By Gene Ayres

Here’s an idea: go to your pantry (or fridge) and take out ten random processed food or beverage-like products. Take a look at the ingredients. Random processed food products are required by law (weak as it already is) to list products’ contents in order of quantity (i.e. the mostest is the firstest). What’s firstest on practically everything? (Water doesn’t count, and we’ve already discussed water). Hint: it isn’t MSG. At least not yet (another article for another day).

If it isn’t number one or two on there, it’s not far down the list. Sugar. Sugar. Sugar. Not there, you say? Wrong! To paraphrase The Who, the new additive is same as the old additive, so don’t be fooled again. Sugar has lots of tricky names these days, and comes in lots of sneaky shapes and forms, just like any carnival act.

There’s cane sugar, of course. When it comes to toxic addictive drugs, this is right up there with heroin. Come on: ask yourself, why is your kid really on Ritalin? Answer: he’s hopped up to the gills on sugar. Especially if it’s refined. Just like heroin: nothin’ like that pure white powder or better yet, pure white crystals to get you wrecked, baby! No wonder half of America needs downers just to get functional again (another topic).

Sugar can be so-called Pure Cane Sugar, or if a bit less refined, light brown, and a bit better, dark brown, on the nutrition scale. Sure you can get organic sugar in all these forms. Then there’s honey. Again, refined at differing levels, and organic or not. I always wondered how you direct the bees to only pollenate the organic plants, but then, what do I know?

But here’s where the real fun begins. If your catsup doesn’t say “sugar,” right up there after tomato puree, it will say “corn syrup.” Or “fructose,” or “high fructose corn syrup,” etc. There’s lots of cool ways to make, and disguise sugar. It comes from lots of other plants besides sugar cane, for one thing. Like corn. Of course that’s mostly going for ethanol now and that’s not so good on your pancakes.

But here’s my question of the day: why do we need sugar in catsup? Or spaghetti sauce (number two in both), or for that matter orange juice, or yogurt, or soup, or crackers, or bread, for that matter? It’s in everything, though. Just take a look.

Maybe it has to do with history, in a way. Sugar used to be the number one export product of Cuba, which produced at one time 30% of the global supply. Then Castro came along, and all the sugar barons moved to Florida. And got a lot of clout, along with a lot of Everglades to grow even more, and more, and more sugar. Florida and the Texas coast and Louisiana are big. Also producing sugar. Way bigger than Cuba. That’s a lot of sugar.

Especially when the government subsidizes you for growing it, or even not growing it. There’s one family of Ex-Cubans in Florida, for instance (I won’t name names, but you can probably find them if you study the history of sugar and Florida), that gets an extra $50,000,000 a year from the USDA as a “price support.” That’s in addition to their usual income from their wholly owned company, U.S. Sugar. At least they still did when I lived in Florida, and that was before GW came to power. Now it’s probably more, since agricultural price supports remain very popular in the Red States. And it always helps when you are Anti-Castro and have friends in high places.

Here’s how it works. Big Agriculture has big investments in Big Sugar. They not only want to produce a lot of the product, they also want to make sure there’s a ready, steady market for it. Ever notice how many TV adds are selling something sweet? Especially to kids. Never mind all that “healthy breakfast” crap. It’s sugar, plain and simple. That cereal has just as much as that candy bar or bowl of ice cream. Even all that plus mom and pop and the kids dumping three spoonfuls more on their Sugar Smacks isn’t nearly enough. It’s gotta be in the coffee, too, of course. And just in case, also in the coffee creamer, just to make sure you get your full daily dose. And the “orange-flavored beverage.” Never mind those 11 teaspoons of sugar in every can of Coke, that news has been out for years. But catsup? French fries?

In fairness, the Chinese have known for eons that a little sugar is nice to spice up your rice (for the record, the Chinese didn’t used to eat sweets or desserts until we came along, they only used it like salt, just a touch for cooking). Now of course, they’re full bore sugar addicts like the rest of us.

So it was inevitable we’d get to a place where if a little sugar is good, a lot of sugar is even better, and why not a little sugar in everything we eat and drink! Wait, let’s make that a lot of sugar in everything we eat and drink. Good for the dentists, too, although it’s not their fault, they even warned us.

Which brings us to Aspartame, but not today, I feel a little queasy. I think it was that coffee creamer. That or that sugar-laced honey muffin with the side of sugar-laced fruit preserves—yeah, fruit is no longer nearly sweet enough all by its lonesome.

Anyway,

Sweet dreams.

And don’t forget to brush your teeth.