GoutPatrol said:
Because the average American eats 33% more calories then compared to the 1950s, and over the course of the century our total caloric intake coming from sugars switched to 33% (already much higher than the 15% found at the turn of the 19th century) to 50%.
Sugar is bad, especially at those levels. But saying that we should be aiming for a 50-40-10 protein/fat/carb diet is a little extreme.
People don't have to eat low carb, they just have to eat low refined carbohydrate. I don't think the government should tell the general population what percentage of macronutrients people should consume. But they should advise limiting refined carbohydrates because we know that with most people they lead to health problems.
My initial post in this thread was about how the USDA food pyramid, and the government consistently pushing for this garbage:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USDA_Food_Pyramid.gif
See the base of that pyramid? To the human body, that's all
sugar.
EDIT: It's all blood glucose. Sugar/sucrose is actually worse than these carbs because the synergy between excess fructose fucking with the liver and excess glucose going to the liver to be converted to triglycerides is a pretty nasty combination.
Potatoes actually elevate blood sugar faster than sugar which is kind of weird. This has significantly contributed to obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and possibly cancer and dementia depending on how that scientific data turns out (shaky right now, but some data suggests that it contributes).
Constant intake of those base foods we're told to eat chronically elevates insulin, and with many people causes problems long term.
It's probably difficult to consume more than 40% unrefined carbohydrate. When you replace bread with vegetables and fruit people tend to eat far few calories. People don't want to eat 10 cups of broccoli to match the carbohydrate intake, so for people that can tolerate it, they can add some rice and low GI refined carbs. For people that cannot, they should increase dietary protein and dietary fat.
Now you say that people are fatter because they ate more calories. Yes, that's true. But the reason why most of them overate is because their insulin chronically elevated. It's the reason why you can consume 2000 calories of buttered popcorn, but not 2000 calories of a steak with the same effort.
