obama’s support for military families, but GT’s cartoon logic lets us connect panel #2 with panel #8.

Even though his “Army Strong” character mistakes the problem, GT makes him unconsciously anticipate Michelle’s campaign against childhood obesity. In the last panel, he sees his mistake–and realizes that what concerns “the First Lady” also affects recruiters like him.

http://www.scripps.edu/news/press/20100329.html

my point exactly cfimeiatpap.

Exercise alone won’t do it. You’ve got to give up Corporate Food. Make your meals from scratch. Lay off the white starch and white sugar completely.

You’ll go through ‘withdrawl’, then you’ll lose weight and feel great.

That’s true. What you eat and how much is most important.

And Ushindi, we’re all proud of you for telling us the truth….about lying that is.

Earlier corzak brought up America’s corporate eating habits and said it was part of the cause for our general obesity problem. I agree. We eat out way too often and when we do we eat way to much and there is far too little exercise in between. Right on!

But I have to disagree with his comment on wishing Obama luck solving this issue. I’ve looked through the Constitution and can’t find anywhere it saying it’s the Presidents responsibility for over weight citizens.

We need to get as far away as possible from having the government get involved in solving our problems. The whole Nanny Government thing is a bad idea. Don’t get me wrong, I like Obama, I think he’s the first president we’ve had in years who isn’t afraid to look like a leader, rather than a ‘manager’. This is one of the many things the government should stay awat from. However once they’re in the Army….slim ‘em down!

Don’t put too much faith in jtpozenel’s link to the BMI calculator. It fails to take in to account too many factors to be accurate. Gender, for one. Age. Measurements at specific points on the body. Neck and waist for men. Neck, waist and wrist for women.

@justice22, speak for yourself. There are many reasons why people can’t do things, reasons which other people usually don’t understand. So they hit on laziness as they explanation. I think they’re too lazy to take the time to understand the situation!

To talk about staying at (and first going to, if necessary) a good weight, you begin with the not-well-enough-known saying, “Eat less and exercise more.”.

Then you have to learn about nutrition, what and how to cook, and how to order in restaurants. These are skills.

Finally, there’s the problem of time. People who work full-time are usually too tired at the end of the day to think about cooking properly. I’ve known people who found a neat solution to this problem: on the weekend before, they (1) planned their week in advance, and then (2) spent time cooking the meals and freezing them. So when they came home at the end of the day, it was just a matter of heat and eat (microwave, probably).

@Dypak, it isn’t that we eat way too often - it depends on how much when we eat.

The advice I’ve heard is to eat six small meals a day rather than three big ones. This is called “grazing”. It keeps the sugar in your system more stable and even, with no big swings up and down. Of course you still need to avoid white flour, white sugar, white rice, and white potatoes. So you don’t get that horrible starving feeling.

Yes if you have a fat neck and a fat waist you probably will have a higher BMI. I believe that’s the “I’m big boned” syndrome.

According to the BMI calculator, if you were 5’10” for example, you could weigh between 129 and 173 to fall into the normal weight category. Women would probably fall in the lower part of that range and men at the upper.

Remember also that as you age your muscles decrease in size. So if you think that extra weight is all muscle, you’re just kidding yourself.

It may be a “cheap shot” material-wise. .. but thinking cartoonishly - what isn’t? Still danged funny – and that is the point of cartoons - political or otherwise!..

If you’ve tried to buy fruit or veggies at the Farmer’s Market lately, you would know why everybody is so fat. It costs a lot more to buy healthy foods and cook at home than it costs to eat at Mickey D’s.

Corn (and high fructose corn syrup) is govt subsidized, cherries ($6.00/quart) & asparagus ($4.00/bunch) are not.

Hershey bar, anyone? Yummy!

The thing that gets me is the last panel ‘What? What?’ - the guy does’t seem aware his gut is a problem.

Oh yeah… how does that statistic read? Something like 75% are unfit…

@ Steben - You’re right, recruiting goals are being met. But you’re mistaken if you think it’s an easy, low stress job. Doonesbury is right on target here. In order to make those goals recruiters often have to accept marginal prospects and then hope and pray that the Drill Sergeants are able to sort them out and shape them up.

And don’t blame the Soldiers serving as recruiters for accepting low quality recruits in order to make their quotas. US Army Recruiting Command is on Fort Knox, not far from where I live. The officers and DA Civilians who staff that place are the ones who make the final decisions on who gets in and who does not. The recruiters are more like salesmen who submit the paperwork requesting approval. If it were up to the recruiters no one unfit would ever get that chance to wear a uniform.