Yesterday Chicago restaurant diners bid au revoir to the delectable delicacy foie gras. Foodie political correctness has infected the normally—sensible Windy City as if it were San Francisco. Rick Moran covers the story at Right Wing Nut House.

...in lobbying for a ban on Foie Gras, the animal rights activists have become quite selective in their pity. In fact, it is pure politics. Foie Gras being an expensive delicacy ostensibly eaten only by the rich, PETA has hit upon an issue that boosts their profile in the activist community, thus assuring an increase in donations while politicians can strut and posture like peacocks in the barnyard, showing off their care and concern for the well being of our feathered friends. And since the delicacy can be passed off as a rich man's treat, the City Council figured that they could inject a little class warfare into the issue just for good measure.

What they didn't count on was a revolt by the proletariat against the idea that government should be telling people what moral choices they should or should not be making about what they eat:

Don't come between foodies and their foie gras.

That was the message sent by Chicago diners who dug into foie gras dishes Monday, on the eve of the city's ban on foie gras taking effect. High—end restaurants had special foie gras tastings to protest the ban, and even a few down—home sandwich and pizza joints added it to their menus for the occasion.

[snip]

'What's next?' asked Gadsby, who also hosted an Outlaw Dinner last month at his Noe Restaurant & Bar in Los Angeles, where foie gras will be subject to a statewide ban by 2012. 'They'll outlaw truffles, then lobster, beluga caviar, oysters. There are diners who eat to fill a hunger urge, and there are diners who eat to be dazzled. If you take away the luxury ingredients, how can you dazzle them?'

The Chicago City Council passed the foie gras ban in April, joining California and several European countries that outlawed foie gras alleging animal cruelty.

Rick and I are on the same page with regard to the politics. Two and half years ago, when California began considering a similar ban, I wrote:

Foie gras is an ideal target for injecting the moral equivalence of animals and people into the dietary strictures of law. It is very expensive, and relatively few people in the United States have ever eaten it, much less know how to prepare it. It is French, and hard to pronounce, if you've never heard it trip from the lips of a waiter or friend. And, it is very fatty. Even people like me, who love the stuff, acknowledge that it is at best an occasional pleasure, not a staple of the dinner table.

What ever happened to multiculturalism? As I wrote almost two years ago:

Foie gras is a part of the cultural heritage of the European—American community. My long—deceased Alsatian grandfather, hailing from the home of the Strasbourg goose, would certainly protest this denial of his traditional festive food, produced the traditional Alsatian way. California has accommodated the cultural culinary preferences of many other groups, including certain Pacific Islanders who slaughter and then spit roast large quadrupeds in their front yards. But some animals are more equal than other animals, at least when it is Caucasians who are being told about the limits on their freedom to 'celebrate diversity.'

The whole exercise is a predicate for a ban on eating all meat. Having established the principle, the animal activists will now turn to other meats, with the long term goal of forced vegetarianism.

Thomas Lifson   8 23 06