Food & Politics Memo: A Cheeseburger in 'Mile-High' Paradise - President Obama Takes His First Trip Aboard 'Air Force One' and Orders A Cheeseburger

Special Report: President Obama & the U.S. Food Industry

One of the major perks of being President of the United States of America is the use of Air Force One, the fully-armored, customized jet that's ready and available for use by the President and Commander-in-Chief 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

The fully-secure Air Force One is outfitted on the inside to look and feel more like the living room of a house rather than the interior of a typical jet plane. It has leather chairs that recline, a couch, a big screen television, and other comfortable features.

There's also a complete Presidential office inside the plane for the President's use, as well as office space for the many aids who travel with him.

The Presidential plane, which also features a fully-secure wireless government Intranet network (fully connected in real-time to the Pentagon, for example), also has beds inside and a kitchen. The kitchen is fully-staffed, including with a prefessional "Commander-in-Chef," and even offers a choice of food, beverage and dessert items on the menu.

Just one day into his first-term as President and Commander-in-Chief of the United States of America, Barack Obama took his first plane trip on Air Force One -- and the American President and leader of the most powerful country in the world ordered and ate his first meal aboard the flying White House.

And it just might surprise some who've heard, including from First Lady Michelle Obama herself, that the new American President can have picky tastes when it comes to food that the very first meal President Obama ordered and ate aboard Air Force one was that quintessential American delight -- a cheeseburger -- a cheddar burger, done medium well -- to be precise, according to the President's communications staff.

We're told that the hamburger, cheddar cheese, buns and everything else contained in the burger is "Made in the USA." We couldn't get confirmation by press time however whether or not the hamburger meat is organic and hormone-free.

In fact, you a view a video of the new American President's first flight aboard Air Force One, and his first meal, courtesy of the nationalgeogrpaphic.com channel at this link: Video with the “central casting” quote, and a pre-roll ad.

It appears to Natural~Specialty Foods Memo (NSFM) that President Obama's campaign-winning, and now Presidential, communications team is being ever-smart and savvy in wanting to showcase the fact that the President chose to order and eat what is arguably the most popular food choice among Americans during his first trip of what will be many aboard the Presidential jet.

Since a great many Americans are eating cheeseburgers, particularly the ones off the dollar-menu at McDonalds, instead of steak and other more expensive meals in the current bad economy, touting President Obama's choice of a cheddar cheeseburger also shows his concern for the food choices of his fellow Americans in trying times.

But the truth is, President Obama is known to actually love cheeseburgers almost as much as he loves chili, which he has said is one of his most favorite foods of all.

Meanwhile, we suggest the new President's food choice, the cheddar cheeseburger, offers great promotional opportunities for the beef industry (hamburger) and the cheese industry (and all those who make the stuff that goes into burgers), especially those companies that make and market cheddar variety cheese. The first meal aboard Air Force One could also give the restaurant industry a needed shot in the arm were it to promote burgers big time starting tomorrow.

And by ordering the burger medium-rare, President Obama is showing he is a prudent President in terms of avoiding e-coli by not ordering his burger done rare, but that he is far from being a wimp who fears e-coli so much that he would order the burger well done, thereby dramatically decreasing the chances of any of the bacteria surviving after cooking but at the same time completely ruining the taste of the burger. A country needs such characteristics in its President and Commander-in-Chief, after all. And so does the meat industry.

With about 83% of Americans currently approving of the new President (president Bush left office with a 13% approval rating), according to polls released today, its hard to think of a better rapid-response PR campaign that the U.S. beef and cheese industries could launch right away, capitalizing on the popular President's first meal aboard Air Force One.

Meanwhile we think being able to order a medium rare cheddar cheeseburger off the menu, then have it prepared for you right there, gives brand new meaning to that popular Jimmy Buffett song, "Cheeseburger in Paradise." But in all fairness, President Obama has so many crisis and challenges to address, we want him to have a many moments in paradise as he can find, including those culinary ones that occur a mile-high in the sky.

USA Presidential Inauguration 2009 Memo - Essay: The Inauguration of Barack Obama and the New American Spirit

President-elect Barack Obama addresses a crowd of Americans today in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the cradle of American liberty, before embarking on a historic train ride to Washington, D.C., where he will be sworn-in as the 44th President of the United States of America on Tuesday, January 20. Tuesday morning America renews itself, not devoid of its history, but rather determined to create a more perfect union. [Photo: courtesy of The New York Times.]

On Tuesday morning, January 20, Barack Obama -- a 47-year old man who was born of an African father from Kenya who deserted his son shortly after he was born and a white mother from Kansas in America's heartland who raised her son alone with the help of her parents, a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, a former community organizer in Chicago's South Side neighborhood and a constitutional law professor at the University of Chicago, and a former member of the Illinois State Legislature and most recently a United States Senator -- will be sworn in as the 44th President of the United States of America.

Mr. Obama joins only 43 other men who've held the nation's highest office since the United States won its independence through lots of guts and the shedding of much blood. Take a minute and think about that -- just 43 men, and soon 44, -- that's certainly an elite club. And yes, no woman yet. But that's coming as well -- and nearly did in 2008 with Hillary Clinton.

President-elect Obama stands out most obviously among those other 43 men to be elected President because he's the only soon to be member of that elite club who has black skin.

Barack Obama adopted Illinois as his hometown after living as a child and teenager in places as varied as Kansas, Hawaii and Indonesia. And it isn't lost on him or us, and shouldn't be on any American, that is was another Senator and President from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln, who signed the emancipation proclamation, which ended America's most cardinal of cardinal sins -- black slavery.

But Barack Obama is far from only being the first a "black" President. He's a man of dual ethnicity and multiple cultural backgrounds and experiences. Some years ago people laughed at (and many criticized) the great professional golfer Tiger Woods when he used the word "Cablinasian" to describe his ethnic makeup. Tiger created the word himself, a combination of Caucasian, Black, American Indian and Asian, which are all parts of his ethnic makeup. He was trying to make a personal and public point that his whole was much more than what others could see.

But the fact is, multi-ethnicity is becoming the new normal in America. The melting pot has and is increasingly becoming more of a blender. Americans aged about 30 and younger don't even consider race as a significant attribute like generations of older Americans have, except to celebrate it as unique to one another. And older Americans, many who have children in mixed marriages and grandchildren who like Tiger Woods are multi-ethnic, in most cases no longer looks at a person's ethnic background as something that should limit them or make the any different they they themselves are.

Sure, racism still exists in the U.S., as does discrimination. But it's truly on the way out. When those Americans who are in there late teens and twenties today are running things in 20-25 years, imagine how even much more irrelevant a person's race and ethnic background will be in terms of equal treatment and opportunity.

And 20-25 years from now those of us still living will likely look back on the candidacy and Presidency of Barack Obama as being the seminal 21rst century watershed event to a fully ethnically-integrated America two decades hence, if not sooner.

President-elect Barack Obama will place his hand on a bible used by Abraham Lincoln on what promises to be a very cold Washington, D.C. morning on Tuesday, January 20, taking the oath of office to lead a country with serious challenges. But America also has abundant opportunities -- some we can already see and others we've yet to discover.

We tend to agree with President-elect Obama's chief of staff, former Congressman Rahm Emanuel, who has been delighting in a new saying he created: "A crisis (as in economic and financial) is a terrible thing to waste." What Rahm Emanuel, a scrappy political operative from Chicago, Illinois, basically means is that sometimes it is only in a crisis that change and new, better things (in this case a better America) can come about. Abraham Lincoln, a fellow man from Illinois, knew this well. He used a divisive and bloody crisis, the Civil War, to, despite objections from advisers and many of the pundits of his day, to ultimately end America's stain -- slavery.

The new President faces a U.S. economy in full free-fall. Over 1 million Americans lost their jobs in just November and December of 2008 alone. Despite injecting hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money into the financial and credit markets, those markets are still frozen for all intents and purposes. And, even if the markets were to thaw tomorrow, most Americans are in no position to borrow money to buy a home, new car or even in many cases a washing machine.

Additionally, housing foreclosures continue to grow. Business bankruptcies are on the rise. And Americans are worried about the future more so than they have been in many decades.

Barack Obama isn't the messiah. And it's important Americans remember this. It will take time to turn the U.S. economy around. There will be false starts and outright failures.

It also will take time to extract America's fighting men and woman from Iraq, even though the new President is committed to doing so. Those on the left who supported Barack Obama, as well as those on the right who didn't, need to give him, and America, time. By this we don't mean idle time. That's not on Barack Obama's agenda. He will, and already has, hit the ground running, even before officially becoming President.

What we mean is that Americans of all types and stripes need to understand this isn't the new President's mess. It's a mess made by many, including in some ways all Americans. And it will take many -- all of us in one way or another -- to make it better.

But there is a new spirit blowing across America this Saturday afternoon. This new spirit could be felt at the train station in Pennsylvania where President-elect Obama, incoming first lady Michelle Obama, and Vice-President-elect Joe Biden and his wife Jill took off for their historic train trip from the cradle of American liberty on to Washington, D.C.

This new American spirit could be felt in the Vice-President-elect's hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, where at an Amtrak station that for 36 years as a U.S. Senator Joe Biden left from each weekday morning and returned to after doing Senate business in Washington, D.C. because after losing his wife in a car accident and becoming a single father he did what he had to do, which was come home each night to his sons. Today at the Amtrak station President-elect Obama mentioned that aspect of Biden's life. It's a bond of shared loss the two men share, one having lost his mother way to soon in her life, the other having lost his first wife far too soon in her life.

The new spirit blowing across America was again felt a short time later when the train carrying the Obama's and Biden's, along with about 50 Americans from all walks of life chosen to make the train trip in an historic rail care with the incoming President, pulled into Baltimore, Maryland, where one of the most important battles of the War of Independence was fought, the last stop before Washington, D.C. for the incoming President. At least 30,000 people waited for hours in bone-chilling 11-degree weather in front of Baltimore's City Hall to hear the President-elect speak. And he did -- sounding the themes of unity, change, shared responsibility and hope.

As we write this piece, the train is do to pull into the train station in Washington, D.C., America's capital city which is named after America's first President, a great soldier and statesman, but also a slaveholder, named George Washington.

The streets of D.C. are already packed with hundreds of thousands of visitors in preparation for Tuesday's inaugural ceremony -- and its just Saturday. Cars bearing license plates from Utah, Montana, Illinois, Indiana line the streets. People are driving in (thanks to the drop in the price of gasoline), flying in, riding the train and the bus to the nation's capital.

They may be coming from all over, and getting to Washington, D.C. by different means of transportation, but these Americans all have one thing in common -- hope and optimism for a better tomorrow.

And a better tomorrow will come. It will come for the 12-year old African American child who on Tuesday morning will see a man with the same skin color as he has being sworn-in as the leader of the most powerful nation in the world. It will come for the unemployed machinist, who despite knowing he shouldn't drove from Detroit to Washington, D.C. because of the cost, he did anyway because he too wants to help keep hope alive. It will come for the 18-year old high school senior from California who despite getting excepted into the prestigious University of California at Berkeley campus has no idea how she will pay for her tuition and other expenses because dad lost his job and mom's hours have been reduced because of the recession.

It won't come easy. But then few good things seldom to. But a new spirit is blowing across the land. Eight years is a long time for a President in the U.S. We saw that even in the case of Bill Clinton, who left office in 2001 with a rather high popularity rating. But the eight years of the Bush Administration has been particularly long, and troubling to many, even to many of the most loyal Republicans who supported him. One can feel a collective spirit of "its time for a change" among many Republicans in the nation's capital, as well as throughout America.

What needs to be unleashed once again in America is its unique entrepreneurial spirit. Human and financial capital. Ideas once again turned into new products. Education once again made supreme.

The U.S. has led in just about every human and technological revolution since it went from a colony to a nation -- agriculture, food and fiber, automobiles, architecture and building, computers, the Internet. And each time Americans have come through the strongest and most innovative has been after a period of malaise, bad economic times and war.

During and after World War II America's farmers created the world's premiere agricultural system, and entrepreneurs and innovators revolutionized food processing and retailing.

With his New Deal, President Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, tinkered with idea after idea and program after program. Americans were put to work. New industries were created. Idle industries like automotive plants were turned into assembly lines for the production of trucks, tanks and other vehicles to be used in the war and to keep Europe free after the war. Spirits were raised.

No one really knows for sure Roosevelt's New Deal is what got the U.S. out of the Great Depression, but most believe without it and all of its programs, despair just might have defeated survival, which then led to progress. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the New Deal was that it raised the American (and Americans) spirit.

It was following World War II and then the Korean War that a Republican President, Former Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight Eisenhower pushed through legislation in which America spent tens of billions in today's dollars creating what was billed as the 20th century U.S. infrastructure -- new interstate highways, roads, bridges, tunnels and more. This building prepared the way for American industry to create jobs in the private sector.

The 1950's and 1960's saw changes and innovations earlier generations thought impossible -- the creation of the middle class, home ownership for the masses, personal transportation as the norm, a huge boost in college education and social security and Medicare, which has allowed millions of older Americans to live lives of dignity.

Later on, Americans invented the microchip and the personal computer. Then the Internet and World Wide Web. The nation has been on the forefront in science, medicine -- and so much more.

Each time before a new wave of American innovation there have been dark clouds -- war, recession, even depression But then a new, fresh breeze in the form of a renewed American spirit somehow kicks up from throughout the land. Today is and should be no different. It will get worse before it gets better. But so what -- that's always been the case.

The challenge and goal now, for both the new Obama Administration and Congress, for the American people and American business, is to learn from our mistakes over the last decade. To change for the better. To do what we've always done best -- innovate, experiment, explore. We should not fear experimenting, failing, then trying something new. And we should allow the new Administration that same option, to do just as Franklin Roosevelt did with his New Deal.

The way that airline pilot took his plane down in New York's Hudson River the other day, a confident, solid, soft landing, in which every one of the about 150 passengers on the plane survived, is a pretty good object lesson for America beginning on the morning of January 20.

Like that pilot, we need not fear taking a chance. Nor should we not allow the new President to take some chances. In the pilot's case he took a chance on landing the plane, which was disabled because birds flew into its jet engines, in the Hudson River in a way most experts have called audacious and amazing. Yet at the same time, like that pilot with his hand on the airplane's stick, we must be confident -- confident in America's future because of its past. Like the pilot we also must be steady and resolute -- things will not get better overnight.

There's a new spirit blowing across America as the 44th President of the United States prepares to take office on Tuesday morning. You can feel this new American sprit blowing across the Potomac in Washington, D.C., across the great lakes in the Midwest, and in big cities and small towns throughout America. Call it hope. Call it optimism. Call it the American spirit.

It's the incoming President's job, and even more important it's the duty of all Americans, to make sure this new American spirit is harnessed -- that it becomes a new American spirit we capture and use and don't let go of until we've made the country a more perfect union in all of the many ways it can become, just as those before us have tried to do.

[Natural~Specialty Foods Memo (NSFM) Editor's Note: Beginning today, Saturday, January 18, until Tuesday, January 20, Inauguration Day 2009, we will be writing and publishing various stories, and making related posts, about the new American President, with a particular focus on how the new Administration will impact and interact with the food and grocery industry, including from a public policy standpoint. Stay tuned.]

Independent Grocer Memo: National Grocers' Association Asks President-Elect Obama to Look Out For Independent Grocers When He takes Office in January

Independent Food & Grocery Retailing USA

The National Grocers Association (NGA), the trade association for America's independent grocers, has sent a letter to President-elect Barack Obama requesting the new administation maintain a "level playing field" for U.S. independent grocers by enacting a federal economic stimulus package, supporting strong enforcement of federal antitrust laws (including the Robinson-Patman Act), supporting "fair" employer-employee legislation and supporting new federal legislation of credit card interchange fees.

The letter was sent to the President-elect last week, according to NGA president and CEO Thomas Zaucha.

In its letter, the NGA also offered some specific suggestions to the incoming President, who will be sworn into office on January 20, 2009. Those specific suggestions include decreasing corporate tax rates, or the taxes on individuals operating as subchapter S corporations or other pass-through entities. Most independent grocer members of NGA operate family or privately-owned supermarkets, hence this being an important issue to the trade group.

Regarding the inactment of an economic stimulus package, which President-elect Obama is talking about doing to the tune of $600 billion up to nearly $1 trillion shortly after he takes office, the NGA's letter says any such package should extend the current expensing and bonus accelerated depreciation legislation enacted by Congress and President George W. Bush, which is scheduled to run out if not renewed next year. Such provisions are beneficial to privately-held companies, such as the majority of those that comprise the independent grocer association.

From these more routine suggestions, the NGA's letter gets more interesting, touching on issues that are sure to be in conflict with policies of the incoming President and his supporters.

In its letter to President-elect Obama, the NGA argues for relief from the Federal Estate tax for its members, the majority of which operate family or privately-owned supermarkets, as we mentioned earlier. Estate tax relief and the outright elimination of what it and others have called the "death tax" (taxation on inheritance from one family member to another) has been one of the trade association's hot button legislative issues for decades. The amount of money (the threshold) in which estates are taxed was raised under the Bush Administration, with support from many Democratic members of Congress. However it appears the NGA wants even more relief for its members.

The letter to the incoming Democratic President also warned against inacting "over-regulation that can increase labor costs."

Additionally, In the letter to President-elect Obama, the NGA says it opposes mandates for paid sick leave, increased minimum wages, punitive civil penalties for employment law violations and expansion of employment discrimination laws. A pretty healthy laundry list we must say. President Obama has indicated he favors legislation on all four of these issues. Based on its letter it appears the NGA and the incoming administration are at odds on all of these matters then. But if both are willing to comprise they might be able to work something out?

The independent grocer's association also includes a "big issue" in its letter to the new U.S. President, writing that it opposes the Employee Free Choice Act., and a provision in the legislation called "card check," which would replace the current secret ballot method in which employees vote for unionization in secret, with a simple card in which the employees of non-union companies, including those who work for non-union supermarkets, could merely check "yes" on a card if they desire union representation.

It's not so much the actual checking of the card the NGA and others, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, oppose about the "card check" provision and the overall Employee Free Choice Act -- which passed the U.S. house of Representatives last year and just lost in the Senate in 2007 by a couple votes and is supported by President-Elect Obama -- it's the fact the legislation makes it much easier for workers and unions to organize, compared to the current system, that they strongly oppose.

In fact, the NGA says defeating the Employee Free Choice Act is its number one legislative priority for 2009, a top priority it shares with numerous other trade associations and U.S. corporations and small businesses. [Read more about the association's top legislative priorities here.]

However, the Employee Free Choice Act happens to also be the top priority for 2009 of organized labor -- getting the legislation passed that is. And, since organized labor was a key force in getting President-elect Obama elected, they have a strong ear in the incoming President, who says he supports passage of the act. Obama supported the act as a Senator in 2007 as well. He also sopported the act during his campaign for President.

Additionally, there is overwhelming support for the Employee Free Choice Act and its "card check" provision in the Democratically-controlled U.S. House of Representatives. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she will bring the legislation up for a vote in 2009, adding that it will pass in the House by "even more than it did in 2007."

There also is majority support in the U.S. Senate for the Employee Free Choice Act. The legislation failed last year by only a couple votes. Since then the Democrats have picked up additional Senate seats in the 2008 election. They have about 58 seats so far and could add another depending on the outcome of the contested Senate race in Minnesota.

The Senate needs 61 votes to prevent a filibuster on the legislation (and on any legislation) by Senate Republicans. It's expected that with 58-59 Democrats voting in favor of the legislation (that assums all will vote in favor which isn't a given), plus the ability to pick up the two Independents in the Senate, plus a moderate Republican or two, like the two moderate Republican Senators from Maine for example, the legislation could pass the Senate with a filibuster proof majority.

It won't be easy though -- and corporate and trade association lobbyists have already started their campaigns against the legislation, even before the new President and new Congress takes office and even before new Employee Free Choice Act legislation has been introduced. It's called a premptive attack.

Lastly, the NGA letter urges the President-elect to make sure federal anti-trust legislation is strongly enforced. The trade group is concerned about any potential concentration of business among supermarket chains in the U.S. in terms of such actions posing a unfair competitive advantage to its independent grocer members. This includes wanting strict enforcement of the Robinson-Patman Act, which prevents price discrimination and related anti-competitive behavior. It's often been applied in food retailing mergers and other related issues of direct interest to the supermarket and grocery industries.

Some might say the trade group is pro-government regulation and legislation as long as it benefits it members, but anti-government legislation and regulation if it hurts its members. Such an argument is essentially correct -- not just for the NGA but for every trade association and interest group in Washington, D.C. This is how business is done in the nation's capital today. Competiting interest groups that are against government intervention of any kind on Monday are all for government regulation -- new laws, financial bailouts, ect. -- on Wednesday, depending on which of those two days their members' interests are being served.

Welcome to Washington, D.C. President-elect Obama. That's right, you've already been in the capital for a few years as a U.S. Senator. So you know how it all works.

Meanwhile, Mr. President-elect we do suggest you look out for the nation's independent grocers as they are a vital and dynamic part of food and grocery retailing in America. They are among the innovators. They are the home town folks -- the grocers who serve and give back to their communties the most generally. They also serve as the idea factory for the entire industry. If you see something a big chain is doing that's innovative, it's likely they got it from an independent.

Of course independent grocers, like all of us, need to look at the bigger picture as well. For example, the NGA might want to eliminate the estate tax completely. But we suggest that money might be needed to pay for all the corporate bailouts the Bush Administration is doing in its remaining days. Some of it also might be needed to feed the growing number of out of work and hungry Americans.

Don't forget NGA, it was the massive deregulation under President George W. Bush, who you supported twice, that is costing American taxpayers, including your member companies, trillions of dollars to bailout the financial institutions and now the Detroit automakers.

Great call on supporting President Bush twice by the way NGA -- he sure is an economic conservative, isn't he? The latest tally looks like he will be credited as being the biggest spender as President since LBJ and his great society. At least U.S. society got some benefits from LBJ's blank checks though. Mr. Bush leaves the country broke and in near-depression. The guns are in need of being replaced and there's very little butter. (Just rubbing it in a bit -- we all make bad calls; but twice?)

It's all about compromise though. Right NGA? Right Mr. President-elect? We need to do much of that in 2009 in order to get the country back on its feet, and to create stronger consumers who have the money to support America's independent grocers, who are the backbone of America and don't ask for bailouts, just like the majority of us. Fewer demands from the left and right and all around, more cooperation -- that should be the mantra for 2009, in our analysis.

Notes:

>View the letter sent to President-Elect Obama by the NGA...NGA's campaign against the Employee Free Choice Act: N.G.A. Action Alert -- Oppose the Anti-Democratic EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT...Advertisement against: CDW Latest Print Advertisement...NGATV (its in-house Web Network) PR spot on its opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act: Watch now.

Global Food & Agriculture Memo: Afghanistan Expanding Pomegranate Farming, Launching $12 Million U.S.-Funded Marketing and Export Program

Ali Akbar, an Afghan pomegranate seller, arranges his product during the World Pomegranate Fair in Badam Bagh Farm in Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Nov 20, 2008. Afghan officials have launched a marketing and export campaign for the fruit in the hope that it will give farmers an alternative to growing poppies. (Photo Credit: AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool.)

Afghanistan has been producing the ancient fruit, the pomegranate, know as the Anar in the various regional tribal language spoken there, for about as long as the ancient country has existed in its many forms, from Kingdom to colony and now potentially budding Democracy.

The fruit however has historically been produced by Afghanistan's farmers primarily for national consumption and limited export to neighboring countries, despite the country's capacity to produce enough of the fruit for export.

Today many government officials and others in the country believe and hold out hope that exporting pomegranates could be a positive replacement for Afghanistan's current number one export crop -- the opium poppy.

And such an initiative was announced last week in Afghanistan.

With the help of a $12 million initiative funded by the United States, Afghanistan's government, farmers and others are planning to improve and expand pomegranate farming and processing in the country and launch a global export industry and marketing program designed to sell lots of Afghanistan-produced pomegranates throughout the world, as well as to attempt to position the ancient fruit long-grown in the ancient land as the best pomegranate on the planet.

Last year, Afghanistan exported its first pomegranates to outlets of the French hypermarket chain Carrefour in the Kingdom of Dubai, according to a report by the Associated Press. The fruit, larger and redder than many pomegranates imported from Turkey or North Africa, was a hit. Carrefour, which is the world's second-largest retailer after Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., quickly placed orders for all its Middle East stores, according to U.S. funders and Afghan officials.

This successful effort served as the impetus for the newly launched $12 million, U.S.-funded improvement, marketing and export plan.

Read the story, "Afghanistan markets its brand of pomegranates," from the Associated Press here

Opium production and export has long plagued Afghanistan. And in recent years the production of the crop has soared because the now re-emergent Taliban group is using the growing and sales of the poppy to fund there attempted return to power in the country and war against the elected government and U.S. and NATO troops.

The government under elected President Hamid Karzai has been reluctant to launch a mass poppy eradication program in the country because like it or not, without the poppy crop not only would there be millions more impoverished people in already impoverished Afghanistan, but the central government's major source of revenue besides U.S. aid, taxes paid by citizens, (few people pay taxes in the country but without the poppy crop even fewer would) would likely disappear.

President Karzai has long been arguing for financial assistance to build Afghanistan's agricultural sector. At one time the country was a solid agricultural producer in the region, before the war in the 1980's with the then Soviet Union, before the Taliban took over following that war, and before the current war following the September 11, 2001 attacks in the U.S. But that's been decades ago now -- decades of war and destruction of the country's infrastructure, which wasn't exactly good before that.

Many analysts and others are skeptical is an agricultural improvement, exporting and marketing program can work in the war-torn country, as you can read in the AP piece. However, Natural~Specialty Foods Memo believes it is well worth the $12 billion effort.

We also think the west, the U.S., Canada and Europe, where pomegranate sales have soared in the last few years, should do everything the nations can to open the door to the Afghanistan-grown fruit. After all, it is in the U.S. and Europe where most of the illegal drugs produced from Afghan poppies are bought and used.

The U.S. government under current President George W. Bush has been very vocal about wanting programs to eradicate the opium poppies in Afghanistan. Therefore both the U.S. and Europe should become part of the potential solution, the building of Afghanistan's agricultural and food industry starting with the pomegranate, by doing all that can be done to speeding up the process of allowing Afghanistan-produced pomegranates into the western markets.

Earlier today we wrote and published this piece, " about California-based Paramount Farms and its success in branding and marketing fresh pomegranates and value-added pomegranate products like fresh juice teas and other items under the POM Wonderful brand. William Phillimore, the company's executive vice president, was in Kabul, Afghanistan last Wednesday for the launch of the pomegranate export and marketing program, a marketing effort the California company might play a part in.

Phillimore, who works for the company most responsible for boosting consumer demand for pomegranates and pomegranate-based products in the U.S., said at the kick off event: Afghan pomegranates are "as good as anything I've tasted," adding that he thought there is plenty of room in the U.S. market for pomegranates exported from the country, despite the fact Paramount Farms is the largest U.S. grower of domestic pomegranates.

While Afghanistan remains a war-torn country, and in fact all signs are that things are about the worse they've been in the ancient land since the now resurgent Taliban were defeated in 2002, we think it important that initiatives such as the $12 million pomegranate marketing and export plan be initiated. Afghanistan needs economic development programs like this to build not only its economy but also its civil society. The people need reasons not to support the Taliban, and jobs, a decent economy and the civil society that comes with those things are just as important as winning in combat in terms of the outlook for and ultimate state of the country.

After all, it was such a vacuum that was created not so long ago right after the former Soviets were driven out of Afghanistan that paved the way for Taliban rule, which not only created a totalitarian state but also wiped out any economic progress the country had made prior to the war with the former Soviet Union, which of course we all know today as Russia.

Therefore we cheer the pomegranate export and marketing program. And having eaten an Afghanistan-produced pomegranate, we can tell you they indeed are delicious and of a very high quality, which is distinguished by the bright purple color and smoothness of the ancient fruit produced for so long in the ancient land of Afghanistan.

Additionally, on average, Afghanistan's farmers make about $2,000 per acre with pomegranates, versus $1,320 per acre growing opium poppies, according to currently available data. Therefore, if the west opens its markets to pomegranates grown in Afghanistan, the economic premium of producing the fruit over the poppies could, with this expanded export market and thus increased demand for pomegranates, serve as an economic incentive to get the country's farmers to switch from growing poppy to pomegranate. It's worth a try.

Food Safety Memo: Maybe the Chinese Government Needs to Look to its Minority Muslim Population for Food Safety Advice and Expertise?

Employees remove milk products contaminated with melamine from the shelves of a supermarket in China's Hefei, Anhui province on September 16, 2008, after Chinese Government officials announced a nationwide recall. [Photo Credit: Reuters.]

The Chinese government may not need to look any farther than to the country's own minority Muslim population to help the world's largest nation solve its serious and chronic food safety problem.

China's most recent food safety problem, and a big one it is, involves powdered and fluid milk, along with numerous food products made with the milk, that's been tainted by the chemical melamine. The contaminated milk has thus far caused the deaths of four children and sickened over 50,000, according to official Chinese government reports. Most observers inside and outside China however believe as many as twice that number of Chinese children have been made ill by the adulterated milk.

Chinese candy made with the adulterated milk also has been found and pulled off the shelves of Asian grocery markets in the U.S. and in Europe. No confirmed cases of illness from the candy has been reported in the U.S. or Europe to date though.

Additionally, because powdered milk and products like candy and numerous others made with the contaminated milk were exported to countries throughout Asia, there have been numerous cases of children becoming ill in those countries because of the Chinese powdered milk and milk-based products.

High levels of melamine in milk -- and it appears the melamine was laced into the milk and related products on purpose -- cause kidney problems, particularly in small children. The reason experts expect the melamine was intentionally put in the Chinese milk is two fold: The percentage of the chemical in the milk appears too high to have been a mere accident, and adding melamine to milk increases it protein level.

The last point is important because the Chinese government requires a certain protein level in milk. Chinese government officials believe chemical company sales representatives in the country convinced farmers to add the melamine, allowing the farmers to make more money off the milk because the chemical artificially raises the protein level in the milk, allowing for higher profits. Melamine means less milk fat which means higher profits.

The majority of China's Muslim population lives in the country's Xinjiang province. There, as well as in other Muslim communities in China, as is the case with devout Muslims throughout the world, the community adheres to strict Muslim dietary laws known as halal, or "permissible" in Arabic. As a result, the provincial government and food industry serving the Muslim population in Xinjiang province follows the strict halal dietary laws for food preparation and safety. It's estimated 70% of the world's Muslims follow Islamic halal dietary laws.

Halal incorporates strict Muslim dietary laws - similar to kosher rules practiced by observant Jews - where meat is slaughtered according to traditional guidelines and pork is forbidden, among other ritual food preparation methods.

All food must be certified by a local Islamic Council. At meat plants, imams or nonclerics trained in ritual slaughter are present daily. Council members also periodically visit processing factories to ensure compliance with religious laws, while government inspectors are ultimately responsible for food safety.

According to a story written by San Francisco Chronicle foreign service correspondent Reese Erlich, who did the reporting in China's Xinjiang province, "In past months, hundreds of Xinjiang residents have been sickened and an infant has died from melamine-tainted milk products imported from other regions of China. But so far, provincial officials say, Xinjiang's domestic milk supply has remained safe in part because of halal oversight."

In the story published in the Chronicle last week, Erlich reports the province's governmental officials and food industry say they "are determined to keep it that way by combining strict government inspection with the moral authority of Islam."

Read Reese Erlich's report, "Islamic dietary laws help Chinese region's milk," here.

As is often the case, sometimes the solutions to a problem are right in a country or industries back yard.

Both the Islamic faith's halal and the Jewish faith's kosher laws for how food is to be prepared for sale offer important food safety guidelines that can be used in conjunction with scientific-based guidelines and in combination with governmental regulation and enforcement to ensure a safe food supply.

Of course, in the case of the Chinese milk contaminated with melamine, which appears to have been an intentional act, laws and strict enforcement of such laws must be present as well. And dairy farmers and other food producers must know that if caught intentionally adulterating the food supply they will be punished severely, which shouldn't be a problem in politically Communist governed China, even though its economic system is a form of mixed capitalism. But it is a problem.

China though has a far more serious and systemic food safety problem beyond the intentional adulterating of foods and beverages. It's sanitary systems are lax, quality control standards poor, and regulations out of date and in many cases non-existent.

This is where learning from its minority Muslim community makes sense on a practical basis. Adopting aspects of the halal system would improve China's food safety standards 100%. And combining some of these time honored processes, which work, also would be politically smart, as China needs to better integrate its Muslim minority into the nation's mainstream.

Doing so also would help create increased confidence throughout Asia and the rest of the world vis-a-vis China's food exports. Right now that confidence among China's key trading partners -- Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia, Europe and the U.S., among others -- is at an all time low.

China is the world's most populated country and the fastest-growing economically. Its goal is to become a 21rst century developed country as fast as possible. In order to do so though China can't have a 19th century food safety system, which it does.

The country needs to rapidly upgrade it food safety system. Borrowing some of the time-tested halal techniques from the nation's Muslim community, along with modernizing China's food regulatory, inspection and enforcement policies and procedures, could be a way for the country to improve its food safety system in the most rapid and at least initially comprehensive way.

Election Day USA 2008 Memo: Barack Obama is the New President of the United States of America

Election Day USA Special Report

11:40 eastern, 8:40 pacific time, November 4, 2008

With the votes in the Western United States not yet even fully counted, Democratic candidate for President Barack Obama will be the the next President of the United States.

Based on our analysis of all of the national news media projections, the Senator from Illinois has passed the needed 270 electoral votes required to win the 2008 Presidential election.

We project Obama currently at 320 electoral votes, five more than is needed to become President.

Republican John McCain has 142 electoral votes, less than half of what Obama has.

President-elect Obama has 51% of the popular vote at present to McCain's 48%

California alone has 55 electoral votes. As of yesterday's polls Obama was favored to win in the Golden State by as many as 20 percentage points. The polls in California and the other Western states have just closed. Results will be coming in shortly.

However, these states will only add to the already 275 -- and growing -- electoral votes that now have put Barack Obama over the top, making him the first African American President in American history.

Americans it appears decided to choose change and a new direction (Obama) over experience and four more years of Republican governance in the White House.

Democrats also are picking up numerous seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate.

Thus far the Democrats have gained nine (9) seats in the House of Representatives, the GOP losing nine (9).

In the U.S. Senate the Democrats are up by four (4) new seats, with the Republicans losing four (4). If the Democrats can gain six more new Senate seats in the election, for a total of 60 (they now have 54 seats in the Senate), they will have a majority which will prevent the Republicans from Filibustering any legislation passed by the Democratic majority.

As of press time, the Democrats have 172 seats in the House, compared to 112 for republicans. In the Senate, Democrats currently have 54 seats and Republicans 38.

The Democratic Party will have a majority trifecta in 2009, as a result of today's election. A Democratic President, Barack Obama, a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, and a majority Democratic Senate. The last time this happened for the Democrats was in Bill Clinton's first term in the early 1990's.

Barack Obama, the son of a white mother from Kansas and an African father from Kenya, a man who was raised in part by his grandparents on his mother's side, and just yesterday found out his beloved 86 year old grandmother passed away, is the 44th President of the United States.

Tonight American parents can tell their children with a completely straight face, that regardless of the color of their skin or ethnic and economic background, they too can, if they work extremely hard like Barack Obama has, one day become the President of the United States.

For real time election results click here.

Food & Politics Memo: Election Day Freebies USA: Vote, Then Eat and Drink For Free

Election Day USA Special Report

Who says there's no such thing as a free lunch...or dessert...or cup of coffee?

A number of U.S. national food service chains are offering free food, drink and sweet treats today, election day 2008, to voters.

Starbucks, which has cafes throughout the U.S., many of which are very near polling places, is offering voters a free cup of coffee all day today and tonight. Specifically, a free cup of tall, brewed Starbucks coffee.

Starbucks originally announced that in order to get their free cup of Joe, voters would have to show their "I have voted" slips of paper with the smiley face that's given to them after they vote at their local polling places.

However, the coffee chain was told it's illegal to require proof of voting in return for the free coffee offer, so the King of Coffee changed that policy, offering free cups of coffee to everybody today regardless if they voted or not. [Note: If you haven't voted but still get your free cup of Starbucks coffee at a cafe, be advised it's possible the Coffee Gods might just bless your house (or reusable travel mug) with bad karma for the rest of this year. So, vote first -- then get your free cup of Joe at your local Starbucks cafe.]

The free cup of Joe offer from Starbucks is rather fitting for this election since we've had "Joe the Plumber" and lots of talk about "Joe Six-Pack" and the "Average Joe," primarily from the McCain campaign and the news media's reporting on it. Therefore it seems appropriate to end the 2008 election with a "Free Cup of Joe."

And while you're getting your free cup of Joe at Starbucks, do make sure you say hello to "Joe (or Jane) the Barrista" for us.

And what's a free cup of coffee without a free donut to go with it? Voters are in luck. The Krispy Kreme donut chain is giving free donuts to voters all day today.

Not satisfied with just a free donut and cup of coffee. Never fear. The Ben & Jerry's ice cream folks are offering free ice cream to voters at all of its U.S. Ben & Jerry's retail ice cream shops today. That should add a little extra sweetness to voter's election day on top of the free donut.

But it's not just free coffee and sweet treats being given away for free to voters today.

If your lucky enough to life in the southern U.S., and have a branch of the regional restaurant chain Shane's Rib Shack nearby, go there first, before hitting Starbucks, Krispy Kreme and Ben & Jerry's for your free coffee and deserts. Why? Because Shane's Rib Shack restaurants in the south are giving voters free chicken finger dinners all day today as an election day promotion.

The Chik-Fil-A fast food chain also is giving away free chicken finger dinners at stores in selected regions of the country.

There you have it -- a free lunch and more, if you have branches of these food service chains near where you live in America.

Click here for a Web site with a list of election day freebies, along with links to articles about the election day free eats and drinks today.

Food & Politics Memo: It's Zen and the Art of Chocolate Making For City Council Member Turned Chocolatier and Confection Company Entrepreneur

Oakland, CA city council member Nancy Nadel shows off some of the chocolates that she has made from beans. Nadel spends her summers in Jamaica cultivating a cooperative of cacao farmers to supply her with fermented beans. (Photo Credit: Mike Lucia/Oakland Tribune)

From the Natural~Specialty Foods Memo Editor's Desk: Who says food and politics don't mix? Not longtime Oakland, California USA city council member Nancy Nadel.

Her honor, perhaps finding a lack of sweetness in her position as a local politician and lawmaker, decided to seek her sweet delights elsewhere: She founded a confections company, Oakland Chocolate Company, specializing in chocolate, and named it after the city she serves.

Nancy Nadel remains on the city council, she just added a second hat (well, a hair net actually) to her already busy life.

The Oakland Tribune newspaper profiled city lawmaker/chocolatier Namcy Nadel and her Oakland Chocolate Company in a recent article. We enjoyed the story, including the interesting juxtapositon of local politics, chocolate-making and small business building. We thought you would enjoy it too. Read it below:

Oakland council member finds her Zen in chocolate
By Cecily Burt
Oakland Tribune
October 18, 2008

After a grueling week immersed in the city of Oakland's problems, Councilmember Nancy Nadel unwinds in a unique way. She puts on a hair net, cranks up the reggae, and loses herself in swirling vat of warm, rich, dark chocolate.

Nadel has become a chocolatier in her (very little) spare time, launching the Oakland Chocolate Company with its roots in Jamaican soil.

"It's like my Zen," Nadel said last Sunday, the only day of the week she isn't buried in budgets and voluminous agenda packets or other issues affecting her West Oakland district. "The preparation and even the clean up, I get into it. When I give people my chocolate they are happier than when I talk about my progressive policies."

No doubt. But Nadel's progressive policies have a way of steering her life choices, and the decision to dabble in chocolate is no exception.

The story can be traced back to the last vacation Nadel and her late husband, West Oakland activist Chappell Hayes, took to Jamaica before he died. She has returned year after year during summer breaks from council business, staying with friends in the rural reaches in the parish of St. Mary on Jamaica's north coast.

Cacao farmers such as Steve Belnaviz eke out a living selling their just-picked beans to the government, which sends them to a state-run fermenting plant. Many of the poor farmers that Nadel met have land, but no money to harvest their cacao trees. Some have cleared the trees that shade the cacao to plant other crops.

"It's a beautiful place but it has the same kind of (economic) problems as Oakland," she said.

At first Nadel wondered whether she could help the farmers get better prices for their beans by helping them organize a fair-trade cooperative. The cooperative would ferment its own organic beans and sell the product in bulk to chocolate companies, basically removing the middle man. Then she thought, why not try her own hand at farming and making chocolate?

"As a city council member I've talked about sustainable issues and farming for a long time," she said. "My goal is to put my money where my mouth is."

So she took a weeklong class at UC Davis in chocolate technology and hasn't looked back. The Oakland Chocolate Company started small and Nadel intends to keep it that way for the foreseeable future, given the demands on her time.

For a time Nadel rented kitchen space at Brown Sugar restaurant on Mandela Parkway. But that arrangement required her to bring in her supplies and pack it all out at the end of the day. She recently subleased space from the maker of Barlovento artisan chocolates in Jack London Square. She bought a bigger machine for melting her chocolate and she can leave all her equipment, ingredients and finished products there.

Nadel is averaging about 200 pieces of filled chocolates or dipped nuts and fruits each Sunday, plus molded chocolate leaves and textured chocolate crunch bark. She eagerly gives visitors samples of nutty-tasting cocoa nibs to munch on as she describes how the milky white beans are harvested from football-sized pods that grow from the trunks of cacao trees, and then placed on trays and covered with banana leaves to dry and ferment.

It's taken years of research and outreach, but Nadel and her partners in Jamaica gathered with cacao farmers for the first time in February to discuss their plans for a cooperative and fermentary, and efforts to join the Jamaican Organic Agriculture Movement.

And it will be some time yet before a production-sized fermentary is established and the farmers can produce enough fermented beans to provide a steady supply to her company and other chocolate makers.

Still, the seeds are starting to take root.

"Two weeks ago was the first time I made chocolate from beans that I had picked, fermented and dried, and brought back 3,000 miles," said Nadel, sounding like a proud parent. "It's an incredible feeling."

A portion of the sales from the Oakland Chocolate Company will go to help build a production-sized cocoa bean fermentary in Jamaica.

To learn more about the company and the Jamaican farmers, or to order chocolates, visit http://www.theoaklandchocolateco.com/.

Food & Politics Memo: Political Activists-Writers Insult U.S. Food and Grocery Industry With Their 'Obama Waffles' Mix

Two political activists-writers from Franklin, Tennessee USA this weekend insulted all the hard working Americans who toil daily in all sectors of the food and grocery industry.

The two writers, Mark Whitlock and Bob DeMoss, set up a booth over the weekend at the conservative political summit held by the lobbying arm of the Family Research Council in Washington D.C., where they sold a waffle mix with packaging depicting Democratic candidate for President of the United States Barack Obama in blatantly racist ways.

The front of the box of "Obama Waffles" (pictured at left) depicts the Presidential candidate with a huge grin, big lips and ears, and popping eyes next to a plate of waffles and the text "Change You Can Taste." The racial stereotype plays off the old, long-gone image of the pancake-mix icon Aunt Jemima, which is considered a negative racial stereotype.

On the top of the box, Barack Obama is pictured wearing a Muslim turban, next to text that says: "Point box towards mecca for tastier waffles."

Senator Obama, who is a Christian, has been the victim of numerous false smears, mostly on the Internet and on conservative talk radio, saying he is a "closet Muslim" and not really a Christian.

A caricature of Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the former pastor of the Chicago, Illinois church Senator Obama attended for two decades, is portrayed on the side of the waffle box as a missing person next to sayings (he made in a widely played video) including: "God damn America" and "Made in the US of KKA." Obama broke ties with his former pastor. (We don't find that racist. They are among the things he said.)

On the back of the box, Obama is depicted in stereotypical Mexican dress, including a sombrero, above a recipe for ''Open Border Fiesta Waffles'' that says it can serve ''4 or more illegal aliens.'' The recipe includes a tip: ''While waiting for these zesty treats to invade your home, why not learn a foreign language?'' (This seems in the acceptable bounds of political satire, although it's taste is questionable. It's the front of the box image and the top of the box image and text that are racist.)

In addition to their booth at this weekends event in Washington, D.C., the two writers have set up a website where they're selling the waffle mix via the Internet.

The two writers wore white chefs aprons and sold the waffle mix for $10 a box in their food show-style booth on Saturday. According to accounts from people attending the summit, the two were doing a brisk business selling the novelty waffle mix to summit participants until the organizers, who had approved the pair's participation along with other vendors at the summit, shut them down on Saturday afternoon, saying they were not previously aware the writers were selling "offensive material."

The box was meant as political satire, Mark Whitlock and Bob DeMoss, the two writers who created the mix, told the U.S press today in Washington, D.C, adding their was no racist intentions in depicting Obama on the front of the box.

We like political satire. But the "Obama Waffle" mix is far from mere political satire. By including the African American stereotype image on the front of the box, along with the picture of Obama in Arab dress, the two writers knew full well what they were doing, despite saying there is no racial or religious motivation on their part. They were tapping into an undercurrent of racism and religious questioning that exists among some segments of the American electorate, intentionally using that undercurrent to reinforce a negative stereotype for partison political reasons.

Had the two writers, who we suggest stick to writing and not food product creation, used many of the same messages they did, such as the text about immigration on the back of the box, and completely avoided any photographic images of a racist nature, it would be political satire. But they didn't.

It would be no different than if someone created say a John McCain laxative cereal novelty product, filling the package with images of the Republican candidate for President constipated and near death, creating an ageist depiction in order to play up on the concerns among some segmnents of the U.S. electorate about electing a 73-year old who has had cancer and suffers from serious injuries (he can't raise his arms above his head) from his time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

If there are any other so called political activist-writers out there considering similar food-oriented novelty items like the "Obama Waffle" mix, we encourage you to find another industry to piggyback on.

America's food and grocery industry is busy trying to produce, manufacture, distribute and sell products to consumers at a fair price in an environment with some of the highest food inflation and other economic challenges the country, consumers and the industry has experienced in many decades. They don't need 'no stinkin' political activist-writers mucking up their industry with racist food products, novelty or not.

The two writers from Tennessee have a right to create and market the waffle mix. But the two specific (front and top of the box) graphic images on the boxes are not only in bad taste but obviously racist. A little bit of creativity on their part could have created a better novelty waffle mix without the racist overtones. Guys: 'Don't quit your day jobs.'

Food & Politics Memo: Billionaire Supermarket Industry Investor Ron Burkle Makes Millions For The Clinton's Post-Presidency

Ron Burkle (on the right in the picture above), the billionaire supermarket industry investor, founder and chairman of the Southern California-based Yucaipa Companies investment firm, has provided former two-term President Bill Clinton, who's wife New York Senator Hillary Clinton is running for the Democratic Party nomination for President, with a healthy source of income during his post-Presidential years, according to a batch of Clinton family income tax returns the couple just released. The tax returns are interesting reading indeed.

The former President and his wife Senator Hillary Clinton released eight years' worth of income tax returns on Friday. The period covers the Clinton's last couple years in the White House to the present.

The Clinton's jointly-earned a whopping $109 million during this eight year period, the vast majority of which was brought in beginning in 2001, which was the former President's first year out of office after completing his second and final term. In fact, when Bill and Hillary Clinton left the White House in 2001, they were $12 million in debt do to extensive legal bills accumulated over the legal investigations of the Whitewater land deal, the Monica Lewinsky scandal and related impeachment proceedings, and other legal challenges.

President Clinton earned nearly half of that $109 million as a speaker, traveling all over the world between 2001 and 2006 giving speeches to corporations, business groups and other organizations for hefty per-speech fees. The tax returns don't list who he earned the speaking fees from, which would be most interesting to know.

Another big source of income for "brand Clinton" were book royalties. The former President and Mrs. Clinton brought in about $30 million between 2001 and 2006 for their best selling books; two books for Bill and two books for Hillary during this period.

But giving speeches and writing best selling books were far from the only major sources of income for former President Clinton.

In fact, one multi-million dollar source (and name) of income for the former President stands out large to us in reading through the tax returns which were posted online. That name is billionaire supermarket industry investor Ron Burkle, who is a long time Bill Clinton friend and supporter--and currently one of the most generous donors to Hillary Clinton's Presidential campaign.

Not long after the former President left office in 2001, Burkle hired Mr. Clinton as an advisor for his Yucaipa Companies investment firm. Additionally, Burkle made Clinton a partner in a number of his investment funds. Further, a bit later Burkle put the former President on Yucaipa's board of directors as well.

The tax returns show Bill Clinton's partnership with Burkle in various Yucaipa investment vehicles earning the former President and Mrs. Clinton an annual income of about $1 million a year starting in 2003. In 2005, Bill Clinton grossed $5 million from his investments with Burkle, according to the tax returns. Further, the returns show the former President earning an additional $2.5 million in each of the past two years.

All told, Bill Clinton has brought in almost $8 million dollars in income in the last five years from his involvement in and partnership with Ron Burkle and his Yucaipa investment arms. Not a bad pay day.

According to Yucaipa, Burkle hired the former President to be a senior advisor to the firm, which has included helping Burkle meet global businessman and world leaders, land new investors for his funds and identify global investment opportunities. Clinton also has served in a policy role as a member of Yucaipa's board of directors.

As we reported in this piece we wrote on January 30, the former President is in the process of ending his business relationship with Burkle and Yucaipa. It's estimated by a number of sources including the Wall Street Journal that Bill Clinton could walk away with as much as a $20 million final payout when he concludes his partnership interests in the various Yucaipa-controlled investment funds and vehicles. That's on top of the nearly $8 million earned to date.

Burkle made his name as a supermarket industry investor in the 1980's by acquiring and putting together a number of major supermarket chains into a retail grocery company he called Ralph's/Food-4-Less, and then ultimately selling the huge supermarket company for billions.

Among the chains he acquired and bundled together were Los Angeles-based Ralph's Grocery Co., Fred Meyer, Inc. (Oregon), Boy's Markets (Los Angeles), Falley's Food-4-Less (Kansas City, Mo.), Arizona-based Smitty's, Dominick's of Chicago and a few others. [Read our January 30 piece here for more details.]

Burkle, who got his start in the supermarket business as a bagboy for Stater Bros. supermarkets in Southern California where he later became a VP, operated the company with a team for about eight years, building it up, cutting costs and the like. He then broke Dominick's off from Ralph's/Food-4-Less and sold it to Safeway Stores, Inc. for nearly $2 billion dollars.

Following that profitable sale, Burkle improved sales and operations at Ralph's/Food-4-Less even further and then made the BIG sale: Kroger Co. agreed to buy the supermarket company from Burkle for $8 billion. This was the acquisition that put Kroger in the number one spot among grocery retailers in the U.S., where it remains today.

Burkle latest BIG grocery retailing deal was last year's acquisition of natural foods retailer Wild Oats Markets, Inc. by Whole Foods Market, Inc.

A little background: In the 2005-2006 time period, Burkle acquired about 5% ownership in Wild Oats Markets, Inc., making him the retailer's largest individual outside shareholder. Not long after acquiring his 5% stake, Burkle helped engineer the ousting of the grocery retailing company's then CEO, who many felt was responsible for Wild Oats' underperformance at the time. Burkle also took a seat on the fledgling natural foods' chain's board of directors.

In 2007, Burkle was a major behind the scenes force in helping to engineer the acquisition of Wild Oats by Whole Foods Market, Inc., which netted him and his Yucaipa investment firm a healthy payout. Whole Foods announced it was acquiring Wild Oats in September, 2007, with the full support of Wild Oats Markets, Inc.'s board and investors.

Burkle hasn't made a major supermarket industry investment play since last year's Whole Foods/Wild Oats acquisition-merger. However, through his various Yucaipa investment funds, he has stakes in companies of all types throughout the world (including grocery industry) as well as in the U.S.

In this piece we wrote on January 30, we said Burkle was taking a close look at SuperValu, Inc. in terms of possibly making a major investment in what many believe is an undervalued company. We learned this from a source close to both Yucaipa and SuperValu.

To date, Burkle hasn't made major investment in SuperValu that we are aware of , and it's likely he won't, since some fundamentals both at SuperValu and in the U.S. economy have changed since January, 2008. However, don't rule it completely out either--we aren't.

In fact, Burkle's deal tend to be good for the supermarket industry in our analysis. When he bundled up all the regional chains in the 1980's some were tired, smaller operations in need of shaking up Others, like Ralph's and Fred Meyer, were full of potential but just operating in a rather mediocre manner. Burkle bundled all these somewhat disperate chains together and created value--and in our view provided what at the time was some much needed "creative destruction" in the supermarket industry.

His move regarding Wild Oats is the same in our opinion. Before Burkle took his 5% stake in the natural products retailer, it was in big trouble. Whole Foods' was eating its lunch, as were many independent natural foods stores. There was nothing Wild about Wild Oats at that time--and nobody in the grocer's senior management team was even close to feeling his or her "Oats" over the natural grocery chains sales and operating performance.

Many people cry (and even cry fowl) about the Whole Foods acquisition, but it was the best thing to happen to Wild Oats--and the natural foods retailing sector. Burkle shook it up--and likely saved Wild Oats in the process, in our analysis and opinion. Whole Foods had a hand in the saving as well of course.

Meanwhile, Burkle has been very good to former President Clinton. Of course, that's a two-way street. Burkle has been a close personal friend, as well as a financial angel, to Bill Clinton since his first run for the Presidency in 1990, which he won, followed by winning a second term. It's likely that friendship has paid a handsome dividend or two for Mr. Burkle.

Ron Burkle also has extended his personal, political and financial relationship to the former First Lady and Senator from New York, Hillary Clinton, in her run for the Democratic nomination for President. According to campaign disclosure statements as well as a recent report in the New York Times, Burkle is one of Senator Clintons "Hillraisers," a title given to those key supporters who raise more than $100,000 for her Presidential campaign.

Burkle has done that--and much more. In addition to giving the maximum amount an individual can give to a Presidential candidate--which is about $5,000 ($2,500 during the primary campaign and another $2,500 for the general election)--and raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for her, including holding a lavish fundraiser at his Beverly Hills estate for the Senator from New York, Burkle also has made a six figure donation on top of all this to Emily's List, which is a women-run independent political action group that's a big supporter of Hillary Clinton for President.

Who would have thought the grocery industry would end up being such a cash cow for a former U.S. President. We bet Bill Clinton, who says one of the things he loves about no longer being President is that he gets to do some of his own grocery shopping, grins from ear-to-ear each time the supermarket clerk at the checkstand asks him if he wants paper or plastic (bags) for his grocery purchases.

Food & Politics Memo: Is Barack Obama the Whole Foods Market Candidate, and Hillary Clinton the Warehouse-Store Commodity Version?

We often make the analogy between food retailing (and retailing in general) and politics. In fact, that's one reason we have a memo called 'Food & Politics Memo' here on the blog. We aren't alone in that belief: Political strategists even differentiate between what they call retail politics--campaigning one-on-one with voters--and wholesale politics--using the mass media, running TV ads and the like.

There's also lots of merchandizing in politics like in retailing. The difference is in politics the candidate is what's being merchandised rather than products. There's "retail theatre" and "political theatre." And like the buyer/seller relationship in food retailing, politics requires lots of negotiation and deal-making as well.

New York Times columnist David Brooks (Aka Dr. Retail, pictured above at left) agrees with our retailing/politics analogy. He even devoted his entire Times' column today to making the analogy camparison as it relates to the Democratic Presidential Primary race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

In his column, "Questions for Dr. Retail," Brooks uses a Q&A format between himself and Dr. Retail, the mythical sage of the retail world, to discuss Clinton, Obama and their race for the Democratic party Presidential nomination.

Using a food retailing analogy, Brooks says there are commodity retailers--like Safeway (maybe no Lifestyle format stores in his Washington, D.C. neighborhood)--and experience providers that deliver a sensation to shoppers, like Whole Foods Market. He then carries that analogy to the candidates: Clinton is a commodity candidate he says. She caters to the less-educated, less-pretentious consumer. (Note to Brooks: Safeway is upscaling; Wal-Mart might be a better choice for the analogy.)

Obama, on the other hand, is the experience provider (Whole Foods). He attracts the educated consumer. (In polls he leads Clinton by 22 points among people with college degrees.) We aren't sure if Brooks is aware of it--or if our readers are--but Whole Foods Market's number one criteria for locating a grocery store in a neighborhood is the percentage (the higher the better) of residents who have college degrees.

Brooks goes on in his column to compare Clinton and Obama--the commodity candidate vs. the experience provider--on a number of other retail industry-oriented attributes and themes. It's a must-read for retailers, political junkies and citizens alike.

We happen to think Brooks is right on--and all the primary exit polls and telephone survey polls thus far bare it out--in terms of how he is characterizing the two candidates--or at least how each candidate is positioning themselves for the race.

We even recall a comment Barack Obama made a month or so ago. In talking aboout the soaring cost of food at the grocery store, Obama said in a speech to a crown, "Have you seen how high the price of arugala is at Whole Foods?" That's what we call "experience-provider" retail positioning.

Read David Brooks' "Questions for Dr. Retail" column here.