Colbert Report covers Pink Slime

Pink slime: It's gelatinous, it's ammonia-treated, and it's what's for dinner. This meat used to be either discarded or deemed good enough only for dog food, but currently is used as the filler for 70% of supermarket ground beef.  According to The Daily, the US Department of Agriculture buys 7 million pounds of it annually to put in school lunches. Cue the American Public's outrage, and pepper it with Stephen Colbert's comedic take on the matter.

The Beefstate Governorswww.colbertnation.com

So. Is this another case of media sensationalism? Is pink slime worthy of such uproar? After all, it's just lean finely textured beef trimmings, centrifuged to separate the beef from the fat, and then treated with non-toxic levels of ammonium hydroxide to make sure it's free of e.coli or harmful bacteria. "Pink slime" isn't any worse than the stuff you'd find in "yellow nuggets, brown breakfast sausage patties, or any number of mystery meat products," writes The Atlantic. The American Meat Industry, as reported in The Week, maintains that it's an efficient use of lean meat from the cattle they raise, and using it keeps production costs down, which keeps supermarket costs down, and more Americans well fed. 


Maybe we can just say, "if you're weirded out, you don't have to eat it." Unfortunately, it's not listed as an ingredient in foods. We have no way of knowing if it's in the food we're eating. This is where I take issue, and Colbert shares my sentiments; he's advocating the beef industry proclaim loud and proud, "Bro, it's slime!"