Government Cheese – When The President Bought Way Too Much Cheese

08-10-21

Episode Transcription

Made by robots for robots, only read if you're weird

Hey Man: what's up, have you ever heard of government cheese, government, cheese, yeah, government chet is a brain of cheese like grat has a new sort editor and it's government. It feels like. What's the what's the insurance, I I re straight from that. You knew exactly what I was talking about for you know exactly talk about its general general, it so mate, the general yeah. We save or run a gala, general and cheese. So I imagine that the general he got a cheese game. Yeah is a side Hustle in Jim General, Jim N Gin, Jim Tenjin, okay. They also call that cause he's an alcoholic but government cheese yeah for a great well right. You couldn't. I almost had it anyway yeah to make that Burger better on fourth of July, put us go to the fridge and grab a five. That's o all the theme don't Spit on my caritte. It's not water! You can't spit that out. As for me of my house, we will serve Salami. I thought that at your wedding I was like this is an in authentic and we, when you get locked up, you eat a lot of government che whenever Farmville was taken off on facebook and they were like who the farmers are just going to do. This is things so go? I think I know this one. Actually, I straight up yeah, because the government bought a bunch of dairy as a bail out right, essentially yeah. That's the episode yeah, that's Great! Well, the only the reason I'm bringing it up, I'm spoiling it ahead, a not the cheese, the cheese last for a while. It's not spoiled, but I told this to I did the most old man thing in the world yeah, which was I was checking out at HIV yeah and the cashier was like a lot of people buying cheese today, for whatever reason I don't know why they made that their small talk and then I went, did you know the government bought a lot of cheese on? She was like she's sixteen she's like WHA head and that way yeah the government bought a lot of they keep it in caves. She was like tell us about the telephone have key cave she. I got some slices of keys over here. Anybody needs some American keys all right. Well, what you had two episodes prepared right. Let's just jump to this like t'stay. Tell you about something you know about, so the government in the s realize something, and it was that farm murs farmers were realizing also at the same time, everyone was realizing. Fibers are realizing that industrialization was going well yeah and there was better paying jobs in the city and, at the same time, you're seeing the american dream start to really take shape. Yeah and farmers are say man. If i've moved to the city, i can build cars and i can make more money and have a lot less risk that i have living on the farm. So farmers were ditching their farms and going in the cities, because you don't got to rely on rain for cars to grow yeah. You just got a relyin spray paint falling from the sky, the pain yeah. I got it. No, i hunt that's why ford didn't paint their cars in the beginning. They only so i corsaro climate change put that out there for it is like it is, and i wonder if we, if we just change the climate enough, if that orange sky will just produce a lot of orang calcars. So will you tell me in this episode? If, because cheese is not yellow right, no, they die that stuff. Oh, that a hundred percent okay yeah, so the government was like well. This is a problem. We don't want all of our farmers, stopping farming yeah. We got to keep them in the fields, yeah keep them in the fieldsbecause, because here's the thing there problem was same with a city yeah, it's a lot like a field of dreams. If you build it, the farmers will come well and you were like we got to go. We don't want to we, don't we let them to stay yeah, so they what they were really really concerned with was if, if the farmers aren't farming, then yeah, we have to start importing all of our food and they were in. Then we were reliant on other people, especially because we're in the s where in the middle of well, not even we're not in it yet, but the world wale was happening. This was after world war two. So now so now, they're freaked out that they're, like man, we saw world war, two happened yeah. We can't work in everybody yeah. If we were relying on someone else, they said for what year we are now. It's like forty, eight forty, nine, oh, okay, okay, okay, r, yeah. Yes, it's after world war, two, but everyone's like. If some other country we were lying on them for food, they could at the blink of an eye. Just like we're done giving this dan. It would be a levers guy will exactly. They were pint that you had you can't like compromise on or they could poison it yeah at's that there's a lot of risks to having food come from outside, so they wanted to keep their food on the inside, which is generally the goal. If you keep it in you, you don't want it to go anyways. So i don't want food to leave your body. No, i wanted, you know how your dogues et works. Hey man have you ever heard of the lower in testing. I thought today we're ready to like biology. Here's here's, my understanding if you eat and you and you start like dissolves it and pushes it into your blood stream, and then it makes blood and that's where blood comes for a leave. When you cut yourself every afternoon, i just slice my chest open to get on that hay, i'm out o. That's where that hand the piece of ham was coming out of your eye that one just twice a hey, i of whatever way out it could get. Yahi thought everybody. Someone sent me fan mail and i texted you and i said: hey look what someone sent me in the mail and you went to show your wife and you said, guess what someone sent jar in the mail. Her first guess. First guess: first guess yeah was, is it art work and i was like no she's like? Is it artwork made entirely out of deli ham? And i was that lie there was no. There was no pickey didn't show her a picture. You were like here's. What you guys saying nope you were just like: jarn got some of the male. Is it art work made of deli ham and there wasn't anything we haven't had ham in our household honestly, we've never had hammen, not a ham household. This is as for me, my house. We will serve salami, but not ham like this is not i not a ham home i'll. Tell you what that is. This is like a mands to you. I er that he hands. We are we're turkey, people and that is it exactly. Maybe shredded chicken maybe shot a little bit of shad ye for a feel and rich that, like slice buffalo, the deli make that's good anyways. So the government was scared that they are going have to rely on somebody else, and so they didn't want to do that. So what they started doing is they said: hey we can artificially boost boost these farmers, and so they started buying up all their wheat and their corn and even some of their jerry products. So the government did to farmers what your dad did to you with razor scooters. Yeah i was just like was like look at all these customers. You have you're doing so. Your just i mean farming really is a such a great are like their manipulative parents, they're just like you're, a good farm. Look at your american dreams, we're going to start calling your cheese and the no, and you know they has the same freak out in two thousand and thousand and twelve yeah. Whenever farmville was taken off on facebook and they were like wather, farmers are just going to do this. Instead, i mean and then, when run skate at a faster big skill, they were like guys, shut it down, shut it down, take it off the air, take it off the air, all right, yeah, it's so at this point they were really focused on like grains and corn and things of that nature, because they could just stick it in a sile somewhere and it'll. Last a really long time yeah. They were worried about dairy, because dairy. Obviously, milk does not last very long before it gets really nasty and so it's hard to store and keep that alive for a long time alive is at the right word. If, if misas badi die, no, that's some lively milk! That's that milk is healthy. So i the miles got a hard beat. I tell you what yeah listen to that tasor? Stick you up to the label. He's got, is tethea the grocer store. So what are you doing? It's two percent, i'm picking out my milk, i'm looking for the note one probable should do that we should go to i'm looking for some healthy milk. Looking for some other milk, my doctor says i got to make a switch. Excuse me. Man, do you know i can't find any milk in this establishment with a good heart, beat? What's a what's a healthy heart beat? What's the number everything's got a bad and it's like a sixteen year old girl that works at the grover store and she's like she goes, and she tells her my i just like he did. You know milk. Has a heart beat slike. Okay. This is not crazy, but like this guy spent, like fifteen minutes explaining it to me in the in the mill, cile and cato stethoscope, and he was wearing like a doctor's robe. So i mean you're going to the now you're in scrubs, all right now, you're you're, going to the store, you're getting dressed and you're, not a household. You got to stay out, you're, putting a whole a white jacket on you. Can't re is like: where are you going im and you're like i'm goin, to get us some milk? Now? The other question is: if you're going to the store for nat milk, yeah yeah, you have to do the get up. No because you're not doing anything medical at that point, you're not taking the heart beat of the bread. So you don't need. This is a medical milk trip yeah all right, whatever keep going so yeah milk is harder to keep yeah, so they started converting it to things like powdered milk and butter and cheese, but they didn't. They didn't buy a lot of him and yeah. They quickly ran into the issue of the grain and the corn. They could keep for a really long time and it wasn't a big deal, but the even the stuff that they converted still didn't, keep for very long. So they had a reselling it later that that was one thing that they were struggling with because they said hey. If we buy this and we resell it, we're creating competition for them, so we have to buy it and hold it for a really long time before i can't sell it or else i it doesn't, do the intended effect of raising that price for them to make it lucrative for them, because that was the whole idea. Is they wanted to raise the price they weren't, because they're manipulate in the market yeah they were minion the market. So is the same thing as game: stop it's. They just bought enough of it to where the price went up. You know it wasn't and what is game stops heart beat? You know i mean it depends what you're playing, but sometimes it's. I read a yahoo finance article about it. The other day reputa source for stocks, yeah finance, the heart beat of okay amit. I was just watching a dave port and ala tick, talk about it and that's where i get all of my stock advice, and i know a lot about it now, so they pushed they push the price up, but if they all of a sudden released all that they bought back into the market, it would kill the price. So they wanted to hold it for a really long time, right, obviously with the cheese and any of the dairy protest, they couldn't do that they quickly were like. Oh, this was a misstep, so what they started doing is they started? Releasing this government cheese to the military and to schools, they didn't have a ton of it, so that was kind of all that they needed to do, and it was just it just fed soldiers and children for a little while or our soldiers just eaten cheese. I mean yeah like yeah yeah they're, just like here's, some cheese like is this like an we have like quesal on. There are ecolint be greedy. All right. We just got through a second world war. Okay, you eat your cheese and you smile about it. Like you evermore lly our parents, at this point there was like just eat. The cheese eat your cheese, it's all we got okay so and that kind of that kind of was the end of this. For a while, they were spying product from these farmers trying to push the price up and they were just holding on to whatever they could as long as they could and then the is hit and if the roaring s the seventies were real, weird time, because inflation in the s was the highest it had ever been in history, i'm gonna, i'm gonna butter. This i'm going to look it up to see. If i can is inflation in the seventies higher than it is now yeah, the seventies was the the worst inflationary pistor in worst inflationary. I period history in his history definition history that just really ticks you off when you like, when you, when you hear about this story, it just really makes you angry. You know, and that's history- i'm just soling you're watching pistoria that girl we've got history. Hey thanks for being here, we've got merchandise, it's a way to support the show and help us do more stuff by new equipment to reach more people. If you l like what we're doing, i want to help us do that more. Please consider doing that. If you want to link to that all of that's going to be sent to you. If you is text till in to six six, eight, six, six i'll tell you it's not a thing or we're going to text you a lot where no, it's, not a tech service, we're not going to like send you more than, but it's just a way for you to get a link. It's one text! That's all we're going to send. I promise you pretty sure that inflation rates in the seventies over the whole course of sens year over year, like seven and a half percent inflation every year. Oh okay! So it wasn't. Now i don't know inflation. What is the current inflationary? Two percent? Oh wow? Oh well, that was in two thousand and seventeen this last year was one point four. So let me double teck this. Why they have in the s whose fault was that i mean it just depended on the on the year, but it was six percent four percent three percent, seven percent, like there's just a lot of stuff going on the stock market, was really just up and down in the s, and that's all i know about so i don't know rang very short. I don't know this side of the story. Girl i know is inflation was really bad in the s and what that meant is that obviously, businesses were not making as much on their products because they had to raise their prices, but they weren't selling at their higher prices, and so jimmy carter, when he was running for president made this promise in one campaign speech he said and do our farmers he's like. I will raise the price of milk and it was kind of a passing comment like it was one speech. He mentioned it kind of a passing comment, but then he got elected and the farmers of america like like helping to it were that one time that you say you're going to raise milk and he's like why he, like you, said that you were going to raise milk and he's like i don't know. Are they doing like you mean their heart beats? Are they doing a adio milk cardio sounds like one of those weird fads like a kito kind of diet thing? Where he's like a did. We do milk cart over there. He run like four miles and we just chug a half hour milk and i just throw up everything. So they don't understand what they're doing is just purging all their food yeah yeah, but it makes it lose a lot of ways so really fast. Like really fast, did you ever do the milk challenge in high school? No, was that big? Where you were no, we did an evangel yeah. We did it in high school there's the worst man where you try to drink a whole cow n of milk, yeah yeah. They would do it outside of right outside of walter e, so gross yeah anyways, so the farmers hall jimmy care to it. We're basically like you have to do this now he was like i'm the president. I listen here this. He no man, you say you're, one of us. We don't believe it. You just raise peanuts. How hard is that all right, so we scratched your back yeah no scratch out now raise our milk prices, and so the government was left with this problem. They're like okay. How are we going to raise the prices o mi, there's kind of two ways: two philosophies to this one: you can restrict the amount of milk in the market and the easiest way to do that is to tell the manufacturers hey. You have a limit on how much milk you can make, but america wasn't going to do that for two reasons. One says a precedent that you can throttle supply and demand sort of yeah yeah. I mean i don't know they were that concerned with that yeah er cry. I think i think the big issues were one it's kind of becomes a wash because it's like, then you raise the price, but then is not selling as much so it ends up being you're still making the same amount of money and then the other side. Was it not very free, they're very concerned with freedom, and that's not that's what i just said and you were like well, okay, whatever or just go, and you say: okay now you have to sell it for this amount, which is also not very free, and so what then they kind of found a loop hole which they were like hey. We remember we did this in the s. What if we just bought a ton of milk and they're like that, my work, so they pretty much just went to all the farmers and they were. We just got to build a bunch of refrigerators. First. Well, here's what they said. They went to the farmers and they straight up said hey. If you want to sell us milk we'll buy it, it just tell us how much you want to sell us and we'll buy it, and that was the deal. It was just tell us how much you want and we'll buy it from you. I mean it's essentially, it's just a stimulus package sort of, and so the farmers were just like. Okay, i'm going to sell you a ton of milk, like literally one ton, one ton of milk, but tell you one ton of milk and the governs like cool, and then they just bought it and that's kind of how the process went. And what was interesting, though, is the government kind of put these systems in place because they're like we, don't want your bad milk like what you good stuff, good milk, and is this why at school they have milk? I don't know, actually, maybe is this why they got milk initiative started. I thought that i couldn't find anything on that, but i m i am almost positive that i'm pretty sure that's exactly what it is. Airlike guys, the the bottom of the pyramid is actually now dairy and you have to have a lot of it every day. Yeah. You know that thing that you're born and you like are supposed to have for like a little bit well, either all to have it from a cow after yeah once you yeah, you just have to have it the rest of you at about goat milk shut up that does don't exist, go to exist there, not like they're, telling you they're, not trying to be is got arragos are only good for staring at a exactly so they they cut a ton of it and they they created this almost group of government employees who would travel from farm to farm, okay, who rating cheese and other derry parks. Okay, okay, okay, not like shredding but like living at right, great in milk, yeah, and so what they would do is they would literally travel and they would take like core samples of cheese and they would taste it and they would give it a score who's. Who imagine this guy? I think these people exist. I know they exist because i've seen him in a coal verse, commercial yeah, they're like what's it for wine, some a how you say: lin some alie yeah, but they're like for cheese for cheese and thatsachen like and you have to trust them and you got like o got. You got. You got a hope, but they didn't that they, you know something else in the car and the way they are after take. How do they cleanse their pawet yeah? I don't know that i assume they cleanse the power. I did actually listen to an npr interview with one of these guys who used to be one of the cheese graters. How do you get into it? You know: do you go to college for it? They got. They got a cheese, greater college yeah i got. I got my bachelor's, a cheese grating, but no! No! No! You need at least a masters to do that. Well, what he said is he was like he's like it's kind of insane. No, i have right. I have a ph cheese and it's up here on the wall. You can see it. I graduate with honors. I list: is it be our interview with the guy who used to do it and he said he would hit the road for you time we retired yeah yeah, i'm not a have anybody doing it. I don't know. I listened to the interview, so i don't know he met didn't mention he actually set made a fat joke about himself. So, oh so he's large he's got to be yeah but yeah. He he said he was spend ten weeks on the road just going farm to farm tasting cheese, and he said he said the qualities we were looking for is like how metallic is it? How fruity is it like what type of like do like region? It's? It was crazy. The like lists that he gave for the ranking system, but the government would only take great a cheese we imagine looking for the government. Imagine that you have like a government badge, yeah yeah and, like someone finds out you work for the government and they're like oh, oh, do you like do that, because it's a cold war they're like in this spy and he's like yeah? I know a little bit. Yeah, i spend a lot of time on the road dude he's like i mean okay, so you can imagine the see where that goes to a bar with some buddies right and they're. Like he's got work for the government. He can't tell us what he does. You know and, like you know, they're trying to impress some girls at the bar right, the it's now the it's the s and ets right saya, i imagine like road house, you know yeah, and so it's like yeah he's, like you know, can always drinking at the end of the night. He's just tipsy enough that he's like yeah, take it a picture and they go say cheese and he goes ha. I see that's what i that's. Actually i eat a lot of. I eat a lot of cheap, a lot of cheese and you wouldn't believe the metallic taste of some is cheese. Has so me tell you a aenean, then it's that it's that men, where the couples of the baseball stadium and the guy is just like, got her pulled in real close and is just like explaining it. Yeah he's man's plaining james laing cheese to the hall bar to the whole bar yeah. He stole the karaoke mike and then the men and black pull in, and they do that brainwash thing that everybody they take him away. They kill government's super serious, yeah they're, very so here's a thing you're saying they killed them. He kill a o. They killed them because he's the thing they don't want the tax payer to know that this is what they're spending their money on they like they're, like we don't want anybody to know. This is your tax dollars an we we've got a lot of projects coming a lot of infrastructure. You know, we've got a lot of things to boost the economy and i'm really hoping that things go smoothly. Yeah and a lot of the things that we did before you know. We took those plans and we shredded them. They had a whole team of people that were traveling in the country. Tasting cheese like that. I had to cost a lot when you figure salary on to trackers and all that it was not cheap, but it was they bought all this cheese and they were buying milk. They quickly were like this is going to work. We're going to lose all this mok started by long like she's, pretty much cheese not much longer, but it's better than milk yeah as the pot. Well then, because they bought a bunch of it, they had to sell it back and that's where they started like they gave her such a discount rate. Well, here's what happened yeah, so they bought five hundred sixty million pounds of cheese across the d s was that guy's joke on npr. He was like it was allmost s as much as i way was that his joke, no, no okay, but he, but they bought so much cheese and they were like okay, where we going to put this because you can't just like five hundred sixty million pounds of cheese, it a lot and so what they did is across thirty two states. They found cold storage plants and they just kind of delivered it there and rented space for decades to keep their chees in their chees. Meanwhile, is like starting to get mouldy. Their biggest facility actually was here in kansas city, so they cut old george lofts yep, the no no subtropics, the underground cold storage- oh, oh, a or the casino yep yeah, and that that's a fifty five million square foot facility and they were using the majority of it to keenin the s s and t and s to store their cheese. A hundred feet under ground as, like you just see a truck, and i imagine it- and i know this isn't real but is is the way i maginn my head right. Isn't there rolling into kansas city with just giant vel vita sticks that i huge bibite sticks on the back of his trailer massive yeah. That's pretty close to what it was actually happening. They were shipping them in barrels, but it was just they cut them into the shape of a barrel and it's like stuck it in a barrel and that's how they ship them. So there's the big barrels of just solid cheese and they were just storing them in these gold stores ocations and there they lasted apparently a while, but they were starting to mould over and they're like okay. Well, we need to do something with this and their options were destroy it, which they figured would be bad publicity because they're like were, i mean they bought five hundred, sixty million pages go in and there you know. If you melt five hundred and sixty million pounds of cheese at your onoyom yeah, i mean well not even that you're creating a forty foot wave of nacho cheese right, yeah yeah. They i mean they're, going to create a salt, boston, malasana thing exactly where it's just nato cheese yeah, so what they do with instead, so they said okay. Well, maybe we can sell it, but that was the same issue. They said if we sell, if we a m, did you know how the farmers are selling great a cheese? Would you like to purchase hear me out? Would you like to purchase some mouldy cave cheese? I, like you, guys, are going to package out a little better yeah, so they had successfully. They successfully drove the price it because the farmers were like. Oh, my gosh, this is working, and so they just kin investing they're like let me buy more cows and make more thees, so they just started making as much cheese as they possibly could and they were like. You got, want some more cheese and the government was like. I guess i like yeah sure in the they just kept just funneling cheese into the government, and meanwhile the prices are rising because all of a sudden, a government's forcing inflation, yeah, yeah and so making cheese became a very lucrative business for farmers for a while, and so now the problem was: if they tried to sell it, they would undo everything they did. They would kill the market because they went over oversaturated yeah over saturate the supply we be like hey. I we canst millions of pounds of cheese they're like we can't sell it. We can't sell it overseas because we're exporting as well so that would kill the exports and so they'll pretty much last. As put them on boats- and he just let him on to float into the ocean, you know that's what they put an article. That's why nobody can go there anymore. Yeah, i mean there are just sixty million pounds. I mean on free ships, great h. There is just a free ship of cheese out there now, so they in the olden times they used to find ghost ships and they be like. Oh, my gosh. This is davy jones. You know and now they're like. Oh my gosh. This is cracker barrel cheese, so they they were like a drink to exactly what we used to do, let's just give it to the military and to children, and so they started sending it to schools, sedit the military, and they did that and they got cheese and all the schools and they were like all right. We still five hundred million pounds of cheat a one to got sixty million pounds yeah and they were like what well that made a den. They were like that, helped and they're the meaning and to like okay. Well, how much do we have left? Okay? Well, if we started with like let's do in numbers that our manager for if we started with twelve slices, were now down to eleven and a half slices and someone's over there eating a gene just like that's all, they have bit off a tiny lit. We go or employees on the s, wallowing cheez yeah, it's like lunch, and then this guy, like ordered, capote and he's like hey, you can't eat that is like eat these. It's like the ead is the orsieres like. No, you have to she's put that fork down put that fork that you can't eat that race slips his plate to eat the tea okay, if you're gonna do it at least add at least a four pounds of cheese. A yeah here is a twenty. Ten black every year employ daily quarter of cheese. They have to eat an you, an your cheese today, hey we! Actually, this is so effective. We actually were able to take toilets out of the o, the capital building, no one usanas the rath or anymore hey bill. I notice that you haven't put in your cheese numbers at all this week. Yeah. Can you update excel for where you're at you give me that you give me that need to know? I need to know what you're a i i on my desk by tomorrow morning. You understand here's the thing you're helping the nation. Don't forget that right also, we know that you've been sneaking cheese home to your wife and kids. We want you to know you do not have to sneak it. Take please take it take more. Is there anybody in your family who likes cheese, anybody else like we're actually going to make it mandatory. The families also have to eat all this cheese. Your whole fanoe, your youngest. You just had a new baby last year. Right, congratulations! Crety on solid food! Yet yeah can. How fast can we get them to solids yeah? Are we? Can we make a binkie of the cheese just just get this in on blocks and cheese, the government's desperate to get rid of this stuff? That's. I actually heard that some of these buildings downtown the foundation of blocks are moulded cheese, the cheese just bolded cheese. That's what i heard this a chief piracy. The government came out on so ces under the reagan administration. They were like. We got to get rid of this cheese. You like what a second perfect scenario we just say: hey. We have a new welfare program, that's going to help millions of people and we're use fo, give away three cheats yeah. So they started the government cheese program yeah which they went to every nat, every city or every state, and i said hey: if you ask for jes, we'll give you like thirty million pounds of it say like we. Don't i onthe governments like do you? Do you do but think about it? How many million pounds of cheese do you have now? I mean as yourself like thirty ask yourself how many, how many pounds of cheese do you have right now, not a lot uh yeah, you could use more, so they started the government. These program he's the thing most of the cheese was going back and so what they said is hey. We could process this and make it one last longer and then make it to savage the good sides of the not multi cheese. So it became really so they ad they pretty much made velvit yeah. They may be ta bricks, which is not cheese, half cheese. It's got cease ashes in it. It's cheese, ness, yeah, yeah, and so they just started shipping it to all these little cheesy states that were that were issing for ten stand up comedy or it's like it's not completely cheese, but it's it's got to be some cheese yeah, and so this became kind of a phenomena where you had to be on like welfare or food stamps, or something like that. You did have to spend food stamps to get them, and you had to like him package you had to like prove a your welcome package for program. Here's some cheese, yeah yeah, and so you pretty much can sign up to it like a monthly shipment of this cheese. Here's the thing about the cheese it became a big deal really quickly. I think, for a couple reasons, one for some reason: it just kind of invaded pop culture like it was in s and l. They reference it in s and l all the time. There's a bunch of singers government, cheese, yeah, there's a bunch of singers who would reference it. It was in movies, people, reference government, cheese and, in fact, in the early two sands, this was after the government. Cheese phenomena have kind of ended, but somehow they got rid of it yeah they ended it i'll talk it we'll talk about that in a second, but somehow so dog, because he's new dog got his hand on some government cheese and he came on martha stewart show and taught her how to cook with the government cheese yeah. It was that big of a deal that it just kind of invaded pop culture for a little bit that government cheese was around because for some reason what year was that he early and right during the show he was like you should get used to this taste because you're going to add a lot of this in jail when you get locked up, you're need a lot of government. She you gon, need more of that yeah here's a thing. It became something that people who ate government cheese loved it because it was made out of great ages. Well, okay, so here's the thing it's kind of like. I imagine that it's not good. I mean that's what you would imagine, but so it's kind of like to me. It's like mexican villa right. Okay, did you ever go? Explain, did you or max yeah you didn't like it. I thought it was pretty good. Did you really yeah? I thought it was. Oh tit was decent. Well, you got bad taste. That makes sense, so it's objectively not great as kinil. If you don't know it's a chain in springfield, missouri yeah, it is basically if pizza. If pizzas, if people from branson went to a mexican restaurant and then they were like, we should try this yeah yeah. So it's just as ben it's just white people who make mexican food and it's decent. It is okay, you, but i grew up on it. So we loved it yeah, but you didn't like their salsa yeah. I thought they sells was a little the sweet sauce, mah yeah, yeah yeah, we loved it grown up, that's interesting! So we grew we g. I was thinking because we grew up on it. We were like this is a springfield state. This is amazing and then people from not springfields come and they're. Like you guys are. I don't think it's like that. I think it's more of because here's the thing it was made from great ages like this is top shelf cheese that, like you're buying when your cheese, samolians yeah that so and sos and yeah they processed it and they turned it into like a velvet, a thing, but at its base it was great ages and because the processing it melted, really really well yeah. And so there was something about it that once the government ended the government cheese program, people started being like desperate trying to figure out how to recreate government cheese because they loved it. So much and there's restaurants out there that claim to have government cheese recipes to make government cheese with their burgers or their sandwiches or whatever they're making cheese with, because people apparently love government cheese, and it was a big deal until the s when they kind of started, run out of their stock pile and they ended the government cheese program until recently. In two thousand and sixteen at the beginning of the trump presidency, farming surprise surprise had been a little less lucrative than it had over the past and he was like you know what i've got a very original idea that no one's ever thought of before the best idea i ever had in my life yeah yeah, what if we just buy it? What if we just five hundred and sixty million pounds of cheat exactly five hundred and sixty million yes random number, i thought of son kansas city, all of it out in kan city and then do they buy a bunch of cheesecakes and they are reintroducing the government cheese program right now. So you can get government cheese again. So we're going to do like a tasting show where we eat government cheese. Well, that's the thing! I don't know how you can like get your hands on it without being like on welfare. Where do they got a government cheesecake? I don't know, i mean they're almost cancel my shows. I a gill go on welfare for the cheese, oh, my god, i'll go on way welfare for the bit. So i found i searched governances ca, etired me to a site called squad: helpdom, slash names, last government, cheese, okay and it's like a web store and it says government she's. It's got a picture of like some fany looking wine and cheese on the table, i'm going to make a shirt, that's just like a capital building, but it looks like cheese government, cheese, government, cheese, eight, eight thousand dollars for a block of government cheese yeah. This seems like a scam. This seems very scam because it looks like one of those rooms, cape sites where you can buy corn. All this is government scom is for sale. Okay, okay, kay, hey, hey! Look at me how many more patrons ports we need. I was literally going to say: textiles, eight, six, six to get us government e stacom. This is what we're going to spend your eve. Is your tax dollars that your patrin dollars at work yeah we're going to buy five hundred, sixty million ounces and here's the thing there's still more expensive than people realize? Okay, because firt of all we got to pay alex for us in the show. Ever. Okay and then we also got a rent storage space at the sub, propolis and sub trop. Okay, and then we have to get the transportation for, and we also got to hire some dude to travel around for ten weeks at a time, and he sees- and i mean like i would do it- i would do it i i would do i would do it is the i s. If you want more episodes, i got to be home, i got it yeah. We got to be around text till into six six, eight six, six speaking of patrons. This was recommended by one of our patron snide pancake. So thanks, sty pancake for this recommendation, people's names and discord are just you know. My name and discord is jaren. You know why, because i'm an adult- and i don't- i don't understand it- you know mine- is in discord. It's tib, tib, yeah. Speaking of i delivered a door dash, ordered it tibert the other day, birgus text you that taper tibbards. This is a show. I was acting surprise for the show yeah. I don't do that. That's inauthentic and weird, which is also like the rest of your life too. I thought that at your wedding i was like this is an inauthentic a week. Don't spit that on my cover. It's t, that's not water! You can't spit that out. That'll stay in this carpet i'll get charged on that. I have a security deposit, a state here right, i'm going to need the security tepoto, my guess on his goveren spit it in your tea bag over here, there's a good like twenty seconds there, where i was debating just paying your security bus. So if you decided in your head, you had decided to do it. You would have spit the tea in the carpet, turn around and push a l tand then just walk out like i'll pay for it i'll pay for it, because people support us on patriot, your patron dollars at work or by merchandise. Also text till i sixteen sixty six. Also, if you buy merchandise or support a patron you're paying for my security deposit, we can just tear apart this apartment. That's what i call an apartment, so harrod apartment her apartment. I got so do that whenever i'm rich there's a lot of rich people ideas i have in my head, like sometimes i'm like man, i would just buy some cars and just drive them into a wall. Yeah yeah! That's pretty! It's pretty funny, t time that i'm like whenever i see you honestly like when we're going to the meat at like topola, something i'm just like i'd, be funny my tap every t yeah. I think that all the time, a yeah and with your car man that i could afford to replace it, it's honestly about the same price of my security post. So but that would be pretty funny whenever i'm just saying rich people don't care they, don't they don't care. Let me tell about the. Let me tell you, let me tell about this government cheese. I don't know if i've told you enough about this, yet ye sor for the time. How long are we in this episode? What's the time like forty minutes? Great thanks for finally getting to the point i remember hearing about government cheese, i don't remember where i heard about it. First, i think it was in a movie argo with me at the store one time, because i told the the cashier all about. I sit there. You were talking at first, but he thinks an what is that? That's an odd concept. Oh yeah, we were at the store one time yeah and i had to change out of my scrubs in your car yeah. Can you believe i found this milk with this, this kind of a hard beat. Do you want to put some scrubs on today and go the store? There's a scrub store right next to starbucks. This is crop store right next to the store stay. I think i think they call i, and this is not a joke. I think they call a scrub up. I think that's what they call it. I think okay, so they they just gave a bunch of cheese away for a while yeah super popular. But here's what i was always curious to me. I always felt like i was like man what a waste, because here's the thing i do know that sounds bad. What i'm, but i'm like what good is a couple? Sices of cheese going to do somebody like yeah, if you can't eat anything, cheese helps right, but i mean for a lot of these people. It's chesu an ingredient, it's not a meal. It's not you're, not you're, not surviving off of government cheese. You know and he's the thing. I think i want to hear this. This privileged white man. Okay, let me finish what i'm singing here saying he's over here saying: what good is it to give food to people who need it? I'm saying what good is jeez white finish on can coot? Is it to give someone a loaf of bread when you could use that at mcallister's to make a king's club honestly? No, no ones? Let me finish what i'm saying said: we were giving them an ingredient when we spent it was five. We had five hundred sixty million pounds and they were trying to get the price of six dollars per pound. So, let's say let's say they were paying a very low rate for this two dollars a pound. They spent one point: two billion dollars buying this cheese, which drove the price up, which pushed people to not be able to afford the cheese in the first place had to give the chan get the cheese yeah and then the government came in as a hero and they were like hey. We know you can't afford jees yeah exactly a d and then even beyond all that, with you figured distribution, storage, the the cheese samales, the rouen yea, their process has been more worth. It would have been like two billion dollars, i'm like you could have given them, something that wasn't just an ingredient but actual like sustenance for that same cost, because you were giving them something you spent so much to just keep that in storage for ten years and then give them something. That's like i mean it's your fault. That's is expensive. To begin with. That's my that's! My issue is that it it seems like getting choked up here. It seems like it seems like want it's their fault to begin with and they're acting like. I also believe it's their fault, they're, poor. No, that's the gono! I hear what you're saying i hear what you're saying if you can't afford to eat it's your fault. I'd say: if that's what his stone is same, a government's fault. I didn't think this was going to be a shaming thing. You know how on i was on unemployment last year. What do you think about me? You were on unemployment. I, okay yeah. I think that the government's fault the government made the cheese prices so high and then they gave people cheese acted like a time and now they could what it doesn't matter. What you're saying i'm lily not even listening to anymore, i'm just going to be like wow. Why? I do so much wow honestly and we have free timson, hats or merch store, but i'm going to take those down, because i think you should be locked up yet what absolutely monster i want to put out merchandises says: canceroso canceled, timson wow. I can't believe you had that thought and then you were like. Let's make this thought public. Oh, my gosh, i'm just quoting tweets i've seen people respond to things that are not cancellable, offenses and they'll, be like wow. I cannot believe you made this thought public yep yep. So thank you laugh talk to you hear that hating the word yeah, it's my laptop. It's an all that tob we've talked about this yeah. You have a new one in your backpack. I remember to know tim has a new laptop and he just goes yeah, but the stickers are part of the brain. This is part of the tilling. I think we, i n- and this is speaking honestly candidly- even we should rebrand. This looks like trash. I literally said i was like i was like i was like i. I know i got the new laptop, but i can't use it until i cover it in this mithtake s. I need this much stickers, this much stickers. Oh, my gosh okay, so you think that the government inbut i mean the hindsight- is ton twenty on it, though you know, because you can go- and this is, i think the problem with all government programs essentially, is that it's always solving a problem that exists right now. Yeah and it ends up creating a bunch of other problems. You know, but they were solving the problem of farmers. Yeah needed a stimulus, it did. It did and it's much easier to get those funds past yeah rather than saying hey. Can we just give a billion dollars to farmers to the you know the government's like? Well, we want something in return for it. Well, withies 't super make sense. Yen years later, yak, because, like okay, they're, like it's easier to justify to statuens, were gei bought otoc from them. Yeah you know, and then what happens is you know? You've raised the price and you've priced out people that you now have to give that product to for free, it's kind of like it's kind of it's. It really is a trolley problem. They solved the issue of us getting locked in its. He didn't work, we heselton the other track sufficient yeah. True, you know, but i mean do they ever know. That's what i'm saying yeah is there and then what happens is then they create a government program to give those people cheese, which then floods and saturates this whole like yeah. You know it wasn't, which i don't think was their first choice. I think it was right. It was a i mean to borrow a babraham term. I think the government was like well. This is a happy accident. You can make ourselves look better, but i don't then they did kneel some pr stuff advertat they did. They did yeah. So it's o government, cheese man, it's a weird thing. If anybody's ever tried it, i want to know what you think of it, because i've seen a lot of people. I've seen some people who think is awful, but i seen a lot of people who think is really good. I don't want to know where to get my hands on some, because i do want to try some like the freeze get my hands on some. You know it just feels wrong. I don't like that phrase on any tin and that's not even about like o the way. It's just the way that you say like. I would love to know where to get my hands on. So what o? I just don't like the phrase yeah on dethign. Some, you give him a team. I would just love to hear that jesus heard i want to listen to your cesi, would love to feel the pulse of that cheese. Yeah! Here's the thing about government shes! If you listen to any guy you put, that sees, goes up real real close. You got to get right up on it and you listen closely. Do that again. Do you hear it? I don't listen closely. The fiddle off t


Every Presidential candidate makes promises throughout their campaign to sway voters to earn their spot as president. For many candidates, only a few of these promises come to fruition. Other promises haunt them throughout their presidency. These promises present challenges for the White House in a few unique scenarios long after the president who made them is gone. That is exactly what happened when Jimmy Carter promised to spur the economy for dairy farmers. This is a story of government employees traveling the country tasting cheese, warehouses full of cheese stacked to the ceiling, and the government’s hurried effort to get rid of its cheese through the Government Cheese program. This one sounds like a joke, but we promise it’s a true story.

What is Government Chese?

It is exactly what it sounds like, cheese from the government. During the 1980s and 90s, the United States government provided free blocks of cheese to its citizens as a form of welfare. Those who lived off this cheese had mixed opinions of it. Some people hated it, and others loved it. Some loved it so much that they look for it to this day. Popular restaurants like Wahlburgers, the burger restaurant owned by Mark Wahlberg and his brother, even have the special cheese on their menu.

Why did the Government give away cheese?

Well, this is where it gets interesting. The Government had a whole bunch of cheese. Here’s why while Jimmy Carter was running for president, he promised dairy farmers to raise the price of milk. Once elected president, he began working to fulfill that promise, and the best way to do that was to buy a lot of dairy products. So the government told dairy farmers to tell them how much dairy they would like to sell them and what price they would like to sell it for, then the government would purchase it. Needless to say, the farmers jumped on this deal, and America bought tons of cheese literally. Over the course of the program, the US purchase 560 million pounds of cheese.

A wrapped slice of government cheese
A wrapped slice of Government Cheese
Image provided by Wikipedia
Storing millions of pounds of cheese

Dairy presented a problem for the government, and that was the issue of it being perishable. As much as possible, the government converted its dairy stockpile into more long-term products, most commonly cheese. Even cheese required cool conditions to keep. So the government rented millions of square feet of cold storage around the country for its massive cheese stockpile. Most often, these were caves, the largest of which was in Kansas City, Missouri. The United States Government really had cheese caves.

Ronald Reagan saves the world with cheese

When Ronald Reagan took office, the cheese stockpile was a serious problem. It was a major expense to store that amount of cheese in cold storage throughout the country. Also, this cheese was getting old, and much of it was going to waste. However, selling the cheese would wreck the dairy market in the US, and exporting it would also damage the market. So, Reagan created the government cheese program. The novel idea allowed states to request aid from the capital and receive 3 million pounds of cheese. Then, local governments distributed this cheese to their citizens on their own. This welfare program lasted for a couple of decades and gained notoriety. It’s been referenced in everything from Saturday Night Live to Snoop Dogg songs.

Conclusion

The Government Cheese Program was certainly one of the strangest things the United States government has ever done. They spent millions of tax dollars purchasing, storing, packaging, and distributing cheese to low-income families. The government acted as if they were helping the people, but in reality, they were getting rid of something that they bought way too much of. There is so much more to this story, like government employees who traveled the nation tasting cheese to determine which cheese was worth being purchased. Watch or listen to this episode of Things I Learned Last Night to find out more about Government Cheese.

Things I Learned Last Night is an educational comedy podcast where best friends Jaron Myers and Tim Stone talk about random topics and have fun all along the way. If you like learning, and laughing a whole lot while you do, then you’ll love TILLN. Watch or listen to this episode right now!

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Sources

Government Cheese – Wikipedia

How the US Ended Up With Warehouses Full of ‘Government Cheese’ – History


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