New NE Governor Rolls Out Bold Policy Of Hysterical Attacks On Soy Milk, Meat Substitutes

[hatrack]

Last week, Nebraskans elected Republican businessman Jim Pillen to be the state’s next governor. It’s no surprise he won: Nebraska has picked a Republican in every gubernatorial election since 1998. But what made Pillen’s campaign so peculiar — and alarming to those who care about animal welfare and climate change — is that no other political candidate has campaigned so vehemently against veggie burgers and soy milk. Throughout his campaign, Pillen vowed to “stand up to radicals who want to use red tape and fake meat to put Nebraska out of business,” and promised to work to pass laws that ban plant-based food producers from using words like “meat” and “milk” on their packaging.

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Pillen also has a financial interest in maintaining Nebraska’s hands-off regulatory landscape: His giant hog operations have been trailed by air and water pollution complaints since the 1990s. Pillen’s campaign did not respond to an interview request for this story. The real aim, it seems, of his vitriol toward bean burgers — a tactic increasingly deployed by Republican politicians — is to ensnare plant-based meat into the culture war and further cleave an already divided electorate.

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Real meat is for real Americans, while the stuff made from plants is touted by “coastal billionaires,” Pillen’s campaign asserted. The same message lit up right-wing media last year when the Daily Mail speculated — with zero evidence — that President Joe Biden’s climate change plan might limit red meat consumption. (What became the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed a year and a half later, didn’t touch meat; ensuring an abundant, cheap meat supply is a goal that still has bipartisan consensus in the US.)

The message resurfaced this summer when Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene nonsensically warned that the government was going to surveil and “zap” people who eat cheeseburgers. Texas Rep. Ronny Jackson, who served as the White House physician for five years and who won reelection last week along with Greene, tweeted “I will NEVER eat one of those FAKE burgers made in a LAB. Eat too many and you’ll turn into a SOCIALIST DEMOCRAT. Real BEEF for me!!”

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https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2022/11/18/23458234/jim-pillen-governor-nebraska-pigs-pork-plant-based-meat-water-pollution-nitrates

[Tetrachloride]

1. I sense someone will troll him with a food cart

of soy milk smoothies and veggie chili cookouts.

[multigraincracker]

2. No more Milk of Magnesia,

unless it uses cow milk? OK to eat real meat as long as the real cost is included in the store price.

[Blues Heron]

4. oops didnt see your post - great minds!

[OnlinePoker]

5. Or Milk of Human Kindness

I guess Shakespeare was a left-wing radical.

[Blues Heron]

3. dont tell him about milk of magnesia

or liebfraumilch for that matter

[C_U_L8R]

6. Cream of Wheat's gonna be pissed

but many won't cry in their milk if Nebraska wants to make itself a food desert.

[DarthDem]

7. Ah, so this is the new attempted front in the endless Gooper culture wars

They're coming for your red meat!!! BOOGA BOOGA!!

Of course, no one is.

Another thought - doesn't Nebraska have plants? Just asking questions!

[NotASurfer]

8. How cheesy. Wait until he finds out there's no ham in a hamburger

And that a wiener dog isn't made of wieners.

On the positive side, maybe he'll try to do something about spammers