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CONSIDERING THAT I am so left wing that I make Ralph Nader look like Denny Hastert (they do share a tailor, don’t they?), I should be pleased that Nader is speaking out about a White House that has sold itself out to its campaign contributors, allowed large utility companies to write energy policy, threatened civil liberties in the name of protecting Americans, turned testosterone into a foreign policy, and just signed a new Medicare entitlement that might just as well be called “The Pharmaceutical Industry Protection Act.” I should be pleased—except for one minor point: Nader is the reason that most of this is happening. Liberals and progressives have let Nader off the hook for too long, but no longer: He is evil. His 2000 campaign siphoned votes from Gore and allowed Bush to squeak past him in Florida (with a shove from the Supreme Court) and into the White House to usher in a decidedly un-Nader-esque regime. But rather than apologizing (or, better yet, hiding in some cave like other repudiated “leaders” like Osama and Saddam), Nader keeps putting himself out there. So what is Nader saying that’s so darn important? In the Op-Ed column, he targeted the usual suspects. First on Nader’s radar is corporate greed, as represented by former Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski, currently on trial for, well, corporate greed. Nader specifically honed in on the $2-million birthday party that Kozlowski had for his wife, a party that “featured a model of Michelangelo’s David with vodka streaming from its penis.” It wasn’t the booze-disgorging penis that bothered Nader, but the fact that Kozlowski deducted the party as a business expense. “Parents cannot deduct their children’s college tuition as educational expenses, yet corporations can deduct liquor, lurid entertainment and luxurious gifts as business expenses,” Nader wrote. But again, it’s all Nader’s fault for giving us a president who, while he no longer enjoys sidling up to anything spewing vodka, definitely enjoys gratifying big corporations.
Nader also condemns the Bush administration for going “soft on corporate crime” by allowing white collar criminals to “settle for probation and a modest fine” or dropping prosecutions altogether. His third sign also had to do with corporate fat cats. In both cases, Nader’s complaining about a government he put in office.
Now, I would’ve cut Nader some slack—hey, he’s still right on so many of the issues, even if he remains unapologetic for creating an administration that is wrong on so many of the issues—but for the fact that he is entirely wrong about his fourth sign of “social decay.”
“Gluttony is rapidly becoming a competitive sport, in what its euphemists call ‘competitive eating,’” Nader wrote. “There is even an International Federation of Competitive Eating, which presides over dozens of events a year where contestants inhale hot dogs, matzo balls and chicken wings. What’s next—mayonnaise?” See? I told you Nader was out of touch: Mayonnaise is already a vibrant part of the competitive eating circuit. Oleg Zhornitskiy ate 136 ounces of Hellmann’s at the Glutton Bowl last year, a record that I think will stand for generations. Look, I have no equal when it comes to condemning American gluttony, from high-fat fast food to gas-guzzling SUVs. But Nader’s condemnation of the IFOCE willfully ignores the sport’s fundamental beauty (full disclosure: I am the Federation’s recording secretary—but only for the free hot dogs, I assure you).
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Competitive eating is the only sport entirely dominated by average folk like you and me (even bowling has celebrities nowadays). As such, it is our most democratic sport.
Unlike the myth that any American kid can grow up to be president, any child who really puts his stomach to it can be a competitive eating champion. Ed “Cookie” Jarvis, the American hot dog, cannoli, chicken-fried steak, dumpling, ice cream and chicken wing-eating champion? He’s a real estate broker from Long Island. Eric “Badlands” Booker, the burrito, cheesecake, corned-beef hash and matzo ball champion? He’s a conductor on the 7 line of the New York City subway system. Hirofumi “The Kofu Consumer” Nakajima, who ushered in seven years of Japanese domination of the sport? He’s a furniture delivery boy.
More important, competitive eating is constantly pushing our society forward. Sure, hot dogs and mayonnaise get all the attention, but the IFOCE just sponsored the first-ever turducken-eating contest last week in New York. (Turducken, for the uninitiated, is an ethereal Thanksgiving treat consisting of a turkey stuffed with a boneless chicken that’s been stuffed with a boneless duck breast. Order one at turducken.com.) “Turducken is the first real advancement in Thanksgiving since the Indians sat down with the Pilgrims,” said IFOCE president George Shea. “I’m so pleased that the IFOCE is playing a part in advancing our entire culture.”
And the best thing about last week’s turducken-eating contest was that the winner was none other than 100-pound Sonya Thomas, the sport’s brightest rising star. Watching the svelte Thomas eat 7 ¾ pounds of turducken dinner while standing cheek-by-jowl with Jarvis and Booker (both about 400 pounds) was a sight of athletic majesty that Ralph Nader simply couldn’t understand.
“Ralph Nader sees competitive eating as a sport for fat guys, just as many Americans see golf as a sport for rich white people,” said Shea. “But that’s living in the past. Sonya Thomas is our Tiger Woods.” Shea, who described himself as politically liberal, said he was most bothered that Nader, in giving us the Bush presidency, has turned usually thoughtful, even-tempered liberals like him into the most vile, hateful, red-meat, talk-radio kind of partisans—exactly the thing we hate about Republicans. “I am so disappointed by Bush that I’ve become one of those hating people,” Shea said. “I’m not that person, but Nader has made me that person.” So one word of advice for Ralph Nader from this Bush-hating liberal: Next time you write a list of what’s wrong with this country, don’t forget to put yourself on top.
Gersh Kuntzman is also Brooklyn bureau chief for The New York Post. His website is at www.gersh.tv
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