Boatman,

Do yourself a favor, and at least get the $10 DVD. I bought the book also because it has recipes.

You will be surprised. It isn't only fat from Meat, but milk, eggs, cheese, and vegetable oils, including coconut, and Olive oils as well.

I am trying to get off those, as I have been a vegetarian since the 60's.

I also came across some info talking about how vegetarian/vegan diets can potentially lead to cancer, diabetes, and heart disease as well. It was because of the amount of fiber and the high carbs. The papers mentioned how the high carbs (sugar) can promote bacterial/yeast overgrowth and the overgrowth then further feeds on the fibers. This leads to bowel problems and eventually disease and cancers. Diabetes results from the high blood sugar causing high insulin levels and eventually insulin resistance and pancreatic failure. High carbs raise triglycerides and lower HDL cholesterol, leading to heart disease. After learning of this, it makes me wonder who is really behind all the promotion of vegetarian diets.

You didn't offer any link to this info, much of which is in direct conflict to what I posted. I would like to read this info, can you provide a link? Thanks.

Every vegan I know of in "real life" gets B12 shots to avoid a deficit. What happens if someone's illness causes or is caused by a deficit in these nutrients, and they take up a vegan diet?

http://url2it.com/bcos

Insight I think you have the right idea.

Leafy greens are great but just because they are a good thing doesn't mean you should eat them at the exclusion of everything else.

If you haven't read the works of Dr Bass, you might find them interesting.

In Search of the Ultimate Vegetarian Diet
http://drbass.com/mice.html

Vegan rats die early and have low energy
http://drbass.com/veganrats.html

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So you were a fruitarian, and a raw vegan, and finally came to the conclusion that those diets will cause deficiencies?

Actually this is quite a common route. Many vegans (who are not cheating) have through their own experiences come to the same conclusion.

Here is an typical example from Arnold DeVries book "The Elixir of Life":

.......
MAHATMA GANDHI
"The late Mahatma Gandhi devoted much of his life to the advocacy of strict vegetarian diet, and for years he experimented on his own body to find a suitable selection of plant foods on which to sustain health.

But all attempts were failures. In 1929, Gandhi and 22 companions went on a diet consisting of a limited selection of uncooked plant foods. Whereas the diet worked out well for a time and led to marked improvement in consumptive cases, it failed to prove adequate on a long-range sustenance basis. One by one Gandhi's companions were forced to depart from the diet, and Gandhi himself had to add goat milk to his fare in order to regain health.

"For my companions I have been a blind guide leading the blind," declared Gandhi after the experiment was over. Gandhi still felt, however, that "the hidden possibilities of the innumerable seeds, leaves and fruits" of the earth could be explored and found to provide mankind with adequate nourishment. He never stopped trying to experiment along these lines, but he always had to turn back to goat milk to regain his strength.

In the end he had to acknowledge the necessity for animal food. In 1946 he declared: "The crores of India today get neither milk nor ghee nor butter, nor even buttermilk. No wonder that mortality figures are on the increase and there is a lack of energy in the people. It would appear as if man is really unable to sustain life without either meat or milk and milk products. Anyone who deceives people in this regard or countenances the fraud is an enemy of India."

These are strong words from a man who devoted most of his life to the search for a satisfactory vegetarian diet. But Gandhi's experience is not unique in the field of nutrition. Many others have also gone through the experience of believing that man could thrive exclusively upon a limited selection of uncooked plant foods, only to find in the end that animal products were necessary for sustenance.
...."

Note that Arnold DeVries himself started out as a convinced fruitarian, but in the end became a strong supporter of Weston-Price theories.