Monday April 23, 2012

NEW VOICE COLUMN UP, about the Obama-eats-dogs thing. Again this week, the bonus bit is by Ann Althouse, who offers this analysis:

Notice how the individual will of the child is missing. The father figure teaches; the child learns how to eat. He receives instruction. He has feelings in that he reports the texture (but not the taste) of the various foods, but we hear absolutely nothing about whether he resisted these impositions or felt any sort of disgust. 

Somehow I get the feeling that when young Ann Althouse refused to eat the carrots on her dinner plate, her parents just sighed and got out the Cap'n Crunch.

And now, Obama, President of the United States, is married to a woman who purports to teach us all how to eat. She's not forcing us to do anything. And despite some recent talk on the subject, the government has never undertaken to require us to eat broccoli. But young Obama wasn't forced to eat dog. He "learned." He was "introduced." (Fido, meet Barack. Barack, meet Fido... meat Fido.) It's instruction, not compulsion.

And maybe you will eat what you're told.

Children.

Similarly, W's youthful consumption of Jack Daniels inspired Laura Bush's sinister literacy drives. Yet we resisted the subtle pressure to join a book club. Never surrender!

UPDATE. Althouse disputes my characterization. For one thing, she says she was too old for Cap'n Crunch. Come now, Professor, you're being modest! Also:

Here I am explaining my cereal preference to 2 guys including a guy who looks like my dad and has a name like some guy in my adopted home town, Guy Madison.

Is this like El Topo and I'm supposed to get high before going to see it? The whole blog, I mean.