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Michelle Obama Unveils Childhood Obesity Initiative

First lady Michelle Obama rolled out "Let's Move," her national initiative to combat childhood obesity, at the White House yesterday. It has four pillars: more nutrition information, increased physical activity, easier access to healthy foods and, ultimately, personal responsibility. It appears to have widespread bipartisan support, Robin Givhan reports, and little wonder why.

"It's not about being 100% perfect, 100% of the time," Obama said. "Lord knows I'm not. There's a place for cookies and ice cream, burgers and fries -- that's part of the fun of childhood."

The program challenges the Food and Drug Administration to work with food and beverage producers to make ingredients more prominent on packaging, as well as make calorie counts per serving easier to understand. The vast list of proposals also includes a new foundation called the Partnership for a Healthier America. The administration is also pushing for the reauthorization of the Child Nutrition Act and is requesting $10 billion over 10 years to improve school meals.

Some nutrition advocates were disappointed, of course. The Center for Science in the Public Interest wants Obama to use her bully pulpit to push for removing all junk food from schools and to ban advertisements for junk food from children's programming, Givhan reports.

Yale University's Jennifer Harris, who is director of marketing initiatives at the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, tells Mar ketplace's Sarah Gardner that there's one problem with marketing food that's good for you. "What has been found several times is that if you describe the food as healthy, then people think it doesn't taste as good as foods that are not described as healthy," she says

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