The Kellogg company has apparently dropped Michael Phelps from its roster of endorsees, because according to Susanne Norwitz, a spokeswoman for the company, "Michael's most recent behavior is not consistent with the image of Kellogg."

Kellogg, the maker of Pop Tarts, Frosted Flakes and a hundred other high-fructose corn-syrup snacks and pseudo foods marketed to children amidst an epidemic of childhood obesity, diabetes and out of control national health care costs, apparently draws the line with one of its athletes taking a bong hit at a party.

Presumably Kellogg is doing this because kids, who look up to Phelps, might be influenced to smoke marijuana if the company were to retain him. But setting aside the relative cost, suffering and death attributable to obesity and diabetes vs. marijuana abuse (I would bet the ratio is a million to 1), there's also the issue that Phelps, by smoking marijuana, is only implicitly condoning its use for 23-year olds, rather than intentionally marketing and promoting it to children, as he does Kellogg products.

So what Phelps really ought to do is apologize to his fans for ever taking money from Kellogg. He has plenty of money, so why is he endorsing a line of junk food products? As a taxpayer that's going to have to kick in for huge deficits eventually, I'd like to see health care costs go down, and this jerk is making money selling junk food to kids. I couldn't care less how much marijuana he smokes on his own time.