Cory Booker’s interactions with the denizens of Twitter started out pretty typically on Sunday. First, he told a man whose transgender friends are nervous about moving to Newark that he’d be happy to give them a call, and by the evening he was offering to help a student staying up all night to write a report about him. However, things grew more contentious when he tweeted a bit of ancient Greek wisdom, courtesy of Plutarch: “An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.” Booker was accused of plotting to redistribute wealth and told “nutrition is not a responsibility of the government.” Since simply debating the merits of providing food assistance to impoverished Americans doesn’t fit into Booker’s ridiculously hands-on approach to governing, by the end of the night he’d challenged the Twitter user to a contest in which they’d both try to live off of food stamps for a week.
Connecticut’s University of Bridgeport, which happens to be holding a “UB SNAP Food Challenge” in December, offered to referee, so it looks like the contest is on. The rules stipulate that participants must, “Avoid accepting free food from friends, family, or at work, including at receptions, briefings, or other events where food is served.” Presumably, that precludes Booker from subsisting on cases of donated Hot Pockets.
