Government & Food

As a libertarian, I’m all about minimizing government involvement in private lives.  I accept that government exists for a reason, and that there are valid governmental responsibilities as spelled out in the constitution, & maybe even some above & beyond what is in the constitution (although I recognize that such power is dangerous, so I am forever skeptical of the government assuming those responsibilities).

One area I don’t feel government has any business in, is the market.  Sure, we need some regulations, to prevent fraud & other crime, and (theoretically) keep the playing field level, even if the players are not evenly matched.  One thing the government should not be in the business of is market subsidies, especially agriculture.  I could understand using government resources to assist poor farmers in getting educated in the latest ag & business practices, or to assist in capital outlays, or to provide assistance during natural disasters, but to just hand over money to farmers to grow, or not grow, is stupid.  Especially for farmers who clear 6 figures of profit in a year.
What is even more stupid is government marketing ag products to the public in an effort to boost consumption.  Like this:

Domino’s Pizza was hurting early last year. Domestic sales had fallen, and a survey of big pizza chain customers left the company tied for the worst tasting pies.

From marketing campaigns, to restaurant menus to your own dinner plate, what evidence are you seeing of more cheese in the American diet? Share your experiences.

Then help arrived from an organization called Dairy Management. It teamed up with Domino’s to develop a new line of pizzas with 40 percent more cheese, and proceeded to devise and pay for a $12 million marketing campaign.

Consumers devoured the cheesier pizza, and sales soared by double digits. “This partnership is clearly working,” Brandon Solano, the Domino’s vice president for brand innovation, said in a statement to The New York Times.

But as healthy as this pizza has been for Domino’s, one slice contains as much as two-thirds of a day’s maximum recommended amount of saturated fat, which has been linked to heart disease and is high in calories.

And Dairy Management, which has made cheese its cause, is not a private business consultant. It is a marketing creation of the United States Department of Agriculture — the same agency at the center of a federal anti-obesity drive that discourages over-consumption of some of the very foods Dairy Management is vigorously promoting.

It’s one thing to assist during disaster, or to offer education assistance, or low interest loans; it’s something else entirely to pay for a marketing campaign for a single business in order to promote a product sold in the marketplace.  Dominoes does poorly for a reason, they choose to be cheap and flavorless, and it was a bad move.  Government had no business handing them a $12 million dollar advertising grant.  And to make matters more conflicting, such a campaign runs counter to another campaign the same government is running.

Urged on by government warnings about saturated fat, Americans have been moving toward low-fat milk for decades, leaving a surplus of whole milk and milk fat. Yet the government, through Dairy Management, is engaged in an effort to find ways to get dairy back into Americans’ diets, primarily through cheese.

Americans now eat an average of 33 pounds of cheese a year, nearly triple the 1970 rate. Cheese has become the largest source of saturated fat; an ounce of many cheeses contains as much saturated fat as a glass of whole milk.

When Michelle Obama implored restaurateurs in September to help fight obesity, she cited the proliferation of cheeseburgers and macaroni and cheese. “I want to challenge every restaurant to offer healthy menu options,” she told the National Restaurant Association’s annual meeting.

But in a series of confidential agreements approved by agriculture secretaries in both the Bush and Obama administrations, Dairy Management has worked with restaurants to expand their menus with cheese-laden products.

Now, I’m a country boy from Wisconsin.  I grew up on family dairy farms and in family run cheese factories.  I remember drinking whole milk that had come from the cow just that morning, and eating string cheeses as it came out of the forming machine.  So I’ll all for people eating cheese and supporting those industries, but there are industries out there already promoting cheese.  I think Tillamook, or Dean Foods, do a pretty good job selling cheese, so why is the government getting involved?

In the same vein, I also want to point out this little bit.

The [New York city health] commissioner wants New Yorkers to quit smoking in parks and beaches, take the stairs, cut the salt, lose weight, swear off sugary drinks, have safe sex and drink less alcohol; and he advocates legislation, taxes and industry regulation to help them do it.

Yeah, that’s crap.  Sure folks need to get healthier, but just as we can’t be passing laws telling people who they can have consensual sex with, and how they choose to have said sex, we can’t be passing laws telling people to be healthy (and since minors can not legally consent to sex, statutory rape laws are OK, although I think they are sometimes too rigid).  Still, I think there is a time when the government can dictate your life choices.

In an essay in The Times, he revealed that the Bloomberg administration wanted federal permission to stop poor New Yorkers from using food stamps for soda and other sugary drinks.Usually, it is conservative and corporate voices that go after Dr. Farley. This time, traditional liberals accused him of stigmatizing poor people.

“To say that low-income people are uniquely irresponsible, ignoring the Paris Hiltons of the world — I find the message offensive and counterproductive,” complained Joel Berg, executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger.

Mr. Berg said he was not “in any way, shape or form pro-soda,” but added, “I’m used to fighting with conservatives, and it’s particularly heartbreaking on this issue that I’m fighting with people who should be natural allies.”

You take Caesar’s coin, you dance to Caesar’s tune.  If you are on food stamps, or, to extend the logic, on Medicare, the government has the right to dictate what it’s money can be spent on.  Food stamps are there to help the poor get nutritious meals, in the hopes that they will be better able to work and make more money, or at the very least, to make sure their kids are not starved and unable to learn to become better citizens than their parents (theoretically).  Soda is delicious, but it has very limited nutritional value, so sure, the food stamp program should be able to limit what it can be used for.  Hell, if I ran the system, food stamps would be good for the most basic of foods (meats, fruits & veggies, breads & cerals, and dairy products, and baby formula).  Candy, soda, cigarettes, alcohol, frozen meals (Stoffers, frozen pizza, etc.), etc would not be allowed. Participants would not be banned from buying such items, they just could not use food stamps to do so.
The only caveat to these restrictions would be that such programs must be entirely voluntary (which is why I oppose ObamaCare, it sets it up so everyone will eventually be on Medicare).

I’ve often said that I think government assistance should not be a pleasant experience.  I know that quite often, people who apply for taxpayer help are desperate, and need help, and are already having an unpleasant experience.  I’m not looking to add to their woes, what I am looking to do is give them some serious incentive to get the hell off taxpayer assistance.  Limit the food they can eat to the basics, not the luxuries.  Same with other lifestyle choices.  If you can afford a new big screen TV, you don’t need taxpayer assistance.  If you can afford the payments on a new Lexus, you are doing just fine on your own.  Force them to report all single item purchases over $200 (even if paid with cash).  Conduct surprise home inspections to check on things.  If there is a new plasma TV on the wall, and they didn’t report it, they’d better have a receipt from somebody showing where it came from.  Don’t like the terms?  Withdraw from the program, that simple.