The American Spectator : The Spectacle Blog : Only the Federal Government Could Define Pizza as a Vegetable

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The Spectacle Blog

Only the Federal Government Could Define Pizza as a Vegetable

By Joseph Lawler on 11.18.11 @ 2:04PM

Liberals are outraged that the House of Representatives scuttled an effort to improve school lunches by maintaining the definition of pizza as a vegetable under USDA guidelines. All credit for this absurdity goes to the giant frozen pizza makers, such as Con Agra and Schwann Food, who successfully lobbied to ensure the obesity of our schoolchildren.

Of course, one wonders if this outcome could have been avoided if decisions about the suitability of dishes weren't up to the USDA. Maybe at least a few states would have been able to avoid defining pizza as a vegetable. And needless to say, the dynamics would be totally different if parents enjoyed school choice: that way they could decide for themselves whether they trusted a system that defines pizza as vegetables with their children's education, not to mention their nutrition.

View all comments (15) | Leave a comment

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 11.18.11 @ 2:31PM

And yet another example of why most federal agencies should be shut down.

Dan Sudlik| 11.18.11 @ 2:57PM

Mr. Lawler, I think the idea that the government gets to tell schools what to serve is dumb. Government agencies can hardly get out of their own way and are always subject to special interests. It will be a lot harder for special interests to try and control all the individual school districts than to control the USDA. And maybe once a week or so students would like a slice of pizza, and would that be such a bad thing?

JimH| 11.18.11 @ 3:15PM

I believe it was catsup which was defined as a vegetable by an earlier administration.

The Underground Conservative| 11.18.11 @ 7:09PM

It was federal bureaucrats that defined ketchup.

Riff Raff| 11.18.11 @ 9:09PM

It doesn't matter who wanted to define ketchup as a vegetable. The US Government has absolutely ZERO legal authority to provide for school lunches. This is not a "right" but a responsibility of parents. If local school boards want to create and fund school lunch programs, they are free to do so, but the Feds are not. Get the Feds OUT of education.

ncatty| 11.18.11 @ 3:42PM

There is no justification for the Federal Government to have any say on what schools serve for lunch.

Dai Alanye| 11.18.11 @ 4:04PM

The Feds should stay out, but the idea some people seem to have, that tomato sauce has no nourishment value, is inexplicable. Is the tomato a vegetable or not? Are tomatoes good for children and other humans or not? Sheesh!

Some Fruitcake? | 11.20.11 @ 8:48AM

Tomatoes are Fruits, per the scientific definition of
Fruit - the developed ovary of a seed plant with its contents and accessory parts, pea pod, nut, tomato, pineapple... the edible parts of a plant developed from a flower, with any accessory tissues, as the peach, mulberry, banana... So, apples and oranges DO Go Together!!! As do Kiwis and Asian Pears and Columbian Cucumbers...
Just because someone puts toms and cukes in the 'vegetable' area of the produce section doesn't mean they are vegies... Right?

I believe (which does not Garrantee correctness) that fruits are actually a subset of vegetables, as are tubers, roots, seeds, bulbs, stems, leaves, etc...
So, maybe; All Fruits are Vegetables... but, NOT All Vegetables are Fruits ...
Well, that is my story, and I am sticking to it!
Unless someone provides more pragmatic info...

Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 11.18.11 @ 5:20PM

Pizza as a vegetable? Hmmm? I'll have two helping of veggies then!! Mmmm, veggies!!

Dollface| 11.18.11 @ 10:58PM

Pizza, the perfect food:
Crust---Bread
Sauce---Govt approved veggie
Cheese---Dairy product
Pepperoni, sausage, etc---meat
Anchovies---fish
Onions, Green Peppers---more veggies
Olives---fruit
See, pizza has everything you need.

albert constantine jr.| 11.19.11 @ 10:54AM

The practice of the government determining what a vegetable is goes back more than a hundred years, though in that circumstance, it was a court (rather than a bureaucrat) determining that the tomato was a fruit (rather than a vegetable) for the purpose of an act of legislation (which taxed one but not the other). This manipulation of natural or scientific facts (such as botanical classifications, in this instance) to serve the interests of political policy and power continues today in the global warming "debate".

Zbigniew Mazurak| 11.19.11 @ 2:20PM

I have 2 questions:
1) Where in the Constitution is there an authorization for a federal Department of Agriculture?
2) Where in the Constitution is there an authorization for the federal government to decide what is a vegetable and what isn't?

Some Fruitcake? | 11.20.11 @ 11:34AM

Could it be that All Fruits are Vegetables (Vegetation has a similar word 'root' structure), but not all Vegetables are Fruits...
Vegetables have numerous subsets which include; Tubers. Leaves. Stems. Legumes. Fruits. Nuts. Pods. Berries. Roots. etc...

Jumpingjoy| 11.20.11 @ 2:42PM

Oh no the federal govt is mislabeling food! Whatever shall we do? Think for ourselves? Good grief it's as if we want efficient tyrrany.

vb| 11.21.11 @ 6:34AM

Come on! I have a pepperoni pizza bush in my garden. It blooms in May, and I harvest the crop and freeze it in August. Beware of GM varieties that contain foreign elements such as mozarella made of cows' milk instead of the natural buffalo milk.