Jell-O on the hoof

The ancients had entrails to encourage them. I root around for any printed sign of hope as I’m despairing over health insurance reform thanks to the gutless wonders in Congress and the gullible fools out in “the heartland.” And I found one in the e-release I got from Stanford’s hospital announcing it has started to clean up its food act and is now boldfacing all the buzzwords: organic, local, sustainable. If an outpost of one of the last emblems of truly shitty food is on the right track, help might be on the way. Americans no longer confined to crappy insurance plans but set free with single payer could choose where to be laid up by searching Menupages. The brains behind this innovation in blanc mangery, though, might want to lose the “tray liners featuring images of Stanford’s farm heritage.” If we learned one thing from “Food, Inc.,” it’s that the more bucolic the picture, the uglier the reality. Don’t inadvertently remind us how many pig parts are in use in operating rooms — and how few are heritage guts.