Like most adults who once were kids, I have memories of my mom encouraging me to eat something I didn’t want to eat.

For some kids it was peas.  For some it was green beans.  For me it was beets.

I hated red beets and I still do.  The only way I could eat them was buried in copious amounts of mashed potatoes, covered in copious amounts of butter.

Mom seemed really mean when she said things like:

• You aren’t getting up from the table until you finish your beets…
• You don’t get any desert if you don’t eat your beets…
• I bet the millions of hungry children in China would thank God for those beets…
• Well…I guess you aren’t really very hungry if you don’t want those beautiful beets…

But mom was kind and gentle compared to the Federal government.  The people we keep in BMWs and lattes through outrageous taxes are considering a regulation that would punish school districts and state education offices that don’t enforce the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act.  (This is the nanny-state idea Michelle Obama came up with to make sure kids eat their vegetables and don’t consume too much candy, soda and other unhealthy things kids like to ingest.)

There isn’t anything inherently wrong with encouraging healthy eating.  But I think we’re getting more government than we need – or want – when people in Washington start dictating what kids in Peoria have to eat for lunch.

The government tells me how much water my toilet can use and what sort of light bulb to use.  Not it is going to tell kids what to eat for lunch.  I’d prefer the Feds concentrate on keeping terrorists out of the country.