What is it about the combination of food and government antics that send journalists into a pun-frenzy? Never mind the Europeans and their food regulations. Here’s what the news ticker looks like regarding the whole White House “Beer Summit” silliness:
White House “beer summit” aims to quench racial flap
Beer Diplomacy: The Red, Light and Blue Summit
Beer brewers beg for White House berth
Will ‘beer summit’ quench thirst for harmony or go flat?
Media Laps Up Obama Beer Summit
White House summit:Beer brews trouble
..and *this,* from the normally respectable Wall Street Journal: ”White House ‘Beer Summit’ Becomes Something of a Brouhaha:
The president’s plan to toss back a few cold ones with some high-profile guests at the White House has the American beer industry hopping mad.
This afternoon, Henry Louis Gates Jr., the Harvard professor and race-relations expert, and James Crowley, the police sergeant who controversially arrested Mr. Gates, are to stop by for a round of brews…
(…)
Among rival brewers, the news fell flat. “We would hope they would pick a family-owned, American beer to lubricate the conversation,” said Bill Manley, a spokesman for the Sierra Nevada Brewing Co….
(…)
Richard Neal, a Massachusetts Congressman who has also written the White House amid the beer ferment, also hopes the meeting will promote beer-drinking nationalism.
(…)
When questioned by reporters on Tuesday, Mr. Gibbs, the White House spokesman, tackled the beer issue head-on.
(…)
(http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124891169018991961.html?mod=rss_com_mostcommentart)
Seriously.
Ok, I admit, part of me loves this stuff (the part that is not groaning in agony) and part of me thinks the Prez did exactly the right thing under the circumstances, by organizing this little let’s-just-settle-this-over-a-beer event (the part of me that’s from Boston)… but BUD LIGHT as the Presidential Beer?!?!?! Sheesh.
A Single Malt Scotch Summit, or better yet, Single Barrel Kentucky Straight Bourbon Summit, I could have *really* respected.
Filed under: Diversions, Uncommon Comestibles
[...] I’m not an active Wikipedia editor — though I once tried doing some editing on Wikipedia years ago and recommend it for schoolchildren learning a topic. (The best way to learn a topic is to try to write about it — and deal with other psychotic Wikipedia editors nipping at your every edit). In my brief foray into this realm of the nerdosphere, I’ve found that the amount of energy that can go into these Wikipedia meta-debates is astounding — rivaled only by the media’s coverage of Presidents drinking beer with cops and professors. [...]