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From:
Camille Foretich <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 7 Aug 1997 13:24:52 CDT
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The following is long (sorry) from the Yazoo Herald newspaper in Yazoo, MS.
If you would like to respond address it to the author,  Vernon Sikes,
Managing Editor, P.o. Box 720, Yazoo, MS 39194
                FED UP WITH BREASTFEEDING WEEK
"A word of warning.  Don't be surprised if, while you're munching on your
food of choice at your favorite restaurant, the woman sitting at the table
next to yours decides it's time for her little Susie to eat too.
        So, she unbuttons her blouse, unleashes her breast of choice and
commences to breastfeeding little Susie.
        Naw! That wouldn't happen in million years, you say?
        Wrong, Dinosaur Mentality!
        This is 1997, the age of video rentals, do-it-feels-good, and if the
do-it-if-it-feels- good gets you in trouble, big government will kiss the
hurt and make it all better.
        Now, big government is kissing up to breastfeeding.
        Last week, Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, in typical dyed-in-th-
wool, yellow-dog Democrat form, proclaimed Aug.1-7 as WIC national
Breastfeeding Week.
        For clarification purposes, WIC stands for Women, Infants and
Children, which is yet another Democratic touchy-feely, give-away program
that serves 45 percernt of the babies born in the U.S.
        It wasn't enough that in 1993 the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture decided
that Americans were so stupid that they needed to require meat markets to
spend thousands of dollars, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars
annually to remind consumers that a pot roast shouldn't be allowed to sit
around on the kitchen counter for a week before cooking.
        It also became the responsibility of business to warn brain-dead
Americans not to eat hot dogs or hamburger meat that's been lying in the
driveway for two weeks.
        No-brainers, of course. But, then, in the eyes of big government,
Americans are, for the most part, no-brainers.
        Observing some of the lunatics running loose these days, I would have
to agree in part with big government's assessment of our country's mentality
level.
        But all this folderol about breastfeeding is pushing the envelope.
        True, Breastfeeding certainly makes sense. No argument there, except
in the instance of something like what happened in Tucson, Ariz., last week.
        A woman was charged with murder after police said her breast milk was
so full of heroin and methadone that it killed her 7-week-old daughter. The
father was also charged with murder for not intervening.
        But anyone with a smidgen of common sense knows breastfeeding is the
desired source of nourishment for infants.
        My beef is with governmen'ts decision to spend millions of taxpayer's
dollars -- probably $5. or $10 of that once belonged to me - to promote
something that's as natural as dirt to a segment of the population who
doesn't have a clue of what it is to pay taxes and probably never will.
        Again, if breastfeeding is such a no-brainer, exactly what are
Glickman and his merry meddlers up to with this National Breastfeeding Week
crapola?
        Acting Under Secretary for Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services Mary
Ann Keffe - try saying that 10 times in one breath -- said the campaign will
seek to change the attitudes of the public toward breastfeeding.
        That's all the world needs - a generation of women, out to show the
world that their independence includes their right to breastfeed whenever and
whereever they durned well please.
        According to a Clarion-Ledger news story, Pearl resident Debbie
Huffman said she's no longer going to hide as she did with her first son when
she has to nurse her two-week-old daughter.
        "Now I just feel like it's a Natural way to feed my baby," she said,
"Her health and her well-being are the most important things."
        In other words, Glickman is promoting a program that will offer a
touch-feely sympathy and understanding for women who have no qualms about
exposing their upper selves in broad daylight in front of men, women and
children as they take little Susie to the trough.
        Pardon my antiquity and general bad attitude, but National
breastfeeding Week and their "Loving support makes breastfeeding work" slogan
ain't gonna cut it if I'm expected to sit quietly by in a public place and
utter words of reinforcement as some brazen woman asserts her independence
via breastfeeding.
        You can't smoke in public buildings much any more, but you can
breastfeed? Something is definitely wrong with that picture.
        "But we weren't advocating breastfeeding in public places", Glickman
and his merry meddlers will likely claim.
        Sure. And neither was Washington politics influenced by soft money in
the last national election, either.
        Next thing we'll be seeing is men breastfeeding little Susie which,
according to my buddy at the body shop, is being genetically engineered in
England as we speak.
        Makes me wonder just how much more abuse God will Take.

                                                        by Vernon Sikes,
Managing Editor

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