No kidding

From the DUH pile.  Up next, college students still drink beer and Baywatch was never watched for its plot lines.

NY Governor abuses science

In arguing for a soda tax, the NY Governor, David Patterson, borrowed a page from defendents of alternative medicine, by saying:

"A study by Harvard researchers found that each additional 12-ounce soft drink consumed per day increases the risk of a child becoming obese by 60 percent.  For adults, the association is similar."

The study the NY Governor cites is by Dr. David Ludwig, which by his own admission has limited statistical power.  Larger, better studies have come out documenting that snack foods and soda are not linked to obesity.  Rather, it appears that physical inactivity is to blame.  This is straight out of the alternative medicine playbook: find some small study which validates your claim and then ignore any larger, blinded studies that disprove your claim.

To quote Homer Simpson, "Oh, people can come up with anything.  14% of people know that."

MIR Student Researcher in Press!

Congrats, Anita on the excellent CrunchGear writeup!  It appears that MIR research is starting to pick up steam in terms of popular opinion.  Don't forget to read the comments of the article.  Now, get back to work!  The people want more!