From David B. Allison, director of the Nutrition Obesity Research Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, in an article published today in the New England Journal of Medicine:
False and scientifically unsupported beliefs about obesity are pervasive in both scientific literature and the popular press.
Roger that. More here. In a nutshell: pretty much nothing works. The odds are strong that you will never lose weight other than temporarily. I am the poster child for the truth of this.