It's not a place I willingly go, but from your efforts I can see the value of getting a peek now and then.

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Let me be very clear. I think that if someone grows a garden for fun, for survival or just to reduce the amount that they will have to take from the government in the form of food stamps then I am all for it.

I do think it's funny thinking about millionaires (who also happen to be the most powerful couple in the world) gardening. I'm sorry. I can't really explain why. However, I know it's a good lesson for the children and I did have a garden when I was a kid. The problems that I encountered were that I wasn't very good at it and as a kid I hated my vegetables.

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I don't think your opposition is to the policies of this nascent administration. From everything you've written about them, I believe it's personal.

Personally, I find that Obama stands in stark contrast to our previous president, who lived his entire life before attaining office as a recipient of unearned privilege and the largess of his father's suitors (the loan from a Bahraini oil entrepreneur that got him his stake in the Texas Rangers, for instance) without ever doing a lick of real work, or even being a part of a successful business venture of any kind.

Contrast that with the Obamas who grew up poor-to-middle class but hard working, attaining everything we're told we're supposed to aspire to--first class educations with honors, advanced degrees--on their own and then tell me that your derision for these "millionaires" doesn't have a touch of contempt that has nothing to do with your ethics and everything to do with your allegiance to a party. Or worse.

Presidents and their families lead, like it or not, by example. This is a good example of something everyone--regardless of their circumstances--should at least try, even if they don't like it and ultimately opt out. Why? Because there are millions of Americans who have no idea where their food comes from. And because only eating food out of cardboard and plastic containers is a major contributor to the astronomical cost of health care that is killing the American economy.

So...leading by example. I know, it's a totally weird concept. The last guy hid behind his powerful family, laughed at the contrition of death row inmates, lied a nation into war and told the world that Jesus had chosen him to be President. There's nothing honorable in his entire life that I would want anyone to emulate.

Look, I know you're trying, in some instances at least, to be playful, but every time you post about politics, your reflexive and obsessive hatred of Obama really shows. And like I said in a previous post, it just makes you a bore. Go back and read your first comment on this thread and explain to yourself why you think it's funny. Or why anyone else should care what you think.

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The First Family plant a vegetable garden to set a good example for the nation. Because they are such a charismatic and attractive family, millions of other families follow suit. They then quit buying vegetables in markets. This drives down the demand for farmed vegetables. When that industry starts to crash, the demand for farmhands also falls off and that means layoffs.

In the mean time, the family is now distracted by the new garden and become less productive in their other more lucrative endeavors. So, now we have crashing prices, laid off farmers and a lack of productivity from the American worker.

All of this because our President is using a garden to distract his children from the fact that he doesn't want to commit to a dog.

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I must ask whether you're familiar with the general dimensions and capacity of the average private garden.

In the mean time, the family is now distracted by the new garden and become less productive in their other more lucrative endeavors.

I think you have to presume that the gardeners will generally act rationally, and thus use gardening to replace their least productive (not "lucrative") endeavors.

I do note that many people swear by the exercise and existential benefits that come from gardening, so I think you also have to count those benefits against the opportunity cost of whichever "productive" activities are given up (downloading internet porn, would be my guess).

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That's not conservative. It's sore-loser dickheadedness.

Then again, these are the same thinkers who will go on at length about what a loser Jimmy Carter was for turning the temperature in the White House down to 68 degrees, while completely ignoring the fact that, had we followed his recommendations, our dependence on foreign oil would be fifty to sixty percent less than it is today.

It's good to know that "conservatives" don't believe in American citizens being anything but consumers of struggling farmers. Like ADM.

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Every time she opens her mouth to chastise the plebs in her best whispery voice, it makes me want spray pesticides down her throat and rub her face with Mickey D fries. Her smugness does a disservice to her message. Pollan is a better, smarter less insufferable advocate.

As an aside, Chez Panisee has very delicious food.

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Telling people how affordable fresh veggies are while poaching an egg over an open indoor fire with a 4 foot brass ladle reeks of ''let them eat cake'.

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