Opinion: Bill Clinton and a big fat irony

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They’re not going to admit it, but a lot of fat people probably smiled at some of the news coverage of Bill Clinton’s cardiac emergency last week. Commentator after commentator pointed out that the 42nd president, a former fat kid who once compared himself to Baby Huey, had cleaned up his act. He was eating sensibly and working out, not to mention running around Haiti. And still he had to have stents implanted to unblock a clogged artery!

I had to suppress a bit of that reaction myself, having complained in a column a few years ago that Clinton seemed to have internalized the mockery he endured as a fat kid. Also, former fatties, like reformed alcoholics, can be a pain.

Of course, the fact that Clinton needed heart surgery no more proves that obesity is harmless than the snowfall in Washington proved that global warming is a myth. But there is a serious point to be made about the dangers of the national fixation on the childhood obesity ‘epidemic.’

In my earlier piece, I wrote: ‘Yes, childhood obesity is correlated with health problems, including high blood pressure and diabetes. But the psychological pain experienced by overweight kids is arguably just as harmful, and the national campaign against childhood obesity runs the risk of legitimizing that pain, without any guarantee that fat kids will be scared skinny. When Clinton and I were boys, fat-bashers on the playground had no excuse. Today they can claim to be striking a blow for the national welfare.’ (It isn’t just politicians who pick on fat kids. So do the media.)

The same point has been made by Paul Campos, the contrarian author of ‘The Obesity Myth,’ who has lashed out at First Lady Michelle Obama, Clinton’s successor as national obesity scold. I’m not persuaded by Campos’ pooh-poohing of the obesity problem (‘American children, like American adults, are both bigger and healthier now than they were a generation ago’). But he’s surely correct when he writes: ‘I don’t believe Michelle Obama wants to stigmatize fat kids, but a campaign dedicated to eliminating them is guaranteed to do so in a profound way.’

As for Clinton: Get well, Mr. President. But Bubba, don’t preach.

-- Michael McGough