Historical Recurrence is the modern theory that history repeats itself, but the events it describes had been observed for eons. Some link it as far back as 200 B.C.. One of the most commonly used and mentioned observances is the rise and fall of empire, however on a deeper philosophical level we can boil it all down to survival. The hunter with the better weapon is the one that lives to see the next day. In government, the nation with the more control or trust in and amongst its population is the one that won't be overthrown. This means that governments are required to, for example, regulate trade or organize and help to distribute food. The economy is therefor on of if not the most important part of any government. If you have a strong economy, you can feed your people and arm your soldiers, If you can't you die. This is why, especially now with near-instantaneous messaging, there is such an economic incentive for a functioning government. In conclusion, the government with the best economy is the strongest. Taking what we learned we can now immerse ourselves into historical context and interpret. In the late 1800's, god was on the rise. The industrial revolution meant that goods and services were now easier to access and provide by the day. The global economy was rocketing towards new miles of success. The success in question came at a cost, and that was the family. in most cases especially in America, the father would spend most of his time either sleeping or working to provide for a family, but what about when he came home? What would they do to destress? Drinking. Alcoholism soared because it was the only way "real men could relax". This obviously raised tensions at home. These tensions led to many religious and feminist movements calling for a ban on alcohol. Pause, lets assess the situation. Within what seems to be a very amount of time we have essentially connected prohibition with Darwinism, how? Simply put, it's all related because one action sparks another, and then another Ad Nauseam. Continuing down the chain of events we see a complete ban on the sale and transportation of alcohol, which leads to the main question of my research, what do all these former alcoholics do when they can't get their "fix" for lack of a better term? they go to the next best thing. The day after the 18th amendment is passed, nearly all bars and pubs across America become: ice cream shops. Guess where ice cream comes from? cows. Who owns the cows? The farmers in the dairy industry. Which economic sector becomes the center of attention? The dairy industry. Now the connection becomes clear. Strong governments have strong economies, and a strong economy requires an involved government to regulate that economy. The removal of a very popular item from the market opens up new ones. When one door closes another opens and one of the first to walk through that door was the navy because they now had a massive fleet of ships with sailors who needed a replacement for alcohol. Over the years, Ice Cream becomes and American staple while many seek to break the new prohibition laws. The economy had just nearly regained its footing when everything changed. On the fifth of December, 1933 prohibition was repealed. Now the government has a major issue. With a new option on the market, dairy consumption is bound to decline rapidly. With a decline in demand for milk, the dairy industry will suffer greatly. To account for this issue the government, who is responsible for intervening to maintain the economy, begins to subsidize the dairy market to create artificial demand. The plan was to buy dairy milk from the farmers and slowly decrease over time to slowly shrink the economy. The plan had some major drawbacks to however. For example, now that people know the government will buy almost all their milk, they're going to rapidly increase their dairy production to milk as much money as they can from the government. The second drawback is as follows: What is the government going to do with the milk? It cant be dumped in the ocean and too much dumped in the river and it could be harmful to the local water supplies. The government deicides to roll down the buy back program and turn their new found dairy fortune into cheese to preserve it. So soon enough, like clockwork massive limestone caves have been hollowed out, ventilated and filled to the brim with cheese. 1.4 billion pounds are in storage by 1970, for reference a Zumwalt destroyer class warship has a water displacement value of 35068932 pounds. The story continues, as described by "The Farmlink Project", "This led to Ronald Reagan enacting public distribution of the government cheese in 1981. That year then-Secretary of Agriculture, John R. Block showed up at the White House with a molding five-pound block of cheese and told reporters, 'We’ve got 60 million of these that the government owns… It’s moldy, it’s deteriorating… we can’t find a market for it, we can’t sell it, and we’re looking to give some of it away.' Thus, 'government cheese' was born, and the federal government distributed these cheese blocks through the Temporary Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP). It was given away for free by pickup to people at food banks, community centers, and so on. 'Government cheese' became a totem of American culture, signaling both class and nostalgia. It is referenced in Kendrick Lamar and Jay-Z songs, and in 2017, Snoop Dogg even taught Martha Stewart how to cook with it on their show." As you can clearly see, there is a noticeable slippery slope of events all linked to each other. Industrial revolution means workers are drinking on their time off, This disturbs family dynamics and leads to a massive feminist and prohibition movement. With a ban on alcohol many Americans move to ice cream as a substitute. Prohibition is repealed and many people go back to drinking leaving the dairy companies in peril. Dairy industry in peril could lead to economic tragedy so government steps in to help. government buys a lot of milk and stores it as cheese in massive limestone caves. Massive amounts of cheese are then distributed by the government to food banks and a publicity movement is started to slowly trickle the massive cheese supplies out of storage. What does this mean for everyone reading this? Nothing just eat your extra cheesy pizza and god bless America. ReferencesDiModica, Callie. n.d. “Cheese Caves and Food Surpluses: Why the U.S. Government currently stores 1.4 billion lbs of cheese.” The Farmlink Project. Accessed September 2, 2024. https://www.farmlinkproject.org/stories-and-features/cheese-caves-and-food-surpluses-why-the-u-s-government-currently-stores-1-4-billion-lbs-of-cheese.
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I find this topic to be very interseting and enjoyed you opions on it. I do find it hard to beleive that the goverment would have the space to store all the cheese. I also think it would be hard for them to have thouhsands of people help them transport it and store it. Those thouhsands of people wouldn't be able to talk about it and I dont think that everyone would never say a word about it.
This topic intruged me because I would have never known that the cheese took place of achahol. Also, I was surprised when I read that cheese was stored in limestone caves, and I wonder how the government got away with with this with no attention.
This topic really interested me in the 1.4 billion pounds of cheese that the US had stored away. I find it smart how the US can now give out free cheese that people will gladly take in order to get rid of all of it that has been stored up over the years. I can't believe I wasn't educated on this topic until today.
this is a very interesting topic, I have heard of this before, but it was interesting to learn more about it. Theres only so much cheese that america can eat and theres only so many thing you can use the cheese for so what are they going to do when it goes bad.
I have never really ever heard of this before so it was quite interesting. That much cheese there could be problems especially when it becomes expired because where is all of it supposed to go to then. Then you can't eat it because it's expired and it is not good for you or anybody.
This was a very interesting topic, and it made me question a lot of things. I think that with that much cheese it could become a problem, because there is no way to save all of it without having some expired cheese left over. I wonder if it is an easy or hard process to get rid of what they can't use, and if that causes the government to lose money.
This topic in particular has taught me a lot that I needed to know. Especially the part on Ice Cream becoming an american staple to break new prohibition laws. But I can say this, the government idea has worked and will not stop me from buying ice cream. So I say they did a good job on it. What a conspiracy this is to read about.
I learned a lot about this topic since I didn't even know that any of this exsited. I think it is very intresting that ice cream took the place of alcohol. I also thought it was intresting that the government was sending us so much cheese. Do you know if they still store cheese?
I learned alot from this information. Is the government still giving out cheese to this day and what kind of cheese was it? Its amazing how alomost know one knows about this and how the people of america have not figured out.
i think that your hook paragraph and title were phenominal.the concept is while entertaining is only semi belevable. id like to put on my flashy tin hat just like everybody else but the conspiracy wasnt even that; its a decent ly known factoid and not a well enforced secret
Replies
I find this topic to be very interseting and enjoyed you opions on it. I do find it hard to beleive that the goverment would have the space to store all the cheese. I also think it would be hard for them to have thouhsands of people help them transport it and store it. Those thouhsands of people wouldn't be able to talk about it and I dont think that everyone would never say a word about it.
This topic intruged me because I would have never known that the cheese took place of achahol. Also, I was surprised when I read that cheese was stored in limestone caves, and I wonder how the government got away with with this with no attention.
This topic really interested me in the 1.4 billion pounds of cheese that the US had stored away. I find it smart how the US can now give out free cheese that people will gladly take in order to get rid of all of it that has been stored up over the years. I can't believe I wasn't educated on this topic until today.
this is a very interesting topic, I have heard of this before, but it was interesting to learn more about it. Theres only so much cheese that america can eat and theres only so many thing you can use the cheese for so what are they going to do when it goes bad.
I have never really ever heard of this before so it was quite interesting. That much cheese there could be problems especially when it becomes expired because where is all of it supposed to go to then. Then you can't eat it because it's expired and it is not good for you or anybody.
This was a very interesting topic, and it made me question a lot of things. I think that with that much cheese it could become a problem, because there is no way to save all of it without having some expired cheese left over. I wonder if it is an easy or hard process to get rid of what they can't use, and if that causes the government to lose money.
This topic in particular has taught me a lot that I needed to know. Especially the part on Ice Cream becoming an american staple to break new prohibition laws. But I can say this, the government idea has worked and will not stop me from buying ice cream. So I say they did a good job on it. What a conspiracy this is to read about.
I learned a lot about this topic since I didn't even know that any of this exsited. I think it is very intresting that ice cream took the place of alcohol. I also thought it was intresting that the government was sending us so much cheese. Do you know if they still store cheese?
I learned alot from this information. Is the government still giving out cheese to this day and what kind of cheese was it? Its amazing how alomost know one knows about this and how the people of america have not figured out.
i think that your hook paragraph and title were phenominal.the concept is while entertaining is only semi belevable. id like to put on my flashy tin hat just like everybody else but the conspiracy wasnt even that; its a decent ly known factoid and not a well enforced secret
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