Founded 1983: Liberal Mindset; Conservative Morality

September 23, 2026

Pillar of Salt

Genesis records the first health warning about sodium. Lot’s wife, fleeing the burning city, looks back and turns into a pillar of salt. Read it as a warning about attachment, about the price of facing the wrong direction. Then read it as prophecy. Three thousand years later, a whole food supply did the same thing to its eaters. We became the preserved: cured, brined, and held in place by the leading cause of death in the country.

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October 17, 2013

Will We Ever Eat Healthy at McDonald’s?

As a healthy eater, and as a Vegan, I have been a longtime supporter of McDonald’s long-suffering effort to offer a better, and healthier menu, at an affordable price, for their millions of daily customers.

Here’s my review of their new “McVeggie” sandwich — published on January 2, 1999:

The McDonalds McVeggie burger can be found in limited availability. In New York City, there are three or four McDonalds in Manhattan that offer the McVeggie. In locations that offer the McVeggie, you’ll find signs outside and large banners inside touting the McVeggie. There’s even a “McVeggie Extra Value Meal” that offers a large drink and large fries with the sandwich! The full-color McVeggie Extra Value Meal sign was professionally made and looked like all the other food images hanging behind the cashiers. The McVeggie is certainly not a scribbled-on after-thought and it appears to be a full member of the McDonalds family in these limited locations.

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February 22, 2013

Soup! Soup!

I have a variation on the following conversation each evening after I finish teaching. I enter my local deli, order my standard vegetable sandwich, and the sandwichmaker grills me about my soup choices. It doesn’t seem to matter to him that I don’t ever want the soup — even when they have vegetable soup, I don’t want soup because the soup is too salty — and every time he presses me into taking soup I do not want or need. The deli is the only place that’s open late by the time I get home and they do make a delicious veggie sandwich.