The photo of a crumpled can of Diet Coke told the story in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, 30-1-2000, Coke's hometown paper. Fitting, poetic, just, but tragic for the company once rated "The Most Admired Business in the World". Today Coke wouldn't even make the list. Sales are down, profits collapsing, and 6,000 employees soon will be gone. (To make room for 6,000 defence attorneys?) The tragedy is stupendously larger than 6,000 jobs; it affects hundreds of millions of unwarned, innocent, afflicted consumers across the broad face of planet earth.

* This crisis can't be solved by belt tightening, greater efficiency, more advertising, etc. It's so bad Coke can't say the word; to pronounce it will bring instant cataclysm. That word is aspartame, and their only recourse is denial, denial, denial, though every ad and commercial builds higher the scaffold upon which Coke shall surely hang.

* Reality is in that twisted Diet coke can. It's poison. It's killing the unborn, raining tumours and seizures on the population, destroying children, incapacitating workers, mimicking MS, erasing memory and blinding.

* Inexorably Diet Coke visits a plague of 92 symptoms listed by our FDA on a secret report they'll never show which names diet soda as the first source of aspartame disease. And yes, Death was one of the 92.

* Diet Coke is poison. And it's addictive, some victims drink several litres a day and keep it on their nightstands. If Coke changes the formula to remove aspartame the world will heal and the surge of hatred and vengeance by the disabled and bereaved shall certainly destroy Coca Cola.

* The poison in Diet Coke is aspartame. As a member of the National Soft Drink Association, Coke opposed FDA approval of aspartame for beverages. Their objections, running to several pages published in the Congressional Record of 5/7/85, said aspartame is uniquely and inherently unstable and breaks down in the can. It decomposes into formaldehyde, methyl alcohol, formic acid, diketopiperazine and other toxins. In a study on 7 monkeys 5 had grand mal seizures and one died, a casualty rate of 86%.

* Coke knew; and knowing, broke their good faith contract with customers, a breach exhibited by the recent plot to program vending machines to raise the price with the temperature. Dissatisfied with selling flavoured sugar water plus phosphoric acid, they switched to pushing an addictive formula called "Diet". Addictive substances multiply markets, so Diet Coke soared off the sales charts, spreading obesity in its flight. We're fatter because aspartame suppresses seratonin and makes us crave carbohydrates. Our brain is programmed to expect calories and carbohydrates when experiencing a sweet taste. When it doesn't get them, it triggers HUNGER.

* So why is aspartame/NutraSweet/Equal/Diet Coke/Diet Pepsi/etc on the market and in thousands of foods? Can you say CORRUPTION? One FDA Commissioner and one acting Commissioner have changed sides to work in the NutraSweet industry, plus 6 underlings and two federal attorneys assigned to prosecute NutraSweet for submitting fraudulent tests to get it approved. "It's like a script for Abbott & Costello." lamented an honest FDA scientist writing to Senator Metzenbaum. It works like this: "Approve our poison, and when you stop being a bureaucrat we'll make you a plutocrat! After its icensed we'll pay off the American Dietetics, the American Diabetes Association, the AMA and anyone we need who's for sale."

* The jig's up! Worldwide consumer action has exposed aspartame, and millions have kicked the habit. Coke's profits are down 37% and for a year Monsanto's been trying to sell The NutraSweet Company. Finally they sold NSC, producer of the phenylalanine in NutraSweet for $125 million. Now Monsanto faces a $71 million lawsuit for exaggerating profits. Monsanto stock is in the toilet, but they may have found a buyer in the Swiss firm Pharmacia-Upjohn. P.U. for short! The deal won't finalize for a year. The plans are to ditch the Monsanto name, as its stench is unendurable. CEO Bob Shapiro may soon be history, like Doug Ivester of Coke who just resigned.

Will the last one out please turn out the lights! The next time you reach for a diet drink (or some Sweet & Low), please consider some fruit juice. You will be much healthier.

Have a great diet-soda-free day.

(The original source for this story is not known. -ed)

It's only anecdotal, but an old friend of mine used to get a bad stiffness in his joints. Sometimes his legs would lock. Doctor told him to stop drinking diet coke. He never had any problems after that. He was doing 6 cans a day at the time.

See there, not one mention made of beer. Not even light beer!

Ok, this post has me kinda freaked out; I drink Diet Coke, however, and I must say, if you drink liters per day and even have the shit on your nightstand, you are seriously not healthy....

I'm convinced everything that magically makes calories dissapear is inevitably going to be found to be slightly more safe than ajax abrasive bathroom cleaner to ingest. there have definetly been people in the medical community saying it's not so good for rats since the early 90's.

secretaries generally subsist on diet coke and chicken caesar salads-they'll start dropping like flies in 30 years. just the fact that fat chicks drink it for years without improving things should tip people off this shit isn't kosher and they should kill themselves with chemicals that do cool things with dopamine instead.