Center for Consumer Freedom

Last month, the food police at the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) took their anti-salt crusade one shake too far, suing the Denny’s restaurant chain over the sodium content of its food. As we told the media, CSPI’s claims should be taken with a grain of salt. (Cue the rim-shot.) CSPI is up to its usual gig of filing “press conference” lawsuits that garner media attention but lack legal merit, which certainly isn’t a new tactic for the group.

Today, Hans Bader with the Competitive Enterprise Institute grinds up CSPI’s latest claims:

Many common food items in grocery stores have more than a day’s supply of salt. … Many frozen dinners have more than a day’s supply of salt. Why would anyone expect restaurant fare to be healthier? (Many expensive, snobby, high-brow restaurants serve saltier food than what Denny’s serves inexpensively and quickly to America’s working-class and middle-class people.) There is no limit on who can be sued if this suit were to succeed.

Moreover, expecting all restaurants to have less than or exactly equal to the average restaurant’s salt content is as unrealistic as harboring the Lake Wobegon fantasy that all children are above average. Some cuisines are just saltier than others.