Putting the Political Spin in Spinach

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Now we know. A major reason for President Donald Trump’s demonstrably erratic, impulsive, irritable behavior is that he never eats his veggies.

According to former presidential physician Ronny Jackson, in order to get the Commander in Chief to down any vegetables at all, the White House cooks had to hide them in mashed potatoes. That would just about limit the menu to cauliflower. And while concealed cauliflower can do a lot for a guy, fully nourishing body and brain takes a steady supply of nutrients found in a rainbow of foods from asparagus, beets, and carrots to spinach, yams, and zucchini.

You can pretty much tell at a glance that the President is more irregular guy than arugula man. And Jackson confirms it in an interview reported in The New York Times. You may recall that Jackson, who is now running an uphill battle in Texas for a seat in Congress, once gushed about the leader’s “incredible genes” and declared he had done “incredibly well” on a cognitive test that turned out to be not such a good test of brain power at all. All that was entrée to Jackson being nominated to lead the Veteran’s Administration, from which he had to withdraw in disgrace.

Still before he left his post, Jackson announced that, given such genetic endowment, the president could have counted on living to 200 had he eaten better over the past few decades. Overheated as it was, the message was highly unpalatable to the many Americans trembling that POTUS might survive politically even for another four years.

Clandestine cauliflower might be as good as it gets at the current White House. Among the goodies in the brassica powerhouse is choline, which bolsters the frontal lobes of the brain—you know, the parts where reasoning, decision-making, and impulse-control are headquartered. But for a guy whose short fingers are twitching right next to the nuclear code, you’d want to see set before him, say, steaming platters of red peppers, rich in vitamin B6—essential for begetting the soothing effects of serotonin—or mountains of mushrooms sautéed in olive oil, whose antioxidants are linked to longevity. Better to err on the safe side.

It’s the 21st century, and the presidency is an ever-more cognitively demanding job. A leader needs all the brain power he or she can get. So taking a lead from POTUS’ favored style of information consumption, it’s time to get fully conspiratorial about cabbage. Yes, it’s hard to get furtive with fennel, but the future of democracy may just depend on stealth sustenance, masking more vegetables on the White House dinner table to deliver nutrition undercover.

The steward of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue might want to consider some new provisions for the White House mess. Admittedly, it’s a challenge, but there’s an urgent need to get crafty with leafy greens, because they help maintain memory. And go ahead, go all out and get brazen with broccoli, because ounce for ounce, it might be the world’s healthiest food, so rich in folate and other agents that just might keep DNA going for all those 200 years.