Monday, April 03, 2006

Parental Responsibility?

Never heard of it.

From yesterday's Boston Globe, comes this editorial calling for more public funding for school breakfast programs. Cutting to the chase, let's play "Spot the Cop Out".

Today the battle is against hunger and obesity, since parents don't always have the means to provide nutritious meals while fattening, unhealthy food is cheap and plentiful.


Time to once again hoist the bullshit flag, me hearties!

According to the Boston Globe editorial staff, we parents are powerless to make the right choices regarding our children's nutritional needs. We are but malleable pawns in the hands of the mind-controlling junk food industry. Therefore, we have no choice but to cede yet more of our parental responsibilities over to the federal government. It's FOR THE CHILDRENTM, you understand.

Repeat after me: Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit!

If parents "have the means" to buy Dorito's and Ding Dong's for their kids, then they "have the means" to buy tuna fish, beans, and yogurt. What they might lack is the will (or the intelligence) to make the right choices for themselves and their families. And, right on cue, the Boston Globe is sounding the alarm for more government intervention as a "solution".

And of course, they just throw out the "Blame it on cheap junk food" talking point without a shred of proof to back up their assertion (sound like the M.O. of any mayor we know?). While we, as the uneducated commoners, are not supposed to question their wisdom. Fuck that! Let's go grocery shopping!

Over at the West Roxbury Roche Bros. supermarket (via their Weekly Specials Flyer) we find the following:

London broil shoulder steak - $1.99/lb
Broccoli crowns - $0.88/lb
Solid white tuna fish (6 oz. can) - 10 for $10
Canned corn, peas, or green beans - 2 for $1.00
Canned pineapple chunks (20 oz.) - $0.75
Rice pilaf - $0.77/box
Box of Spaghetti - $0.80
Colombo Light Yogurt - $0.60
2-liter Flavored Seltzer - $0.75
Half-gallon of orange juice - BUY ONE GET ONE FREE!
Extra large eggs - $2/dozen


So much for the Boston Globe's "reasoning".

Bottom line - if you're kids are eating crap food and getting fat as a result, it's nobody's fault but your own. To sit back, throw up your hands in surrender, and ask the government to take over and raise your kids for you is pathetic. Healthy, nutritional food is no less "cheap and plentiful" than junk food.

Not that we should ever expect facts, logic, and reality to get in the way of the Boston Globe and their agenda.

Now, where'd I put those Smarties?