The History of An Entitlement

This is the history of the federal government’s “Pizza on Friday Program” (POFP)

• Woodrow Wilson writes in a 1898 letter to a colleague that “I took the family out for a Pizza Pie as all families should”.

• That colleague, wrote President McKinley urging mandatory Pizza Fridays.

• In 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt said “A man that doesn’t like pizza is a rapscallion and should be punched in the snoot, tarred, feathered and run out on the rails”.

• 1911, President William Howard Taft ate three pizzas at one sitting.

• In 1925 a reporter said to President Coolidge: "I bet a fellow ten whole dollars that I could not get you to say two words about pizza!" The President responded: "You lose".

• The campaign song for Alfred Smith in 1928 was “A Slice Would Be Nice”

• In a 1933 as an effort to help struggling diary farmers in Wisconsin, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Wednesday Pizza Administration or The WPA. The Federal Government commissioned free pizza to be given out in special government stores called “Huts” every Wednesday.

• The radio stations all over America played the song “Hey You Let’s Chew”.

• After Pearl Harbor, the country was urged to cut down on its pizza consumption and show Hitler we mean business.

• In the 1948 Presidential race, President Harry Truman said, “The Republican Party wants to take away your pizza and I won’t let them.”

• In 1952 Presidential candidate Dwight Eisenhower promises to hold the anchovies.

• In the 1960 Presidential debates,John F.Kennedy said that there was pepperoni gap.

• In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson signed an executive order changing The Wednesday Pizza Administration into The Pizza On Friday Program since the modern American family was very busy on this day.

• In an interview at a Washington D.C. area Pizza Hut, President Richard Nixon denied ever having pizza.

• In 1979, President Carter signed an executive order allowing for federal funding of deep dish pizzas.

• In a 1986 compromise with the Democrats, President Ronald Reagan allowed citizens to substitute spaghetti for pizza if they wanted.

• After a rousing convention speech in 1988, President George Herbert Walker Bush caves in to Congressional pressure and signs legislation to allow specialty pizzas on the POFP.

• Bill Clinton wins the White House in 1992 promising bread sticks.

• In 2000, George Bush promises “buffalo wings with your pizza” while Al Gore promises “buffalo wings and the beverage of your choice”.

• Illinois Senator Barack Obama wins The White House promising never to get your order wrong.

• In 2011, after years of an exploding Federal Budget, Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin proposes deep cuts to the Pizza on Friday Program. The poor and needy would still qualify; however, the upper classes will be issued a coupon for use at their local Preferred Pizza Provider (PPP).

• The chairwoman of The Democratic Party, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, called Ryan and the Republican Party: “Pro starvation”.