For years, the USDA has spent millions of taxpayer dollars promoting a high-carb, low-fat diet as the key to healthy weight loss. In fact, the old "Food Guide Pyramid" used to recommend eating between 6-11 servings of "breads, cereals, rice, and pasta" per day.

The old Pyramid's replacement, MyPyramid.gov, is slightly less dictatorial, admitting that "one size doesn't fit all" when it comes to a government-recommended diet.

I have a few pounds to lose, so I plugged my own stats (28 years old; 5' 11"; female) into the site to find out what the government says I should be eating every day. Not surprisingly, the USDA thinks that a carb-heavy diet is best.

But a new Journal of the American Medical Association study finds that, when comparing a number of popular diets, women assigned to follow the low-carb Atkins diet lost the most weight.

The authors conclude that, "While questions remain about long-term effects and mechanisms, a low-carbohydrate, high-protein, high-fat diet may be considered a feasible alternative recommendation for weight loss."

Americans spend $35 billion dollars per year on weight-loss products -- so why is the government still in the "business" of health promotion? The lesson here to dieters: it might be better to listen to Richard Simmons than Uncle Sam.