Stomach Tuning

Jacob Sullum | November 21, 2002

The currently fashionable alternative to suing McDonald's because you're fat is to go the Al Roker/Jerry Nadler route and get your stomach surgically reduced. Aside from the risk of the operation itself (one in 200 patients die), there is the ongoing inconvenience of having a stomach so small that you feel "terribly uncomfortable" if you eat more than a few ounces at a time. The New York Times reports that Nadler (who used to be my congressman) maxed out at 338 pounds, a huge amount for someone only five feet, four inches tall. He says he "tried every conceivable way to lose weight," including exercise, various diet plans, and pills. Yet it takes a tremendous effort to maintain that kind of weight. For lunch, the Times reports, Nadler "would typically consume a salad, a bowl of onion soup, a 14-ounce rib-eye steak with french fries, vegetables, bread and butter and a dessert—all washed down with diet Coke. He also snacked constantly—on Oreo cookies, Fig Newtons, frankfurters and even tuna salad and chicken salad sandwiches." Apparently, "every conceivable way to lose weight" does not include abandoning a lifestyle of continuous eating.