Michelle Obama claps back over school lunches

(The Undefeated)

“Why don’t you want our kids to have good food at school? What is wrong with you?”

Those were the words of Michelle Obama speaking at the Partnership for a Healthier America 2017 Healthier Future Summit in Washington on Friday. The former first lady was addressing the recent actions of new Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue, who has decided that basically the rules that the Obamas implemented to create healthier food choices in schools shouldn’t all be required, ostensibly for the purposes of not hamstringing the food service providers.

Ever since Donald Trump decided to run for office, he promised to roll back various measures that President Barack Obama had put in place over the previous eight years. In those cases, one could reasonably argue that political differences were a decent reason for said actions. People disagree on what should and should not be regulated all the time. But food for kids? It doesn’t take a policy wonk to know that the health of the next generation is vital to, well, the survival of the nation. This isn’t difficult.

“Think about why someone is OK with your kids eating crap,” Obama continued. “If somebody is doing that, they don’t care about your kid.”

Which, as an aside, is what made her efforts while in the White House so smart. First ladies are often saddled with the often unfair burden of representing a “cause” just for the sake of keeping up appearances. Lady Bird Johnson wanted to make the nation’s capital look better. Nancy Reagan took a different route, lending her face to the Just Say No movement, arguably the most asinine, ineffective and ultimately harmful marketing campaign in American public health history. As the outward-facing image of the highly problematic war on drugs, Reagan was a star in her own right.

So when Obama decided to put a vegetable garden on the White House lawn and use it as a way to teach visiting schoolkids the importance of healthy eating, it was unimpugnable. On top of that, her Let’s Move campaign, an effort to curb childhood obesity, dovetailed nicely with the overall message that healthy living is better for everyone from a basic human standpoint.

Which is why she brought it up today. Do we know why these rollbacks are happening across the board when it comes to The Donald vs. Barack? Of course we do. But now, we also know that if a corporation or company can benefit from something at the cost of your kids’ future, this administration is willing to allow that.

Are we willing to sacrifice a generation to spite the Obamas? Some people in our country have already said yes to that. The question is whether we’re willing to admit why.