Damned If It Don’t

The Federal government often gets sued for the legislation it passes and the rules it enacts, but now it’s getting sued for not arbitrarily muddling in citizens’ lives:

A consumer group sued the federal government Thursday, saying that salt is killing tens of thousands of Americans and that regulators have done too little to control salt in food.

Despite advisories to take it easy on sodium, Americans are now consuming about 4,000 milligrams a day — nearly double the recommended limit to keep blood pressure under control, the Center for Science in the Public Interest said.

So the CSPI renewed a lawsuit first filed in 1983 to ask federal courts to force the Food and Drug Administration to declare sodium a food additive instead of categorizing it as “generally recognized as safe.” This would give the agency the authority to set limits for salt in foods.

What’s next? Moving Morton’s over the counter, limiting me to three cartons at a purchase, and putting my name in the database of users? Who funds CSPI and thinks its works are in the public interest? Why doesn’t CSICOP sue the CSPI because there’s just the slightest chance of confusion between the organization of scientists who expose crackpots and the organization of crackpots who use junk science?

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