1200 Poisoned Apples: They're Not Just For Witches Anymore

1200 Poisoned Apples:  They’re Not Just For Witches Anymore

Boy, what a relief.  The Food and Drug Administration has cut the allowable amount of arsenic in apple juice.  It makes things tougher for people who want to commit murder by poison.

It means apple juice soon will be no worse for your health than fluoridated water.  We can all continue to believe that drinking fruit juice somehow benefits us.

And we can drink all the apple juice we want without fear of cancer.  We can drink apple juice instead of taking Ex-Lax for constipation.  We can mix spiced apple juice with spiced rum without fear of the former corrupting the latter.

I suppose we now can reduce this to a condition-orange emergency.  Certainly, it’s no longer condition-red. (There he goes again, comparing apples and oranges!)

Is this brilliant detective work?  You know -- like the NSA went through its records and said “Ahah!  So many calls to 911 about arsenic and apple juice!”  No.  This was the work of our ole’ buddy The Great and Powerful Dr. Oz followed by something similar from Consumer Reports Magazine.

Little Elliot Ness wannabes are gearing up as we speak, getting ready to take fire axes to cartons of arsenic-overloaded apple juice as they’re being readied for delivery at wholesale food warehouses.

And this is a boon for the counting house industry.  (Bet you didn’t know there was a counting house industry.)  These people gather in large, airy laboratories, and take one billion part samples of the juice.

Then they count the arsenic parts.  Ten per billion is the new limit down from about 20.  Do you what kind of eyesight it takes to find ten parts among one billion?  The parts don’t congregate in one spot.  They’re all over the map.  And a billion-part map is big, especially when it’s made of liquid.

Already, the protests are starting to roll in.  

AAA: The American Arsenic Association says “Once again we are maligned as a poison.  All we are is a simple natural chemical.  Arsenic doesn’t kill people, people kill people.”

OTHER AAA: The American Apple Association says “See, you import apples from China and look what happens.  Apples from CHINA?  What's the matter with the billions of apples we grow right here in the USA?!”

MYSTERY WRITERS OF AMERICA:  “You reduce arsenic, half of us are out of business.  Arsenic has been the mainstay of our industry since Agatha Christie was in diapers.”

BLUE CROSS OF MOOTE POINTE NY:  “The federal government in its infinite wisdom is taking action that will reduce our caseload by 6.3%.  Our doctors are screaming about fewer fees!”

THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA: “We are the world’s number one producer of white arsenic and this will wreck both our output and further reduce the world supply of finished copper. How do you like THEM apples!”

OLD LACE:  “Who can I turn to when nobody needs me?”

Protests, protests and more protests.  But there are some cheerleaders, too.

THE HOMEOPATHIC HEALERS’ ASSOCIATION:  “We welcome this giant step in the purification of the American diet and hope it starts a landslide of replacing awful chem lab produced chemicals with those of which we approve.  Please do not confuse Arsenic with Arnica.”

OCCUPY GRANNY SMITH: “We are pleased that our months-long campaign has succeeded.  Now we can get out of the orchard and go home.”

DR. OZZIE:  “I am the great and powerful Oz.  DO pay attention to that man behind the curtain.”

Shrapnel:

--Wessays™ “welcomes” Windows 8.  If ever there were a promotion-happy, awkward, forced march operating system, we’ve yet to identify it.  Bring back Windows 3.2!

I’m Wes Richards.  My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2013