Congress' recent "pizza as vegetable" decision regarding school lunches would be laughable if it weren't emblematic of their capture by special interest groups. As writer Mary Sanchez notes in the Kansas City Star, kids receive about 40% daily calories at school, and many poor children rely on lunch subsidies to get by. By defying new USDA guidelines, they're benefiting industrial food producers at the expense of children's health:

The new rules called for limiting starchy vegetables, reducing sodium and raising the amount of tomato sauce that could be considered a vegetable serving, among other changes. The frozen pizza and french fry lobby was not pleased. According to the New York Times, the food industry spent $5.6 million lobbying against the new rules.

Clearly, all of Michelle Obama’s digging in the White House garden, among other attempts to steer the nation’s children toward fresh fruits and vegetables, just got clobbered. If anyone needs more evidence that the U.S. Congress is working on behalf of lobbyists, rather than in the best interests of the nation, this charade is it.

Read the full story here.

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