October 9, 2015

The federal government just stopped serving pig products in federal prison — no more pork, ham, or bacon for 206,000 inmates.

You might instinctively cry: Must all go without because some have a religious scruple against eating pork?!

But the government says it's because a survey shows the prisoners don't like pork.
“Why keep pushing food that people don’t want to eat?” asked Edmond Ross, a spokesman for the prison bureau. “Pork has been the lowest-rated food by inmates for several years"...

“I find it hard to believe that a survey would have found a majority of any population saying, ‘No thanks, I don’t want any bacon,'” said Dave Warner, a spokesman for the Washington-based trade association, which represents the nation’s hog farmers.... 
Warner said pork is healthy and economical.... "Not to throw beef under the bus, but we cost a lot less than beef.”
Why don't they just admit they're doing it to accommodate religion and it's easier to have one rule that works for everyone than to bother with the complexity of alternative meals for the minority who must avoid pig products?

The prison system has long made accommodations for Muslims and Jews by providing alternatives to pork and halal and kosher foods. Ross declined to say whether there has been an increase in Muslim or Jewish inmates in recent years and whether that may have factored into the survey responses.

“In general we welcome the change because it’s facilitating the accommodation of Muslim inmates,” said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the country’s largest Muslim civil rights advocacy group. “We hope it’s not an indication of an increasing number of Muslims in the prison system.”

Hooper predicted that anti-Islam groups would spin the decision into a case of the federal government acting under pressure from Muslims. “This is just the kind of thing that drives them crazy,” he said. “It will stoke the fires of Islamophobia based on the usual conspiracy theories.”
The government won't own up to its accommodation of religion because it's afraid of criticism by Islamophobes? I would think that criticism could be advantageously leveraged by this administration. I think this administration is more worried about getting seen accommodating religion when it's fighting against accommodation on other fronts, notably same-sex marriage, abortion, and birth control.

But come on, don't lie. Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say.

110 comments:

David Begley said...

No bacon?

They're already in jail.

I smell a lawsuit alleging unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment.

Gabriel said...

Homer: "Lisa, honey, are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?"
Lisa: "No."
Homer: "Ham?"
Lisa: "No."
Homer: "Pork chops?"
Lisa: "Dad! Those all come from the same animal!"
Homer: "Yeah, right, Lisa. A wonderful, magical animal."

Chris said...

How about this: YOU ARE IN PRISON! YOU GET NO ACCOMMODATION. SUFFER AND LEARN FROM YOUR MISTAKES IN LIFE.

mccullough said...

A new religion requiring the ingesting of bacon will emerge in the prison system.

Qwerty Smith said...

This presumably wasn't a result of the prisons teeming with Jewish inmates, although the incarceration of Bernie Madoff probably represented a pretty big proportional increase.

ga6 said...

Wait untiltgher Congressional Black caucas hears of this, not to mention the Hispanic..

bleh said...

If Muslim inmates don't like bacon, then they should stop committing crimes.

If non-Muslim inmates don't like not having bacon, then they should stop committing crimes.

ga6 said...

until the

MountainMan said...

This is accommodation for the Muslims pure and simple. For many Southerners pork (ham, pork roast, pork chops, ribs, barbeque) would be the preferred meat over beef and chicken. Nobody wants bacon for breakfast? You got to be kidding.

Amichel said...

can't we bring back gruel? whatever happened to good ole gruel?

Curious George said...

"...an increase in Muslim or Jewish inmates"

LOL

" Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say."

Behind every Obamacare pitch, sure.

Big Mike said...

Why don't they just admit they're doing it to accommodate religion and it's easier to have one rule that works for everyone than to bother with the complexity of alternate meals for the minority who must avoid pig products?

You're kidding, right? Because mendacity is the default mode for politicians, as you should know by now.

But come on, don't lie. Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say.

Oh, I don't know. How about "if you like your plan you can keep your plan, period."

jacksonjay said...


“The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.”

Barack HUSSEIN Obama



"Common sense" tells me that BHO doesn't want to be on the "wrong side of history".

Dan Hossley said...

Maybe the kids suffering from Michelle's lunch programs can work a deal with the bureau of prisons. Gotta do something with all that pork.

Birches said...

The hog farmer is right, pork is way cheaper than beef right now. It's probably about even with chicken.

I would imagine there's always a vegetarian option, right?

jacksonjay said...


Obama will never face those Iowa caucus voters again.

Dr.D said...

No more bacon cheese burgers for those cons!

They don't like bacon, brats, ham? No wonder they are in prison; they are criminally insane (that is, insane criminals).

Dr.D said...

No more bacon cheese burgers for those cons!

They don't like bacon, brats, ham? No wonder they are in prison; they are criminally insane (that is, insane criminals).

Gahrie said...

I think this administration is more worried about getting seen accommodating religion when it's fighting against accommodation on other fronts

Oh so close to the truth. However it is actually:

This administration is more worried about getting seen accommodating Islam when it's fighting against Christianity on other fronts.

Michael said...

The real question is when all meats will be Halal.

jacksonjay said...


Joni Ernst might have sumtin to say about this.

I Callahan said...

But come on, don't lie. Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say.

Exactly right. I don't believe this for a second, and neither should the prisoners, the Pork Industry Council, or anyone else for that matter. This was most CERTAINLY done for the benefit of Islam.

When stuff like this is done, it gives more grist to those who believe Obama is a Muslim himself.

SweatBee said...

I love bacon, but it is possible to make it taste terrible. If they're serving up the tough, flavorless, bacon-shaped stuff you find on most chain-hotel breakfast buffets, then I can see how it might get a low rank on a survey. Sausage, on the other hand...

David said...

"Why don't they just admit they're doing it to accommodate religion and it's easier to have one rule that works for everyone than to bother with the complexity of alternate meals for the minority who must avoid pig products?"

Because they are government and like their elected leaders whose example they follow, the truth is not a goal, it's an accident. Much of what federal government does is built on lies or deception of one kind or another. This is an essential element of their culture.

Jane the Actuary said...

Some prison or another just got rid of meat entirely, serving up large portions of tofu. Protein, all right, though prisoners complained that there were estrogen-related side effects.

Bob Ellison said...

There are only a few immutable rules in human behavior. One of them is that everyone likes bacon. Everyone. They may decide not to eat it for various reasons, but they still like it.

So yes, government stopping bacon therapy has nothing to do with dislike.

Bob Ellison said...

Similarly, nobody likes kale. People eat it for various reasons, but nobody likes it. Let's serve it to prisoners! It grows like the weed that it is.

Bob Ellison said...

And don't let's go putting (1) bacon, prosciutto, and properly smoked pulled pork in the same category as (2) pork chops, overdone pork steaks, and crappy ham. Items in category 1 are all good; everyone likes them. Category 2 should be banished as cruel and unusual punishment.

Fernandinande said...

Curious George said...
"...an increase in Muslim or Jewish inmates"
LOL


Yeah. Gosh darn those Jews!

New York state is about 1% Muslim.
New York state prisons are about "17-20%" Muslim.
(their ref link has been purged from "judiciary.senate.gov", see here.)

JSD said...

Prisons are now run by the inmates. You cannot stand alone; you have to join a group for protection and survival. Nation of Islam is a viable choice for black inmates. They have been very successful with conversions. I think OJ Simpson converted?

Freeman Hunt said...

"...an increase in Muslim or Jewish inmates"

LOL


I must say I also laughed out loud.

Daniel Jackson said...

On the other hand, a French court have ruled it is okay to stop accommodating dietary restrictions for observant Muslims and Jews in French schools.

http://www.ibtimes.com/halal-meals-french-schools-court-rules-favor-chalon-sur-saone-mayors-plan-eliminate-2049940

Ironic that the Secular State of France, known for its extreme political correctness, has continued its march to produce a totally integrated society. As if to say, there is only ONE secular culture and we all eat the same food. Don't like it? Go home.

WisRich said...

Would they eat turkey bacon?

Alexander said...

It is easy to say 'well who cares, I'm not fighting for inmate food choices."

This is battle-space. CAIR has no problem changing the dietary rules for 90+% of the population. It won't stay at the prisons, and it shouldn't be allowed to stay there either: because that accepts the logic that catering to Muslim sensibilities is a 'fair approach'.

It's like the bully who steals the candy and then 'lets' you have half: it's worse than outright stealing because it adds a submission that not only *can* the bully steal, but that he is by right the authority on the matter.

No accommodation for the Mohammedan! Assimilate entirely or depart.

Etienne said...

No Jello or gummy-bears either. All made with pork (well pork based gelatin)...

I'm Catholic, and I probably eat a little pork about once a month, if that. I don't like the taste. I don't eat bacon, although I use a chunk of pork fat when I make my baked beans (maybe twice a year).

Pork is just a worthless food in our home, but pork gelatin is in everything these days.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Lying sacks of shit. Time to start the Bacon Project for our deprived inmates.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Why change at all. This will screw up the barter economy. The Muhammadans presently just barter their bacon for things they find valuable, like young boys to rape or goat porn.

Laura said...

If one meat must go, then all must go. Restrictions on one meat source is government promotion of other sections of the meat industry. Federal contracts are lucrative.

Fasting is a religious act too.

Freeman Hunt said...

This isn't an accommodation, it's making everyone live by the religious strictures of some. An accommodation would be to offer alternatives to the pork products when the pork products are served.

jacksonjay said...


Angie Merkel has opened this can of worms in Germany. They get what they deserve.

jacksonjay said...


Are worms halal?

bleh said...

I agree that the government is probably lying, but I don't understand all the concern for the non-Muslim inmates. Really, who besides pork producers should care if inmates can't have bacon?

If I run out of bacon on a weekend morning, I have to run to the store and wait in line and pay for my own bacon. Why should this part of life be better for a prison inmate? Bacon is a free man's indulgence.

MadisonMan said...

Federal Prisons don't serve breakfast? The menu attached to that article just has lunch and dinner.

Alexander said...

@BDNYC

Because it should be us determining what prisoners can and cannot have, not invading Muslims.

How have we not learned this lesson by now: tyrants always start by taking power where it is least objectionable. Then once the principal of the matter is accepted, they move on into more intrusive spheres.

It's why gay marriage started with 'we just want the right to visit our dying loved one in the hospital!' bullshit. It's why gun control always pounces on dead children but is always silent about thug life slaughtering one another in Chicago. it's why drones and the destruction of privacy are always billed as going after terrorism but somehow managed to get turned back on the American people.

Mark Caplan said...

So those persistent rumors were true all along -- Obama really is a Seventh-Day Adventist!

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

Withholding bacon is cruel and unusual punishment.

exhelodrvr1 said...

You have to admit, though, that the new menus look fabulous. Even if you disagree with what is on them.

dbp said...

But come on, don't lie. Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say.

This is the new nation we live in: The government has always lied to us from time to time, as needed. Perceptive people have always known this. The difference now is that they don't care if everybody knows that they are lying to us. At least in the past, they had enough respect for the people to make reasonable, believable lies.

Matt Sablan said...

Is the quality of the bacon being provided in prisons maybe not what we expect? It could just be they get low quality pork, and that's why no one likes it.

Matt Sablan said...

If you like your bacon, don't go to jail.

Ambrose said...

In my prison, the Muslims would be served pork and the non-Muslims would not. If you can't do the time, don't do the crime....

Lewis Wetzel said...

Hooper predicted that anti-Islam groups would spin the decision into a case of the federal government acting under pressure from Muslims. “This is just the kind of thing that drives them crazy,” he said. “It will stoke the fires of Islamophobia based on the usual conspiracy theories.”
Hooper's organization, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, has conspired to illegally fund Hamas:
http://www.nysun.com/national/islamic-groups-named-in-hamas-funding-case/55778/

Sebastian said...

"Why don't they just admit"

Faux question, right?

Why, oh why?

AllenS said...

Turkey bacon is a crime against nature.

rehajm said...

Biggest curse in the animal kingdom is to be delicious.

Pigs are cursed.

Drago said...

Althouse: "But come on, don't lie. Prisoners don't like bacon?! That's about the most ludicrously unbelievable thing I've ever heard the government say."

Without a loud and proud assertion of the "fabulousness" of the obama's preceding this statement, I'm tempted to auto-reduce my assessment of Althouses' credibility in speaking to this issue.

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

Let them all eat vegan. Problem solved.

Ann Althouse said...

"This isn't an accommodation, it's making everyone live by the religious strictures of some. An accommodation would be to offer alternatives to the pork products when the pork products are served."

Normally, the preferences of the majority are automatically accommodated in setting up an institution, and it's the minority that has to ask for the accommodation. But one can also choose to set up an institution that takes account of all the special needs that exist within the group and plans one way to do things that will not burden anyone's religion.

Thus, if you needed to schedule an event and you might naturally avoid Sunday, the majority's sabbath, without even thinking about religion, but if you started thinking, you might say, let's avoid Saturday and Friday too. You want a time that will work for all.

It's like that. You might feel sympathetic to the prisoners who never get something they want, but their needs are subordinated to administrative efficiency. If they want to eat what they like, they shouldn't have committed the crimes that put them under the control of the government.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

First they came for the bacon, and I said nothing because I keep kosher...

In all seriousness, though, I've read that most prisons go out of their way to provide as much good-tasting, starchy/carby, filling food as they can with very limited budgets, the idea being that keeping inmates fat and happy reduces fights and aggressiveness generally.

I like both bacon and turkey bacon, so there.

Achilles said...

We only have 206,000 federal prison inmates? How many people live in or around Washington DC? We will need a lot more space soon.

At least it wont affect pork farmers much.

Ann Althouse said...

I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison.

YoungHegelian said...

Pork has been the lowest-rated food by inmates for several years

Yeah, right! In a pig's eye!

Ann Althouse said...

That would accommodate even more religion.

Ann Althouse said...

"the idea being that keeping inmates fat and happy reduces fights and aggressiveness generally"

More tofu... more estrogen.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...Thus, if you needed to schedule an event and you might naturally avoid Sunday, the majority's sabbath, without even thinking about religion, but if you started thinking, you might say, let's avoid Saturday and Friday too. You want a time that will work for all.

It's like that. You might feel sympathetic to the prisoners who never get something they want, but their needs are subordinated to administrative efficiency. If they want to eat what they like, they shouldn't have committed the crimes that put them under the control of the government.


Ok, but what's the legal rule for determining when something is and isn't a government accommodation? It can't just be when they admit "we're doing X for reason Y," since of course they wouldn't say that. And the principle that we can assume something is permissible as long as we can't show that it was done on purpose also can't be true, since we have lots of findings of disparate impact wherein no one even tries to show that the outcome was the result of deliberate choices/actions--and that notwithstanding the program or structure is found to be improperly discriminatory based only on the outcome.

Drago said...

HoodlumDoodlum: "Ok, but what's the legal rule for determining when something is and isn't a government accommodation?"

Whatever any random sample of lefties believes at that moment for whatever reason.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...More tofu... more estrogen.

On the surface that'd be a good idea, but in practice wouldn't work well. The inmates have to feel like their salutary (from the point of view of the prison officials) dietary choices (to load up on carbs, etc) are their own choices. Unless they WANTED to eat more tofu they'd reject you making that change, and from my experience it's difficult (and therefore costly) to make tofu as appealing to most American as even low quality "comfort food."

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison.

Some people thought it would be fine to stop issuing marriage licenses to anyone (that is, to "get the gov. out of the marriage license business).

Not that "eating pork in prison" is equivalent to the right to marry, of course.

Gahrie said...

I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison.

That would be cruel and unusual punishment.

Ann Althouse said...

"Ok, but what's the legal rule for determining when something is and isn't a government accommodation? It can't just be when they admit "we're doing X for reason Y," since of course they wouldn't say that."

Accommodation is permissible, and it's required under RFRA. It's just an issue of how the accommodation is done. I'm complaining about the failure to be up front about the intention. Here's the Supreme Court case that explains (unanimously) why it's not an Establishment Clause violation.

Basically, it's permissible because government is relieving a burden that is imposed by government.

There might be some argument based on the idea that the accommodation is done through burdening other persons, but I don't think that should work, because everyone is getting fed, fed the same thing.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ok, but what's the legal rule for determining when something is and isn't a government accommodation?

I don't think there is one, because I don't think there is a need for one. You can request/demand an accommodation if you feel that a policy infringes your free exercise/RFRA rights. But I don't think there is any case where the government is required to prove that something is or is not done as an accommodation.

Smilin' Jack said...

I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison.

It's not that much of a step--Hindus don't eat beef, so prisons serving only tofu is the only real solution to the 'problem.'

Except that then no one would dare commit a crime, putting the entire legal establishment out of business. Not gonna happen.

Fernandinande said...

jacksonjay said...
Are worms halal?


Anti-Jew proto-Nazi Luther had a diet of worms, so perhaps not.

Lewis Wetzel said...

I've heard that the only meal where people can be happy consuming the same thing every day is breakfast. Bacon and eggs every morning, or yogurt and black coffee every morning, whatever.
So, to save money and accommodate everyone, prison breakfast will be Cheerios, an every meal shall be breakfast.
Yes, my IQ soars into the triple-digits. Why do you ask?

Gahrie said...

There might be some argument based on the idea that the accommodation is done through burdening other persons, but I don't think that should work, because everyone is getting fed, fed the same thing.

Everyone was being fed the same thing when pork was being served also. If it is a burden for Muslims to eat pork, surely it is a burden for non-Muslims to be denied pork?

David Begley said...

Watch Trump pick up on this and call for vegan only in the federal pens.

rehajm said...

more estrogen.

Soon after they'd all be demanding (and receiving) government sponsored gender reassignment surgery.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said... Accommodation is permissible, and it's required under RFRA. It's just an issue of how the accommodation is done. I'm complaining about the failure to be up front about the intention.

I understand, and you're correct to complain about the clearly false weasel-y excuse, I'm just trying to work out the general (legal) rules. I'd think first you'd have to say "is this change an accommodation" and then say "is this accommodation permissible under RFRA (or some other law)," no? I'm wondering if there are rules or definitions that one would use to make the determination of whether a given change should be considered an accommodation.
I...am not a lawyer.

Etienne said...

If I was running a prison, the prisoners could eat whatever they grew, and I would spare no expense on acreage, farm equipment, or seeds/greenhouse starter plants.

I know some people will die (sharp or heavy instruments used when angry), but the benefits of learning to farm, and harvest animals, are paid back to society 10:1.

Freeman Hunt said...

If you had a lot of Orthodox, I think the other prisoners would be pretty ticked off about Lent.

Etienne said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
YoungHegelian said...

Those damn Jews, they just ruin for everybody, don't they?

Next, it'll be separate meat & milk dishes, no crab or shrimp, and, good Lord, gefilte fish at Shabbos.

"Warden, it's that time of year again. I gots to have my jarhzeit candles to light in memory of my halakhic homies, Pinchas & Chaim, who got taken out in that rumble with the Lubavitchers. My brothers, I'll mourn you 'til I join you!"

Ignorance is Bliss said...

HoodlumDoodlum said...

I'd think first you'd have to say "is this change an accommodation" and then say "is this accommodation permissible under RFRA (or some other law)," no?

No. RFRA does not prohibit any accommodations ( unless they would impose on someone else's RFRA rights, in which case they would need an accommodation-accommodation ).

Removing pork from a pork-eater's diet would not burden their religious practices, unless their religion requires eating pork.

JackOfClubs said...

We should probably just release all of the Muslims. It's not like they are ever guilty of anything.

lgv said...

All I know is that is high time those roving bands of Jewish thugs have been put in jail where they belong.

I think a vegan lifestyle would go over well in prison. Tofu Tuesdays here we come. I think it would help reduce the prison population.


Bob Ellison said...

Must we explain trichinosis again? Can Muslims and Jews step up to modern science on this point?

Danno said...

Isn't this why we keep Guantanamo open? As a refuge for the Muslims.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ignorance is Bliss said...No. RFRA does not prohibit any accommodations ( unless they would impose on someone else's RFRA rights, in which case they would need an accommodation-accommodation ).

Ok, so what I'm asking about is the general case and/or an insight into the legal framework used to decide cases like this. If someone asks for some dietary change and they're asking for it for religious reasons and the prison denies them, and that person then sues the prison for unequal treatment with the argument that the prison accommodated Muslim prisoners' religious demands to remove pork from the facility, how will the prison fight that? Or what if a school allowed time before classes started for Christian students to pray at their desks but then didn't allow Muslim students to pray on mats during the day--if the school was sued and wanted to argue that the change that allowed the Christian prayers wasn't an accommodation what, legally speaking, would they need to show?

If the prison had a rule from the beginning that they wouldn't ever have pork and could articulate a reason for the rule I think you'd normally assume that reason was valid and unrelated to any effects it might have on prisoner's religious observations. Since that's not the case here (the prison did allow pork and have now made a CHANGE to ban it) I think they'd need to PROVE (or at least demonstrate to some degree of satisfaction) that the change was not due to influence X, Y, or Z--with a possible X being consideration for the desires of religious inmates. If the prison shows favoritism towards some religion but not others then they might be at risk of a lawsuit, so it's obviously in their interest to claim the reason had nothing to do with religious-based demands. My question is what would the prison/institution need to do to show that a given change was not the result of a religious accommodation (even if it had that effect), since just making that claim is clearly not sufficient.

Big Mike said...

Just so young Tsarnaev gets forced to eat ham hocks before getting his lethal injection, I'm fine with it.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

HoodlumDoodlum-

I don't think equal treatment enters into it. If a policy causes an undue burden on someone's religious practices, and there is some less-burdensome alternative that would still meet the government interest, then the government must make that accommodation. That is independent of whatever accommodation they made for another group.

Someone claiming an undue burden could certainly point to other practices to prove that the accommodation is possible while still meeting the government's interests. But that is true independent of whether those practices were an accommodation to another group or not.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ignorance is Bliss: a government institution treating religions differently (deferential towards one but not another) doesn't violate equal treatment and/or 1st Amend. prohibitions on gov establishing a religion? Isn't that why states can't have Christmas holidays/displays, etc?
In this conception, the prison deciding to change its rules to conform with a the religious demands of some inmates would be tantamount to the prison (and gov) endorsing that belief (at at least that the belief itself is in some way valid or valuable).

Scott Patton said...

Jules says "Personality goes a long way"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0zJSgHDnpw

Steven said...

I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison.

Hmmph. It's cruel and unusual punishment to force a human to subsist so low on the food chain, eating like a gorilla.

James Pawlak said...

The rational solution is to have Arizona-style "Nutrition Loaf" served at all meals (At least in maximum and medium security "Joints").

Tari said...

From what I've heard from friends/family who work in the Federal prison system, this is just part of a larger trend, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons has become very, very deferential to Islam.

Just anecdotal, but my mom and some friends are all set to go into the Federal prison in the town next to hers to run an inmate-requested Bible study. The inmates requested this church in particular (it's the only Evangelical one nearby), so the church put a group together that met the prison guidelines, the volunteers all passed background checks, everything was done. And now they wait ... because this prison can't have the Bible study unless there is a corresponding study group for Muslims. No Muslim inmates have requested such a group, but that doesn't matter, from what the church has been told. The FBP wants the number of groups to be equal in every facility - or at least that appears to be what's going on.

richard mcenroe said...

"I'm complaining about the intention." The INTENTION is to insult the intelligence of the American voter, always the first goal of any unelected Afederal worker.

Michael K said...

"Obama will never face those Iowa caucus voters again."

Bingo !

Plus, of course, prisons are full of black prisoners who are converting to Islam.

cubanbob said...

Since when did the Federal Bureau of prisons give a damn about what prisoners want? The bureau always buys the cheapest frozen way past the sale date meats it can and pork is cheaper than meat. As as taxpayer, save me my money and give the bum's the cheapest meat they can find. If a prisoner has a religious objection, so what? If they were truly religious to begin with they wouldn't be in prison.

MaxedOutMama said...

The cost of pork has gone up a lot. I think this is really a budgetary change. From the article:
As of last week, the prison menu had added an “economically viable” turkey bacon substitute.

Incarcerated pork lovers still have an option: The prison commissary, a convenience store that sells packaged pork rinds and precooked bacon. But they have to pay.

Douglas B. Levene said...

I do not believe that prisoners are voting against bacon. Just do not believe it. Against crappy pulled pork sloppy joes, sure. Against dried out overcooked ham, sure. But bacon? No way.

Bill said...

AAlthouse: "I think it would be fine for the government to take the whole thing a step further and only serve vegetarian meals in prison."
So you're want to discriminate against orthodox vegans?

Nichevo said...

the doctrine of Stalin. Probe with bayonet. If you meet mush, advance! If you meet steel, withdraw. Communists walk down hallways testing every doorknob, in case one opens. Any door to power is a good one.


I'd rather think that it was either a rational transaction, the greatest good for the greatest number, or a way to mess with the prisoners, then to think that it was kowtowing to religious interests. As for that, Jews have requested or if you wish demanded kosher alternatives but since when do you stop other people from eating with what they want to eat? and frankly, I'd rather have opportunities to corrupt views religious groups. Let there be the temptation and them to come to attend the weekend in their social and political power.


I assume that despite all of the good things you hear about them that Utah's full of prisons and the prisons are full of Mormons. Not entirely full but I'm sure there are plenty of Mormons in prison. Do they really set up the balls to run prison life have some kind of gang? There are plenty of gangs in prison. That's what Islamofascism is, it's a gang masquerading as a religion.

Nichevo said...

I also wonder how American prisons compare with foreign prisons. I'm guessing we do okay as a rule. Japan maybe, but Spain or Russia?

Nichevo said...

also, do you remember potatoes coming off the USDA list? You remember Bloomberg with soda in New York? This really is real full. stop. totalitarian type fascism. Althouse, you like politicizing things? This is politicizing food. That's what they did in the Holodomor in the Ukraine. It's a difference in degree not in kind.



They wanna - it's like William S Burroughs wrote - they want to jump down into your stomach and help you digest your food. This drive to take control of others what is it? Tell people what to do? Yes it's necessary. It's a necessary evil. The better sort will not delight in it.

But so many do. Look at Hillary! saying Fuck You! to the men serving and protecting them all. People who mistreat servants, like children and animals, are of low character and not entirely welcome in my company, or on my ballot.

holdfast said...

It's an issue of taxpayer concern if they are replacing perfecting serviceable pork with much more expensive beef. I have no issue with ensuring that there is an alternative to pork served whenever pork is the main dish, but it doesn't have to be a great alternative - bean burger patties will do.

Nichevo said...

Chicken, duh! Nothing is cheaper. Brand are hardly cheaper than chicken. The prisons could grow them.

Nichevo said...

Rice and beans and corn...

Pulses and whatever else Daniel asked the king for...

Gospace said...

Chris said...
How about this: YOU ARE IN PRISON! YOU GET NO ACCOMMODATION. SUFFER AND LEARN FROM YOUR MISTAKES IN LIFE.

10/9/15, 9:49 AM

Ditto.

Nichevo said...

Sure, why feed them at all. Or feed them Alpo. Maybe we could give them electric shocks. If they're human, and you don't want to turn them into animals, there is a certain baseline of decency to be preserved.


Also, what can be given can be taken away. It's an additional tool of control.

LV Taxman said...

Ms. Althouse, if it is to streamline and not have to prepare special meals for some inmates, where is the cost savings? With beef prices so much higher than pork, it would seem feeding 200,000 prisoners only beef would cost more than accommodating Muslims. I can understand for prisons with a high Muslim population, but unless every Federal prison has a significant Muslim population, many inmates are being punished unnecessarily.