The fruit police (you can't make it up fast enought)

The New Criterion ^ | 12/31/03 | Roger Kimball

[tertiary01]

Believe it or not apricots are hard to grow in many parts of Calif. We've never been able to get them to consistently produce here in Napa, because of the late frosts we often experience. Yet my cousin in the Esparto-Winters area which is farther north gets good crops from the same varieties every year. That area is known for it's wonderful apricots.

[dljordan]

I seem to remember a story recently about the USDA arming the chicken inspectors. I suppose those chicken ranchers must be a rowdy bunch.

[Nick Danger]

I don't believe this can or does apply to a farmer's roadside stands. If so I am amazed.

It does in California. As a wayward youth, I was once busted by one of those Ag Police for selling apples and peaches at the side of the road just outside Tehachapi. I had made a deal with a local farmer to sell his stuff for half of the proceeds. My teenage entreprenurial adventure was crushed when this cop pulled out a "peach ring" and demonstrated that some of my peaches would go through it. For which he shut me down and gave me a ticket. That's how I know about this stuff; I learned it the hard way :)

[Valin]

WHAT! You mean give this "substandard" food to someone who may be starving? Wouldn't that mean that they aren't worthy of our best? If it's not good enough for Knightsbridge it's not good enough for Uganda.





Do I really need a sarcasm tag? :-)

[Boot Hill]

The food police of the European Union are enforcing all manner of rules and regulations

DIRTY HARRY, Fruit Cop...
"Ah-ah, I know what you're thinking punk. You're thinking did I measure 6cm or only five? And to tell you the truth I've forgotten myself in all this excitement. But being this is a .44 Magnum - the most powerful micrometer in the world and will blow your produce clean off your shelfs, you've got to ask yourself a question--Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk!"

.44 Magum -- the most powerful micrometer in the world

--Boot Hill

[dennisw]

Thanks much. I guess you know from real world experience.

[Porterville]

Be afraid of the EU, they the Euro is ahead of the dollar, and Brussels is full of fags (cigarettes)

[Libertina]

The ban on bendy bananas was necessary, according to an EU Commission official at the time, to prevent them from being mistaken for a "bicycle wheel".
And the liberals want us to be more like Europe? Yeah, right...over my dead...

[Libertina]

A peach "ring"? Are you sure this wasn't some sort of gang ? ;)

[dennisw]

Paved paradise and put up a parking lot. San Jose area (Silicon Valley) was producer of apricots and other fine stone fuits. I drove through there and saw the roadside signs for farmer's fruit stands. Hawking apricots etc.

[dennisw]

I "get" the peach reference but apricots are superior to peaches.

[DLfromthedesert]

"Some of it will rub off on us" .. With SC Justices like O'Connor, Ginsburg and Kennedy, I'm afraid more than a little will rub off.

[Libertina]

But peaches bring the fuzz ;)

[Old Professer]

Loopy.

[dennisw]

Oy vey and g'night.

[Nick Danger]

A peach "ring"?

The Official Federal Peach Regulations, I kid you not.

[Libertina]

I'm speechless... So small peaches are out, then? LOL These people have WAAAAY too much time on their hands.. too much power as well.

[T'wit]

> How does 185k pg. compare to the blizzard of bs from the US bureaucrats?

Now that you mention it, it's about one snowball's worth. US regulation is -- no fooling -- measured in shelf-feet. 185,000 pages is about right for federal regulation of paper clips.