Stephanie Simon, of The Wall Street Journal, reports that organizers of the Democratic National Convention in Denver are having trouble planning a party that will please all of the disparate elements of the party.
Take food, for example. The Denver organizers issued a 28-page set of specifications for caterers that included no fried food (the better to please the party’s health-nut wing).
Each meal had to include “at least three of the following colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple and white” (and garnishes don’t count), and at least half the content of each plate had to be fruits and vegetables, the better to please the party’s nutrition zealots.
At least 70 percent of the food was to be organic and locally grown, the better to please both the health nuts and environmentalists (often one and the same) who are worried about the high carbon cost of transporting foods long distances.
And then there was the organic fanny pack dilemma. Each of the convention’s 15,000 volunteers is to receive a souvenir fanny pack, but to please various constituencies, the packs have to be union-made in America of organic cotton and stenciled, if possible, with soy-based ink.
After Simon’s report and a similar story in The New York Times appeared, party planners claimed that the dietary rules are all voluntary, not mandatory. Delegates and others at the convention will be able to get chicken nuggets, hot dogs, French fries and other politically incorrect food.
Will any true Democrat eat fried food in public? Besides Bill Clinton, that is?
— The St. Louis Post Dispatch
Opinion
Other Views: Dems shun fried foods
- Opinion
-
-
Our View: Santorum's Achilles' ear
Rick Santorum knocked everyone for a loop this week, not just with his victory in Missouri but with the landslide size of the thing.
-
Our View: Are school loans next 'debt bomb'?
The late American middle class struggled for decades to keep pace with an American dream slipping from its grasp.
-
Our View: A better way of limit terms
A Missouri House committee on Tuesday endorsed a proposed constitutional amendment that would allow lawmakers to serve 16 years in the state Legislature, either the House or the Senate.
-
Your View: Is it our fault?
When did coveting things and money take over character? What happened?
-
Your View: No way to run a school
All throughout the state of Missouri, you’ll hear much discussion about teacher tenure and the indefinite contracts that go along with that. Most — if not nearly all — jobs in the private and public sectors have no such career protection.
-
Your View: Prime suspects
If it’s too cool in the house, you can turn up the heat if you think you can afford it.
-
Our View: Worldwide concern
There is growing concern worldwide that Israel might launch an attack on Iranian nuclear plants.
-
Other Views: FAA deal up in air five years
The Federal Aviation Administration bill was delayed 23 times, but the agency finally has a law giving it $63 billion and full operating authority for the next four years.
-
Don Ray, columnist: Obama's pipeline excuse an election-year cop-out
On Jan. 18, President Barack Obama announced he was rejecting the Keystone XL pipeline project — a project that had its beginnings some 40 months ago (September 2008).
-
James Whitford, guest columnist: Broken people or broken system?
Are the people broken or is the system broken? If you walk into Watered Gardens, our rescue mission, it may seem the people are broken. But it’s a rescue mission. It just feels that way. And sometimes, it just looks that way.
- More Opinion Headlines
-






