RFK Jr., Who Is Definitely Not Checked Out Of His Job, To Host A Cooking Show

from the show-time dept

RFK Jr. has a lot on his plate at the moment as the head of HHS. America is currently dealing with a record breaking outbreak of the measles, for instance. His agency has had a very hard time getting people confirmed for key roles. There’s that whole cyclosporiasis thing going around, which you’ll know you’ve caught it by the simple fact that you won’t be able to stop shitting yourself. There’s a huge self-inflicted talent vacuum at HHS and its child agencies. Pertussis cases are on the rise. Court orders keep blocking Kennedy’s committees.

With all of these crises and chaos, Kennedy became very angry at news reports that he was mostly checked out of the HHS work he should be doing to address all of this. It’s hard to take that anger all that seriously, though, given that Kennedy also became the very first sitting cabinet secretary to host a podcast while in office. And I have to assume it is also a first time a sitting cabinet secretary will — checks notes — host a cooking show with celebrity chefs.

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has launched a show geared toward teaching Americans how to cook healthy, inexpensive meals.

“Thanks to President Trump, we flipped the food pyramid and put real food back where it belongs: at the center of the American plate,” Kennedy said in a video he posted Wednesday to YouTube touting “The Real Food Show.”  “I’m traveling across America, connecting with renowned chefs to show families how to cook delicious, nutritious meals with real ingredients, and all at affordable prices,” the HHS secretary added. “America, it’s time to eat real food. Let’s get cooking.”

Cute. How about instead you travel the country on a mass vaccination campaign for measles? Maybe some lower level member of HHS can rub elbows with celebrity chefs while you, oh, I don’t know, do literally anything concrete when it comes to cyclosporiasis. Maybe you could fill the open roles in your agencies with competent people you can get confirmed by Congress. Or maybe you could get your agencies running smoothly and with high morale.

It’s not that cooking isn’t important. It’s not even that all of Kennedy’s thoughts on food and health are wrong, because they certainly are not. But there is other, real, important work that needs to be done, leadership that needs to be demonstrated, and confidence building that needs to happen with the public. All of that is a better place for the Secretary of HHS to be spending their time, compared with cosplaying as a daytime cooking show host.

Kennedy told USA Today his new cooking show aims to convince Americans that eating healthier does not cost more.

The price of food at home and away from home both rose by 0.2 percent from May to June, according to the consumer price index, a popular measure of inflation. 

It’s actually worse than that and looking at the CPI for food on a monthly basis doesn’t tell the whole story. Year over year CPI for food is up by roughly 3%. All of that is to say that if Kennedy wants to focus on the affordability of fresh food, part of the solution would be for him to get his current boss to not play stupid games with tariffs and to stop starting the very foreign wars that he promised to keep us out of.

So, as you continue to see headlines for the very real health issues the country is currently facing, just remember that RFK Jr. is hard at work baking crab cakes and getting his plating skills just right.

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Comments on “RFK Jr., Who Is Definitely Not Checked Out Of His Job, To Host A Cooking Show”

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16 Comments
Anonymous Coward says:

“Thanks to President Trump, we flipped the food pyramid and put roadkill back where it belongs: at the center of the American plate,” Kennedy said in a video he posted Wednesday to YouTube touting “The Roadkill Show.” “I’m traveling across America, connecting with renowned chefs to show families how to cook delicious, nutritious meals with roadkill, and all at affordable prices,” the HHS secretary added. “America, it’s time to eat roadkill. Let’s get cooking.”

David says:

Chef/healthy/affordable. Pick two.

I know that healthy and affordable is possible because I need to live on that. But choices are reduced to a degree then that you cannot sustain a chef career from the options that remain.

We are essentially talking prison food here, assuming a prison in a civilized country. Like, say, somewhere in Western Europe.

Anonymous Coward says:

Real food with real ingredients, gosh thanks Bob!
I’m really sick of theses Fake Food from Deep State Leftists Fake Industry grown on anti-American soil using chemtrails and electromagnetic waves by nanotechnology robots with old Covid vaccines chemical injected into it… [cough cough] Sorry, a bad cold since last October, but don’t worry, I’ve already stopped medication and vaccines and I’ll only eat real food from now, it’ll be just fine.

Anonymous Coward says:

The index for food at home rose 2.7 percent over the 12 months ending in June.
The fruits and vegetables index rose 5.3 percent over the last 12 months.

So I guess it will be no fruits or vegetables in “The Real Food Show” recipes.

In June, the eggs index rose 4.3 percent, dairy and related products rose 1.2 percent.

And no eggs, milk or butter neither.
Just put some flour in a glass of water, a cheap meal that all the family could enjoy.

Anonymous Coward says:

But there is other, real, important work that needs to be done, leadership that needs to be demonstrated, and confidence building that needs to happen with the public. All of that is a better place for the Secretary of HHS to be spending their time

Really? You think RFK Jr. is a person who can or should do any of that work? I think a firing would be the best case, especially if out of a cannon and into the sun, but garden leave would be the next best thing. It’s easily worth the quarter-million-dollar annual salary to have this person not work.

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