March 21, 2010

"Why would you go to a bake sale to buy baked potato chips?"

Because there is nutritional information on the package. As is not the case with homemade baked goods, which are, accordingly, banned.

This is how it goes when the government thinks your children are fat and tries to help.

29 comments:

mesquito said...

Liberals ruin everything.

Anonymous said...

Shhhhhhh.

In the good old days, our schools held bake sales to raise funds for the band.

It's precisely this sort of overreaching that will make people despise the Politburo, er, I mean the Democrat Party.

We should be very quiet about this and let them do it (after all, our side is going to defy them ... it is only their side which will obey).

Anonymous said...

It sort of makes you wonder what they're putting in the pre-packaged food that they're so desperate to get inside your body, doesn't it?

Scott said...

Fascism marches on.

The Democrats aren't a political party. They're a cancer.

Jason (the commenter) said...

David Cantor, the education department's spokesman, said the city was simply in line with a nationwide effort to combat childhood obesity, which First Lady Michelle Obama has made one of her priorities.

Michelle Obama hates your Mom's chocolate chip cookies and apple pie!

mesquito said...

David Cantor, the education department's spokesman, said the city was simply in line with a nationwide effort to wring the very last drop of fun from our lives.

Anonymous said...

"Michelle Obama hates your Mom's chocolate chip cookies and apple pie!"

Michelle Obama wasn't proud of apple pies until her husband got elected. Apple pies have always, up to that point, been racist.

Anonymous said...

Any more Meade files? Where is Ann's intrepid traveler?

Ann Althouse said...

Actually, I don't see how schools can allow kids to bring in stuff made at home to feed to the class.

Anonymous said...

"Any more Meade files? Where is Ann's intrepid traveler?"

Hopefully, he's found the courage to take back the House of Representatives and is leading a brigade of Americans to the floor of the House to take the gavel from Nancy Pelosi's hands and occupy Capitol Hill.

Jason (the commenter) said...

Ironic that a school would decide educating parents about healthy eating wouldn't be effective, and that only the use the state's police powers could change behaviors. Of course it is a public school, and we know how good they are at educating. Nice to know they do, too.

Jason (the commenter) said...

Althouse: Actually, I don't see how schools can allow kids to bring in stuff made at home to feed to the class.

In general, or in light of these laws? Maybe the items have to be from an approved list, or, knowing how the bureaucracy works, fatty food is probably perfectly fine as long as it isn't sold.

Anonymous said...

"I don't see how schools can allow kids to bring in stuff made at home to feed to the class."

Why not, Ann?

Is it because of security?

Because they don't check the backgrounds of the cafeteria staff either and it would be much, much easier for a whackjob to get a job as a mop-boy at PS 123 and slip his aresnic into the Mystery Meat.

Fear of what might happen is no reason to change our lifestyles in these sorts of broad senses.

Or else the terrorists have won.

Besides, it's not the cookies little Johnny brought to school that is killing our students.

It's the Uzi's the trench coat brigade are bringing in.

Jason (the commenter) said...

You can probably hand out sticks of butter, but if they catch you with an aspirin you'll be expelled.

mesquito said...

"PUPILS as young as five will soon be placed on school 'hate registers' for making playground taunts, it emerged last night.

"Any form of racist or homophobic bullying will go down on record at the school and the pupil responsible could be monitored throughout their school life."

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/161675/Children-aged-five-to-go-on-school-hate-registers-

Anonymous said...

And why do potato chips get such a bad rap?

Here is the ingredient list on a bag of Lay's Potato Chips:

1) Potatoes
2) Light salt

That's it. They're fried in Sunflower (or Corn Oil) and have no trans-fats, lots of Vitamin C, no cholesterol. And less calories than a salad at McDonalds.

In fact, you could eat the entire 11 ounce bag of Lays Potato Chips and consume just slightly more calories than 1 garden salad and 1 large Coke at McDonald's.

There is virtually nothing bad about potato chips made by Frito Lay, Inc.

The Irish have managed to produce quite comely lasses on this sort of a potato diet.

If you ate nothing but potato chips and exercised enough so that you were burning more calories than you were consuming, you wouldn't gain weight even if that's all you ever ate.

Ann Althouse said...

"Any more Meade files? Where is Ann's intrepid traveler?"

It's a 22-hour trip back home, and he doesn't have WiFi to upload the pictures and video from the camera. I only got iPhone stuff, and he had to preserve the battery. So there will be more this evening.

rhhardin said...

It's the left closing down an avenue for right wing tweaking.

A guy called Limbaugh wanting a free newsletter subscription because he was out of work.

Since Clinton had just proposed organizations close budget gaps with bake sales, Limbaugh suggested "Dan's Bake Sale" to make the $25 for a newsletter subscription.

It started self-organizing, and tens of thousands showed up at Dan's Bake Sale on the appointed day.

It was also the first time anybody noticed that right wing crowds are cheerful and don't leave behind much trash.

Kensington said...

Althouse:
"Actually, I don't see how schools can allow kids to bring in stuff made at home to feed to the class."

Why? They've only been doing it for as long as there have been schools, right? At least, until recently.

Anonymous said...

"It's a 22-hour trip back home, and he doesn't have WiFi to upload the pictures and video from the camera."

If I might take this opportunity to offer a criticism of the Tea Party movement (at the expense of your fine partner who is in no way to blame for this).

The Tea Party/Patriot movement must get its act together with respect to the technology required to make effective protest in today's fast-paced, YouTube world.

You simply cannot have 30,000 people show up at your event and not be streaming it live over the internet.

Doing that is fairly trivial from a technological standpoint, but it requires a communications infrastructure and prior planning that is sorely lacking among these folks unfortunately - primarily because they're a grass-roots unorganized mass of people coming from all parts of the country.

By the time, Ann, that Meade returns and uploads his photos and videos, the damage will have been done. The vote will have been long over (and it is the vote he is trying to influence, no?) The public will have moved on.

The news cycle that would have made his photos and video interesting will have passed, I'm sorry to say. Such is the nature of our 24x7 culture these days.

It is a shame that the Tea Party cannot organize the distribution of its story - the pictures and the video - better to sympathetic outlets. It allows scumbags like James Clyburn to make specious claims of racism. His partners in the media will spread his fake message far and wide.

Glenn Reynolds was yesterday pining for a still photograph taken from 20 feet up, so a good crowd estimate could be shown. That should have been part of the planning ahead of time for this event (having someone taking the picture, and having a mailing list of sympathetic bloggers to email it to so they could break the gatekeeper zone of silence).

You can bet your ass that the opposition will have cameras amongst the crowd filming their agent provocateurs shouting "n*gger." And those fake videos will make the Sunday talk shows.

/rantoff

Deborah M. said...

This was the case when my kids were in elementary school. We could not bring home baked goods to parties, etc. No ingredients list, you just had to trust the parent that they didn't lace it with arsenic or use spoiled eggs. It was probably to keep the school system from getting sued. However I did try to eat a school lunch once or twice. Just the sight of it made me sick.

Omaha1 said...

I don't understand why anyone would have a problem with this, most parents are clearly too stupid to figure out how to feed their own children. The benevolent nanny state is only providing much-needed dietary guidelines.

Hooray for Pop-Tarts!

wv: blogg! Blogg on Professor Althouse!

From Inwood said...

mesquito:

David Cantor, the education department's spokesman, said the city was simply in line with a nationwide effort to wring the very last drop of fun from our lives.

Fake But Accurate!

(Notice, I didn't add an "um")

Unknown said...

"Why are we suddenly picking on bake sales as opposed to looking at the things that are available every single day?"

It's not suddenly. We have let our freedoms go, inch by inch, and now you have to live (and die, with Obamacare) with the result.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

So.....the issue....they say is that the nutritional information is missing?

Living Cook Book or any other recipe software will calculate the ingredients nutritional value per serving.

CHEWY CHOCOLATE - CHERRY COOKIES

Nutrition (per serving): 71.6 calories; 33% calories from fat; 2.7g total fat; 13.6mg cholesterol; 33.7mg sodium; 28.4mg potassium; 11.6g carbohydrates; 0.6g fiber; 7.1g sugar; 11.0g net carbs; 1.0g protein.

No preservatives or artificial ingredients.

Problem solved. Except that wasn't really the problem was it. It was and still is all about control of every aspect of our lives by Big Brother.

They will find some other way to ban banana bread or other treats in the name of protecting "the chillins"

Calypso Facto said...

Like taking cookies from a baby:

Calypso Facto said..."What you think on the subject won't matter soon because Mrs. O says that being fat is evil and once her husband is in charge of your health care he'll have all kinds of leverage to mandate behavior modification."

Jeremy said: Good lord...some of you are beyond stupid.

3/19/10 5:03 PM

Shanna said...

Because knowing the calorie count totally makes poptarts healthy!

So dumb.

prairie wind said...

Actually, I don't see how schools can allow kids to bring in stuff made at home to feed to the class.

What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.

Unknown said...

I'll take a homemade chocolate cookie over a Pop Tart anyday.

However, I imagine that another problem with baked goods with no ingredients or nutritional value listed is the risk of allergies (nuts, eggs, gluten, you name it), and the school doesn't want to be liable for any potentially lethal reactions.

That being said: why doesn't Mrs President advocate limiting portions, no snacking between meals, etc? Why not advocate real lifestyle changes?

Why doesn't the school sell hummous and pita, baby carrots, cherry tomatoes, string cheese, dried and fresh fruit, etc? If the school and the government must get involved in dictating to parents how to encourage healthy eating habits, why can't they get the basic message right? Pop Tarts....(shakes head)... pathetic.