Sorry for the intermittent posts; I’ve been doing some travelling – and will be out of town for the next week or so (celebrating a signficant birthday!). But I’ll post a few things that pop up – like this item in the New York Times.
Obamas to Plant Vegetable Garden at White House
March 19, 2009
WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama will begin digging up a patch of the South Lawn on Friday to plant a vegetable garden, the first at the White House since Eleanor Roosevelt’s victory garden in World War II. There will be no beets — the president does not like them — but arugula will make the cut.
Now that the Obamas have done it, I wonder if we’ll get the same snide comments that the Mayor of Vancouver received with his garden at City Hall. Yeah, about that and the chickens.
I share the frustration of politicians who bring forward a small idea, typically an item of interest to a few constituents but something worthwhile doing, only to find it blown up out of all proportion by the media – who then criticize the council for misplaced priorities.
It’s not that big a deal, it was never meant to be a big deal, please stop making such a big deal.
i’m more concerned that the idea of an organic garden at the white house contradicts his poor choice for Secretary of Agriculture.
From Wikipedia:
“Vilsack has repeatedly demonstrated a preference for large industrial farms and genetically modified crops; as Iowa state governor, he originated the seed pre-emption bill in 2005, effectively blocking local communities from regulating where genetically engineered crops would be grown; additionally, Vilsack was the founder and former chair of the Governor’s Biotechnology Partnership, and was named Governor of the Year by the Biotechnology Industry Organization, an industry lobbying group”
He’s also a lover of corn subsidies for ethanol, since thats been great political pork for his state. And he loves High Fructise Corn Syrup.
So while I applaud the White House garden, the hypocrisy is more then a little disappointing