Given how much Kristi Noem hates it when Nikki Haley promotes free lunches, I can’t believe she hasn’t tweet-erupted about President Joe Biden offering every kid in America another year of free lunches:
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) today issued a broad range of flexibilities to allow school meal programs and childcare institutions across the country to return to serving healthy meals in fall 2021 as part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to reopen schools safely. Several meal service flexibilities that enable social distancing are now extended through June 30, 2022. The waivers continue the Administration’s commitment to provide safe, healthy meals free of charge to children as the pandemic continues to threaten the food and nutrition security of our most vulnerable [USDA, press release, 2021.04.20].
Governor Noem tweeted something about following science and data yesterday to justify another fake executive order against a non-threat. She must be really excited about the real science showing that the Biden Administration will do real good for real kids by giving them real, good meals for free:
A recent study from Tufts University found that in 2018, schools were the single healthiest source of U.S. food consumed across a sample of children and adults. The 2018 study found that diet quality for foods from schools improved significantly from a similar study conducted in 2003-2004.
…Up to 12 million children are currently living in households where they may not always have enough to eat during the pandemic. During the past year, America’s schools and childcare centers have provided a nutrition lifeline for children across the country, many of whom depend on USDA’s child nutrition programs for the nourishment they need to grow and thrive. Some kids rely on these programs for as many as three meals a day, underscoring how essential it is for USDA to empower schools and childcare centers to continue their dedicated efforts to serve healthy meals, safely. [USDA, 2021.04.20].
This additional year of free lunches for America’s kids is brought to your by $12 billion included in the American Rescue Plan, the coronavirus relief bill that Kristi’s pals Dusty, John, and Marion Michael all voted against.
Mmm… bring on the puzzle-fry hotdish!
Food Research Question:
Are tater tots known as “puzzle fries” in SD?
My internet knows nothing of “puzzle fries”.
Our South Dakota rural poverty is wide and deep enough that often half or more of the students qualified for free or reduced fee lunches (before Uncle Joe changed the rules).
Mr. Lansing, I believe I have considerable knowledge and experience eating all possible forms of potatoes here in South Dakota, but I have not heard of puzzle fries. I am not knocking them, mind you, and would be willing to try some with a nice sausage gravy, but I bet you an Aberdeen nickel from the World Famous Silver Dollar Bar (Mr. H can vouch for me on this one) it’s some goofy invention local to Aberdeenites.
well…food for kids should be pretty non controversial….glad to see it…glad its K-12-you can’t fill up a teenager..I taught for a couple years and I never heard a kid complain about school lunch, no matter how bland or gooey….the poor kids didn’t throw much away…the kids from “good homes” might leave some mystery foods uneaten, but I also saw them eat mutton.
I believe puzzle fries are tater tots BUT shaped like Tetris pieces. Yet another not-so-subtle invasion of America by the Russians that happened under Trump.
John, even in “urban” SD, the high rate of free and reduced lunches surprises me. SD is not exempt from the evils of wealth disparity that stratifies our families and dissolves the middle-class. At least SD interests collide in that school lunch is part of the farm bill.
I checked the percentage of kids receiving free/reduced price meals at the schools I attended in Rapid:
Woodrow Wilson Elementary: 31.6%
South Middle: 21.2%
RC Central High: 15.6%
There’s a cluster of schools in North Rapid where 90-100% of the student body qualify. Rapid’s very segregated by class, and by race to a lesser degree.
Food should always be available to any child for free. We are the wealthiest nation on earth. So much food is thrown away or destroyed everyday just from excess amounts or to control prices.
No one in this country should go hungry EVER!!!!!
Usually people who don’t like the free lunch idea have never missed a meal or been in want. Their needs have always been satisfied. Very fortunate.
Children do not ask to be born nor do they choose their parents. I’m quite certain, most mothers are in favor of free lunches, but why are so many grumpy old men against it?
Speaking of hunger and need; while in Vietnam in ’67 I personally witnessed local Vietnamese, some of whom were the VC (our ‘enemy’-they all wore black pj’s) brush the maggots off meat scraps from GI garbage at a dump. That’s how they subsisted.
Wealthy like Noem know nothing – absolutely nothing, of hunger. Real hunger.
But, she will use it as a dog-whistle dividing her voters that she, being of the GOP SD party of ‘haves,’ have to be kept separate from the ‘have nots’ of her party’s mind.
Meanwhile, those that deliver the so-called, by her, “Free Lunch” are subsidized by socialistic practices disguised by ‘free enterprise’ of the GOP mind!
Jeez Cory, I think the puzzle fry hotdish got nixed by Michelle Obama. I know the unhealthy stuff got put back in by trump and his minions, (after all he only eats well done steaks South Dakota), but truly healthy food is not on the pub state menu.
I remember a segment in “Supersize Me” that showed how a school turned around its performance and discipline issues by serving better lunches. Fresh food prepared the way it (used to be) made at home.
V, the amount of “ugly” food we throw away is immoral.
M, I also see the hypocrisy that “pro-life” advocacy ends when those children need to be fed (or provided health care, or need asylum).
For many schools, convenience wins out. Prepared meals are easier to serve (especially now in the CORONA mitigation). Schools also are up against student preferences for processed food because that is what they have been programed to eat. I someone were serious about reforming education, although it seems tangential, serving a good meal or two would be where I would start any reform effort.