Standing up for Canada's Sausages

Politicians in Ottawa have long ignored a sizzling, simmering, serious problem that's afflicting far too many Canadians.

I am referring, of course, to the terrible trauma of exploding sausages.

How many summer backyard barbecues have been totally ruined thanks to over-cooked sausages splitting asunder on the grill?

Probably too many to count.

Yet, amazingly no government has ever dealt with this national sausage crisis.

Until now.

In case you haven't heard, the Conservative government is doling out a whopping $826,000 to an Ontario meat processing company so it can buy the advanced technology required to produce a non-explosive sausage.

Yes, that's right; the Harper Conservatives are actually stuffing your tax dollars into a fancy meat grinding machine.

As the government put it in a news release, this "investment ... will help the company purchase new manufacturing equipment that will produce a higher quality sausage that is more resistant to splitting or bursting while cooking."

Now, I shouldn't have to defend the government's decision to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to produce something as important as higher quality, bursting-resistant sausages, but given the predictable complaints that will emerge from the anti-sausage lobby, let's examine the many reasons why this expenditure is a great idea.

Reason # 1.

First, it's all about economics. If we can master the art of producing non-splitting sausage casings, it will give Canada a huge advantage in the highly competitive global sausage casing industry.

Reason # 2.

Secondly, a sausage subsidy will ...Hmmm, let's see ..... OK, I can only think of one reason, but I am sure the government's PR people can come up with several other plausible-sounding rationalizations.

My only question is why didn't the Conservatives make sausages a key part of their election platform? It would have made for a great slogan: "Vote for us and we will improve your sausages."

Mind you, acting on sausage deficiencies should only be the first step when it comes to dealing with Canada's food-related tribulations. The government needs to do much more.

If you don't believe me, check out this list of other problems we should spend insane amounts of money to research:

• Whenever I try to open one of those individually wrapped cheese slices, I always end up mangling the cheese. Clearly we must set up a government task force to investigate easier opening plastic packaging technology.

• We need a national strategy to produce a chocolate bar that doesn't turn into a pile of yucky, goo when you leave it in the car on a hot summer day.

• We definitely should have some sort of government-financed program to deal with the heart-breaking dilemma of tough pizza crust.

• Why, for the love of Pete, isn't the government doing anything to create non-gas producing beans? This should be a national priority!

• Surely all Canadians, regardless of race, colour or creed, have the right to cook a hamburger that doesn't stick to the barbecue grill. (Maybe the advanced non-bursting-sausage technology the government is subsidizing can fix this problem too.)

Mind you, I realize the Prime Minister will not be able to concentrate solely on this foodstuff agenda, as he has many other key priorities, such as financing fake lakes.

That's why I propose we put former cabinet minster Bev Oda in charge of overseeing all government food-related research projects.

After all, she already knows how to spend money on orange juice.

(Please  note, this article was rejected by Huffington Post Canada, because, as an editor explained it to me in an email, the blog site likes to "shy away from sarcasm." Ha, of course, we all know the real reason it was rejected: The Huffington Post is in league with the anti-sausage lobby!)