
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 28, 1990                   TAG: 9003280479
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BROCCOLI AT LAST, PRESIDENT CAN SAY NO

"I SAY IT'S spinach," quoth the lad in the famous New Yorker magazine cartoon decades ago, "and I say the hell with it." George Bush is a grown-up with a wider range of choices than that rebellious child. And he has made his own feelings clear about another green vegetable, broccoli: He wants no part of it.

If the president's distaste for broccoli is shared widely by other Americans, it could spell trouble for Virginia farmers: The vegetable has been touted here as a good replacement for tobacco, a crop whose future is in jeopardy for obvious reasons.

At the moment, though, 90 percent of U.S. broccoli comes from California. When word leaked of Bush's banning of broccoli from the Air Force One menu, it was miffed West Coast growers who loaded 10 tons of their produce on trucks and dispatched them to Washington.

Bush was unmoved. Asked about the controversy at a news conference, he delivered a proclamation of sorts. "I do not like broccoli. And I haven't liked it since I was a little kid, and my mother made me eat it. I'm president of the United States, and I'm not going to eat any more broccoli."

Being president of the United States means never having to say the hell with it. Your desires carry a power that doesn't require the reinforcement of profanity.

It happens that the first lady eats broccoli. Along with the family dog, Millie, she was on hand Monday when the convoy of trucks arrived at the White House, and she graciously thanked the donors. Her liking for the vegetable has its limits, so most of the 10 tons will go to a food bank. Barbara Bush said she's tried to get her husband to develop a taste for it, but added: "If his own blessed mother can't make him eat broccoli, I give up."

Is the White House worried about alienating broccoli-lovers? After all, the average American eats 3 1/2 pounds of it a year. Chances are good, however, that a lot of this is consumed under protest: by dutiful kids, such as the president once was, or by adults who still feel bound by mom's wishes that they eat what's good for them.

George Bush has pulled another shrewd political maneuver. He's already got the flag-wavers, the tax-haters, the people who fear Willie Horton. Now he's tapped into another powerful bloc, the anti-broccoli vote. Democrats can ponder this while they munch their florets.

by CNB