TIMOTHY NOAH NOVEMBER 15, 2011
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In January the Agriculture department had this crazy idea to improve nutritional standards for federally-subsidized school lunches. It proposed limiting "starchy vegetables" (read: fries) to one cup per week "to encourage students to try new vegetables." It also proposed changing the way schools met daily requirements for fruits and vegetables by limiting--not eliminating, merely limiting--the use of tomato paste (read: pizza) to meet that requirement. Now a House-Senate conference committee has nixed both changes, ignoring, among others, 100 retired generals and admirals who said that disallowing the rule would undermine military readiness because the leading medical disqualifier for recruitment is obesity. The American Frozen Food Institute applauds Congress for "providing school nutritionists with the ability to serve healthy foods kids enjoy while avoiding burdening schools with massive new costs."
This is all quite reminiscent of the famous 1981 controversy in which the Agriculture department, faced with cuts to the school lunch program, proposed crediting ketchup as a vegetable. Agriculture secretary John Block didn't help his case when he clarified that "ketchup in combination with other things was classified as a vegetable." Asked what other things he had in mind, Block said, "French fries or hamburgers." A public furor quickly persuaded the Reagan administration to back down. Thirty years later, Congress no longer even pretends to care more about the welfare of children than about the processed-food lobby.
Nor is the federal government any better today than it was back in 1981 at telling the difference between fruits and vegetables. Tomatoes aren't vegetables. They're fruit, stupid.
9 comments
Wow.
- liberalref
November 15, 2011 at 3:14pm
I don't think it's fair to accuse the Republicans as being against vegetables. As far as I can tell, they might nominate one.
- Nusholtz
November 15, 2011 at 4:17pm
Nush...don't insult vegetables that way! They actually provide sustenance and nutrition. Republicans are like fast food - salty, fatty, temporarily satiating until the empty calories hit your backside and you're suffering from hypertension, obesity and type 2 diabetes.
- singlspeed
November 15, 2011 at 4:55pm
Fat children who run up medical costs and have worse health isn't a major issue. They die sooner so we don't have to pay their Medicare nor Social Security. Protecting over-fed execs, whether banksters or running over-processed food companies, is the important thing government has to do. Didn't you people get it?? (okay, snark off) I have two children in public school. I've seen the lunch menus and to remedy it my wife packs their lunches 3-4 times a week. I gain weight just looking at what they serve.
- tmmats
November 15, 2011 at 5:08pm
Hilarious, nush. You are on again.
- liberalref
November 15, 2011 at 6:11pm
He said if it wasn't for the Lunchlady The kids wouldn't eatcha You should be shakin' her hand And sayin' please to meet ya And by the way the Tomato as a Vegetable is settled law, unamious decision from the Supreme Court, Nix v. Hedden, in 1893. Is Mr. Noah claiming the US Supreme Court is wrong?
- CRS9TNR
November 15, 2011 at 7:51pm
Hey, CRS9TNR, you beat me to that case! Well played.
- andyman345
November 15, 2011 at 9:08pm
Thank you Libref.
- Nusholtz
November 16, 2011 at 7:28am
Looks like the supreme court can't get anything right. Tomatos are a fruit.
Well Blackton, so much for your theory of keeping the poor people healthy so they can harvest their organs. Looks more like they want to keep the poor kids fat and unhealthy to further reduce their chances of living long enough to actually compete for a job that belongs to their child by right of birth.
- GSpinks
November 16, 2011 at 10:56am