Mustard Gate: The Insanity lives on
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Obama Mustard Attack Becomes Full-Blown Right-Wing Talking Point
Jason Linkins
Egads. This whole Dijon mustard thing is turning into a far bigger and more ridiculous thing than I suspected when I warned yesterday that it might become a big and ridiculous thing. Take a look at this dweeb's website! This guy really does believe he's working the Pentagon Papers story, or something! And this is a Cornell law professor. Yeesh. Not since the Battle of Ypres have so many people choked on so much mustard gas!
Here's some more talking heads being mustard-ed:
Anyway, Media Monitor Dylan Z. helpfully points out that Barack Obama's preference for Dijon mustard was disclosed to the public a LONG time ago, in a little known book titled The Audacity of Hope. In it, Obama describes sitting down to eat at a Chicago restaurant with Dan, a guy with strong political-hack tendencies:
"... On the drive down, we stopped at a TGI Friday's and I ordered a cheeseburger. When the waitress brought the food I asked her if she had any Dijon mustard. Dan shook his head.
'He doesn't want Dijon,' he insisted, waving the waitress off. 'Here' - he shoved a yellow bottle of French's mustard in my direction - 'here's some mustard right here.'
The waitress looked confused. 'We got Dijon if you want it,' she said to me.
I smiled. 'That would be great, thanks.' As the waitress walked away, I leaned over to Dan and whispered that I didn't think there were any photographers around."
As Dylan points out: "So, President Obama does like his cheeseburgers with Dijon mustard, and now we have proof that he's willing to say so even when there are plenty of photographers around." Exactly. And even make jokes about it, too. But, sad to say, this Dan fellow has only been proved correct this week. Dylan puts it best: "It appears Dan was right. His opponents are really that small, petty, and ridiculous that they'll try to make an issue out of it."
Also, David Frum -- you know, the noted Francophile philosoph - has pretty succinctly noted that eating mustard on cheeseburgers is the American thing to do.
What kind of a man eats his hamburger without ketchup? That was the big question yesterday on talk radio, after President Obama visited an Arlington, Virginia, hamburger place on Tuesday and ordered his burger with spicy mustard.
First answer: Texans.
Texans traditionally eat hamburgers with mustard or with mayonnaise (or with both), but without ketchup. This is simply called a “hamburger” in Texas, but is sometimes called a “Cowboy Burger” or a “Texas Burger” outside of Texas.
A hamburger with ketchup is sometimes called a “Yankee Burger.” A hamburger with mayonnaise is sometimes called a “Sissy Burger.”
Dirty Martin’s (in Austin since 1926) serves hamburgers with mustard, pickles, onions, and tomatoes, but it is not known when this combination began. The popular Texas “Whataburger” hamburger chain has served hamburgers with mustard from its founding (1950). The hamburger-with-mustard combination in Texas is attested at least from the 1950s, but the pre-1950s hamburger condiments cannot be firmly established.
Second answer: Republicans. A 2000 survey of members of Congress by the National Hot Dog Council found that 73% of Republican lawmakers preferred mustard to ketchup, as opposed to 47% of Democratic lawmakers.
Final answer: traditionalists. Louis' Lunch in New Haven, Connecticut, the restaurant widely believed to have served the first hamburgers ever made in the United States, absolutely forbids ketchup.
I think we shall sum up this chapter of our lives in America with the words of Alex Balk:
Grey Poupon is owned and manufactured by Kraft Foods. It is the processed cheese of mustards. It is the fucking Velveeta of faux-French products. Can we all shut the fuck up?
--The Awl, "People Are Idiots And Yet I Am Responding To This Idiocy," May 7, 2009.
Spicy, spicy sauce