Norm Benson continues to entertain with his most recent satiric piece, “Waiter, there are chemicals in my soup.” Hilarious! Mr. Benson”s straight-faced endorsement of pink slime, and why we should feel happy and privileged to eat it, was almost as funny as Stephen Colbert”s riff on the same topic.
Prior to 2001, pink slime could not be used in food made for human consumption. It was only used in dog food. As Colbert pointed out, that begs the question: “what are our dogs eating now, and how soon do we get to eat it, too?”
What happened in 2001? Three guesses: The product was improved dramatically; exhaustive long-term testing by unbiased non-corporate-owned independent scientists proved conclusively that the product was safe and healthy for humans to eat; or huge and powerful meat industry incorporated paid enough lobbyists, politicians and revolving-door FDA-to-meat-industry-and-back-again bureaucrats to change the law so that corporate food could squeeze more profits out of American consumers, regardless of negative consequences to our national health.
I look forward to Mr. Benson”s next literary trip down satire lane and I bet I can guess one of the topics simmering on his burners:
Thanks to oversaturation of antibiotics and growth hormones being fed to factory-farm livestock and poultry, we now have girls beginning puberty before their 10th birthday and antibiotic-resistant bugs that defy every tool available in modern medicine. I have complete faith that Mr. Benson will provide another knee-slapper: “Waiter, there are antibiotics in my antipasta!”
Deb Baumann
Upper Lake
