It’s official. Congress passed a law that will make pizza count as a vegetable in American school lunches because of the coating of tomato sauce underneath the layers of cheese and meat. The worst part of the whole thing? The humble tomato is a fruit.

Earlier in the year, the Obama administration and the Agriculture department ruled to revamp what constituted a healthy school lunch. They advised limiting potatoes and sodium intake, and adding more whole grains to lunches.

The original bill had language in it that would limit all of these items in school lunches, but was blocked in revisions of the bill.

Food companies and conservatives balked at the proposal. Food companies that make pizzas wanted the changes revoked, and conservatives said that the federal government should have no place in designating what students can and cannot eat for lunch.  

School lunches subsidized by the federal government must contain a certain portion of vegetables, and before this bill was passed, pizza was considered junk food. A congressional committee also wants to keep French fries in school lunches, counting them as a vegetable, as well.   

Interestingly, retired generals who had banded together in a group called Mission: Readiness strongly criticized the bill that would categorize pizza as a vegetable. The generals said that childhood obesity was one of the leading factors to render a young person ineligible for military service. Essentially, it seems that they are saying that making pizza a vegetable is a threat to homeland security.

In its entirety, the bill would block the Agriculture Department from limiting starchy vegetables like corn and potatoes to times a week. In essence, the bill wants to allow French fries to continue being served to children everyday of the week. Additionally, the bill will require further study on sodium reduction options and a more solid definition of whole grains before regulation.

There’s little question that a bill of this nature would be passed just to appease the big food companies that are making children fat. School lunches are already terrible unhealthy, and until at least junior high, students are not given more than one option.

The terrible irony is that Michelle Obama’s main platform is preventing childhood health. When the First Lady can’t even have a sway over the tenor of health and food in this country, there certainly doesn’t seem like there will be much of a shot for the rest of us.