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Buttigieg: “The Government Does Not Make Baby formula.”
Interesting reminder given the current circumstances.
It’s all but impossible not to open one’s Facebook or Twitter feed without seeing images of empty baby formula aisle, or seeing someone selling their own milk to help other desperate mothers during this formula shortage. After the situation grew so dire the Biden administration had no choice, the Defense Production Act was invoked in order to ramp up production and help bring the crisis to an end. Of course, that didn’t prevent his transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg from feeling the need to issue some curious reminders recently.
Branko Marcetic with Jacobin writes:
“…Sitting down on CBS’s “Face the Nation” this week, transportation secretary and billionaire darling Pete Buttigieg addressed the infant formula shortage that’s sent parents around the United States scrambling to find some way to feed their babies. Asked about the sluggish federal response to a crisis regulators were informed about as far back as October, Buttigieg absolved the Biden administration through a little bit of neoliberal sleight of hand.
“Let’s be very clear,” he said. “This is a capitalist country. The government does not make baby formula, nor should it. Companies make formula.’…”
