WILLIAMSBURG, Va. -- With the nation's obesity epidemic rapidly ballooning, Michael Moore does not make a creditable health care reform spokesman for America's youth, its boomers or, for that matter, its senior citizens.

Whatever your political feelings about Moore's call for nationalizing the U.S. medical system along Canadian lines, it's evident that he is embarrassingly overweight -- strikingly above the healthy weight ranges recommended by the insurance companies he wants to put out of business.

Reportedly, the longtime liberal activist from Flint, Mich., has hired a personal fitness trainer to whip him into shape. As yet, alas, the results remain undetectable to the human eye.

This is not to denigrate Moore on the basis of his figure, but merely to observe that costly health care reforms -- like so many government-based panaceas for real or imagined ills -- ought to start at home.

There are many other public figures beside Moore who hog the media spotlight carping about the obesity crisis and looking as if they were ready to audition for a starring role in Supersize Me II.

Indeed, the federal government produces hypocrites almost as quickly as it spends our tax monies and increases the size of the national debt.

Former Vice President Al Gore is so overweight that many media pundits say the surest sign that he intends to enter the 2008 presidential race will come when he checks into a weight-reduction spa for a prolonged stay.

Overweight people have a higher personal carbon footprint than the slim and trim, but Gore's globe-trotting lifestyle also is depositing one of the biggest carbon footprints in recorded history.

The portly Tennessean has left wide swaths of vapor trails as he's jetted from one corner of the Earth to another -- lecturing millions to give up their large cars and SUVs in order to reduce the impact of global warming. All this while his sprawling mansion in a posh suburb of Nashville sucks up enough electricity to run 20 average American households for a year.

Republicans are just as bad. Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, once a school wrestling coach in Illinois, could barely waddle to the podium in the House chamber during his last days as speaker.

Another Republican, William Howard Taft -- better known as "Big Bill" -- holds the dubious distinction of being the largest man ever to serve both as president and chief justice of the Supreme Court.   In the latter role, he reportedly tilted the scales of justice at about 340 pounds.

Because seniors follow politics so avidly, they often seem to be more aware of hypocrisy from high-ranking public officials than their fellow Americans. Yet unlike many Americans, who often are forced to eat on the run because of their high-stress jobs, seniors have the leisure time to eat right and exercise often. And increasingly, they are beginning to do just that.

More and more seniors are opting out of pancakes and sausages and onto elliptical training machines and into saunas -- trading Cracker Barrel breakfasts for high-protein shakes.

Seniors' exercise options no longer are relegated to low-pulse-rate activities like horseshoes, miniature golf or shuffleboard. Most retirement areas now contain miles of running and biking trails, tennis courts and softball diamonds. Leading home builders design their communities around state-of-art fitness facilities featuring dozens of hi-tech cardio and weight-training machines. Many hold weekly classes on combining exercise and good nutrition.

It would be nice to see more of America's leaders follow the seniors' lead and get off their own duffs and shed their extraneous pounds. All voters -- not just seniors -- should encourage them, in person or at the polls, to get rid of their "do as I say, not as I weigh" attitude.

Scott Stanley is an independent journalist based in Williamsburg, Va., and the former political editor of Conservative Digest, American Opinion and American Press International, among others.   Readers may write him at 6 Newman Court, Williamsburg, Va. 23188.

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