Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1922-09-06
What Do They Eat?

What Do They Eat?
Everytime the cattle market
slumps off we hear that the dressed
beef market is bad and that Boston
or some other eastern sea port has
gone on a non-meat diet.
The pork market is affected by
similar inclinations on the part of
the people not to take off pork, over
Lent, or during hot weather, we
have been trained 10 believe.
Now with wheat selling at ninety
six cents a bushel at the country
loading stations and elevators, and
with no particular surplusage of
wheat in the world, and with peo-
pie said to be eating little meat in
The hot summer months, we are in
clined to wonder what in the world
they are eating.
OF course, string beans, bee.s,
cabbage, onions, cucumbers, peach
Is, blackberrieS, early apples and
cantaloupeS and watermelons are
ripening, so we can presume, if we
care to do so, that people have
turned vegetarian.
Truly the people have learned that
the scriptures We're right when they
said that imam can not live by bread
alone" Evidently man can live with
out beef and bread and pork and
bread if he wants to. Perhaps he
does not. Perhaps the market for
bread and meat is controlled by
something other than peoples appeti-
ties. If il is true that an inclination
TO curtail the consumption of meat
and bread causes the beef and wheat
market to cave in then We must be
convinced that when wheat touches
ninety six cents a bushel, and with
part of the world starving for bread
and meat, that the wheat market has
caved in, the public having knocked
the props out from under the struc-
ture by curtailing bread consump-
ton.
1t is a poor rule that does not work
both ways. We are inclined to be-
lieve that there is manipulation Of
the market, and that slight slack
ening up in demand for a certain "a
ton of bread and meat is only an
excuse for bearing the raw product
market. Slackened demand is just as
good an excuse as any for manipula-
tions. Automobile tourists are abroad
in the land. T-bone steaks, French
fried potatoes and bread and butter
are the standard rations OF the coun-
>txy hotels where most tourists eat,
that is if they do nat-conk- enroute.
~ ,,.sss.-.1,~- =
II Is dinIcult to Ne hS---.sr--5 -Sssss'1s-c
on less on tour than they would at
home, particularly since they are out
in the open, but the touring season
IS advanced as one reason for a
slackened demand for beef and bread.
Automobile tourists use less milk
and cream on tour than they do al
home. If they cook enroute there
is a great deal of black coffee. MIX
and butter are not easily handled
where there is no refrigeration, and
vet we do not hear of the milk, but
ter and cheese market showing rs
.v,,res and threats Of caving in. The
,manipulators of the beef and bread
market. The milk men are the
greatest boosters in the world. They
ALWAYS keep a stiff upper lip, and
On on telling the world that milk
and butter and cheese are indispen-
sable, and yet every one knows that
adults can and do, under the pres
sure of circumstances, discard them,
and. as with the automobile tourists
turn to T-bone steaks, French
fried potatoes, sliced tomatoes and
coffee when eating at country hotels
or 10 bacon and eggs and black COT
fee and other quickly and easily
prepared foods when j. comes Il
cooking over camp stove while OF
tour.
Old Barnum was dead right. Ih'
American people have to be hum
plugged. The farmer pays the oil
every time the dressed meat make
becomes stagnant at Boston o
Lynn or Jersey City, or when Russ
fails to take cargo of wheat am
pay for it in paper rubles, or whe
the Argentine dumps a shipload 0
wheat on England. Demand Is
tickle jade, but she is not nearly 5
tickle as manipulators make ne
out.