The city of New York requires chain restaurants to post calorie counts by every item on their menus. Recently, it was big news when 5 restaurants were cited for not following this protocol.

This is one issue that galvanizes people to no end.

On the one hand, Clark applauds restaurateurs for having the marketing savvy to spotlight healthy choices on their menu. But if someone orders fettucini alfredo, isn't it self-evident that the meal will be a heart attack on a plate, as some cardiologists might say?

Meanwhile, there's a disturbing connection between education level and weight issues. The less education you have, the heavier you'll tend to be. Yet if you go back to the Renaissance, the wealthy (and educated) were the ones who grew fat, as we can see from portraits of the period. The poor, meanwhile, had to deal with the possibility of starvation and famine.

Today, access to food is not an issue; it's the quality of what we eat that's become the concern. Go in to any convenience store in a lower-income area and you'll see a variety of unhealthy food choices available.

This, unfortunately, is not a problem that can be addressed by putting calorie counts on menus.