Congress Reaps Pizza Harvest

Tuesday, by act of Congress, pizza was declared a vegetable. The Spending Bill before our elected officials contained an Agriculture Department provision recognizing that school kids are dangerously obese, and that subsidizing school lunches of frozen pizza and french fries is unwise and unhealthy. The Congressional response: a slice of pizza = a serving of vegetables.

The American Frozen Food Institute spent over $5 million convincing Congress to protect their juicy $11 billion annual school lunch harvest from the pestilence of nutritional common sense, and they prevailed. Result: kids will still eat government-subsidized carbs, fat, and salt, and Big Food will get fatter, too.

In other farm news, Monsanto announced that Roundup-Ready Pizza Seeds will be available in time for spring planting, and February pizza crop futures rose at the Chicago Board of Trade after predictions of  increased Super Bowl party demand.

White House Soup

The White House Soup of the Day for November 15, 2011 via MSNBC and FishbowlDC:

Loaded Potato

Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-bzM

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Coffee War in China

Starbucks opened its first coffeehouse in the People’s Republic of China in 1999. It just opened its 500th java joint there and plans to open another thousand by 2015.

But let a thousand coffee shops bloom. True to the market principles of 21st century China, the British chain Costa Coffee is expanding into the country as well. Will this mean the War of the Beans?

Coffee is a pretty hard sell in China, where tea has been king for 5000 years.  There are other challenges, too. Not only does coffee need explanation, so does milk.

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Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-bxE
Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

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Attention Sports Fans

American sports fans: upset that there’s no pro basketball due to the NBA strike? Bored by the NFL and NHL, disgusted with college football? Don’t despair. The Kyushu Grand Sumo Tournament has just started at Fukuoka Kokusai Center and continues through November 27th. Don’t miss it, it’s the last big sumo tournament of 2011. This is truly heavy competition: rishiki (wrestlers) weight in at 250 to 400 pounds. And talk about your World Series: competitors are from Mongolia, Brazil, Russia, Georgia, Bulgaria, Estonia, and the Czech Republic as well as Japan.

Addio, Silvio!

After 17 colorful years, Silvio Berlusconi has stepped down as Italian Prime Minister, resigning in order to spend more quality time with his bunga-bunga parties. Mr. Berlusconi is now merely a private Italian citizen, third-richest man in Italy, and defendant in several lurid court cases.

Ramos Rescued

Kidnapped Washington Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos has been rescued from his abductors in Venezuela. There is no truth to the rumor that he was traded for two players to be named later.

Mr. Ramos was staying with his family in Valencia, the third largest city in Venezuela, capital of Carabobo state, and his hometown. He has been spending the Major League Baseball off-season playing for the Aragua Tigers in the Venezuelan Baseball League. Ethnocentric Norteamericanos insist on calling  this “winter baseball” even though it will soon be summer in the Southern Hemisphere.

More:

“Wilson Ramos rescatado con un final feliz (Wilson Ramos rescued with a happy ending),” Prensa Tigres de Aragua

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Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-bxJ

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

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Android Wrist Smartphones

In 1946, industrialist Diet Smith gave his detective pal Dick Tracy the gift of cutting-edge mobile technology, the two-way wrist radio, and the square-jawed crimebuster became a one-man radio patrol car. In 1964 Tracy got an upgrade, a two-way wrist TV, and another in 1986, the two-way wrist computer. Today’s personal electronics companies have taken a page out of the Crimestoppers Textbook by introducing Android Smartwatches.

Obama Writes Off Extraterrestrial Vote

In a daring political move, the White House has issued a statement denying the existence of space aliens on Earth. With this act, President Obama risks offending extraterrestial voters, an important swing bloc (especially in Roswell NM and Nevada’s Area 51). Democratic Party operatives probably figure that E.T.s will support one of their own, like Michele Bachmann, anyway.

The official statement on space aliens was written by Phil Larsen of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Mr. Larsen wrote in response to online petitions from supporters of Rep. Ron Paul demanding recogition of space alien Personhood and E.T. voting rights.

Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-bvL

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

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White House Soup

The White House Soup of the Day for November 9, 2011 via MSNBC and FishbowlDC:

Cream of Broccoli

Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-bwh

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Mississippi Votes ‘No’ on Unborn Personhood

In a stunning blow to the new-born Zygote Civil Rights movement, voters in Mississippi prevented conception of a new state law granting “personhood” and the rights and responsibilities thereof to fertilized human eggs, without regard to the citizenship status or age of the host mother’s ovaries and uterus. This sudden outbreak of good sense is surprising after the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision granting “personhood” to corporations, allowing them the free speech to purchase all the votes they can buy.