D

ear McDonald’s: This Fourth 
of July, as a Black man, I have 
been forced to re-examine 
what it means to be a citizen of “The 
Greatest Country on Earth.” On one 
hand, we have been making progress 
with our national reckoning regard-
ing race, but we also have an embattled 
president whose mentality seems to be 
more fitting for 1920 than 2020. On the 
other hand, with our crippling wealth 
inequality and surging COVID-19 
caseload, it seems difficult to justify my 
knee-jerk embrace of American excep-
tionalism. As I pondered this over the 
previous weekend, I found myself 
increasingly reliant on the counsel 
of the most prolific distillation of the 
American Dream: F. Scott Fitzger-
ald’s “The Great Gatsby.”
This novel lays out a cohesive theory 
of the ideal American identity that, 
while paradoxical in many regards, is a 
roadmap for how we should behave and 
a cautionary tale for the potential pitfalls 
along the way. According to Fitzgerald, a 
great American is ambitious and entre-
preneurial yet also humble; he or she is 
a legendary, somewhat reclusive figure 
who allows an extensive myth to be 
constructed around them. Then, while 
I was flipping through chapter nine on 
July 5, my theory came into focus.
See, right now, no one person or 
group embodies the American ideal of 
Gatsby because of our deep divisions 
as Americans — we have been forced 
to take sides. You are either a Democrat 
or a Republican. You either spent the 
weekend excited to watch Hamilton 
with your friends over Zoom or lit fire-
works in the woods without masks. You 
are either excited for The Kissing Booth 

2 or have common sense. However, one 
thing we can all (arguably) agree on is our 
love for this country, and, by the end of 
this article, we will all agree that there is 
nothing more American than the McRib.
The birth of the McRib begins with 
the meeting of its two parents: Roger 
Mandigo and Rene Arend. As an emeri-
tus professor of animal science at the 
University of Nebraska and Meat Indus-
try Hall of Fame inductee, Mandigo 
invented the process of meat restructur-
ing: Producers take meat from animals, 
combine the different types of meat and 
form it into different shapes before being 
flash-frozen. Then, in response to the 
dual crises of Food and Drug Adminis-
tration warnings about beef consump-
tion and rising costs of chicken, Arend 
— whose previous fame was for making 
the three McNugget sauces: Hot Mustard, 
Sweet & Sour and Barbecue — used Man-
digo’s process to create the boneless pork 
patty, fashioned to look like a slab of ribs. 
Finally, in 1981, the McRib was unveiled 
to the world and began its journey into the 
hearts of millions of Americans.
Especially popular in the Midwest, 
the McRib immediately garnered a 
cult-like following from fans of the sand-
wich’s unique combination: a pork patty 
covered in an excessive amount of bar-
becue sauce, white onions and pickles. 
However, when McDonald’s celebrated 
its 30th anniversary in 1985, the com-
pany decided to pull the McRib from 
the menu because of assumed relatively 
little fanfare in response to rising pork 
prices and lagging sales, although the 
reasoning is explicitly undetermined. 
When the move was cruelly done with 
little to no warning, customers per-
ceived it as a direct affront, and decades 

later they began to organize negligible 
protests outside of McDonald’s restau-
rants nationwide, but the anger even-
tually faded as the company remained 
firm on not bringing back the item. 
Then, in what I can only assume was 
a response to Taylor Swift’s birth, the 
McRib was reintroduced as McDon-
ald’s first-ever limited-time-only item 
in 1989, becoming a menu mainstay 
once again in 1994. However, just like all 
good things, this was not meant to last as 
McDonald’s once again announced that 
the sandwich would be pulled from 
stores in 2005.
This decision once again faced 
backlash, prompting McDonald’s to 
announce the McRib’s “farewell tour,” 
which, much like the 2014 farewell 
tour of Motley Crue, lasted far too long 
until the general public forgot about it, 
and the sandwich made its “final” exit 
in 2007. While the McRib became a 
distant, if slightly pleasant, memory for 
most, it, much like Shrek and Bene the 
Breadstick, developed a cult following 
on the internet, as superfan Alan Klein 
founded a McRib locator website, dedi-
cated to finding regional locations that 
offered the fabled sandwich.
Thus, 13 years after the McRib has 
disappeared from the permanent 
McDonald’s menu, it has not disap-
peared from our hearts. In fact, upon 
its last nationwide release, the company 
attributed its 4.8 percent sales increase 
to the limited-time offering, which 
prompted me to write this letter.

4

Thursday, July 9, 2020
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
OPINION

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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

KEITH JOHNSTONE | COLUMNIST

Keith Johnstone can be reached at 

keithja@umich.edu.

America needs a McRib: an open letter to McDonald’s

L

ong before the COVID-19 
pandemic sent the American 
economy into a downward 
spiral, our nation had a serious problem 
with our national deficit. Now, after our 
federal government spent trillions of 
dollars in order to support American 
workers and businesses, our staggering 
national debt is more visible than ever.
According to the Committee for a 
Responsible Federal Budget — which 
projects the debt will grow by a total of $4 
trillion in the fiscal year 2020 — the federal 
debt now exceeds $26 trillion in the midst 
of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. This sharp 
increase in our national debt comes after 
Congress and President Donald Trump 
passed the CARES Act in March, which 
included stimulus checks, unemployment 
benefits and business support.
Now, with the CRFB and other 
experts predicting that more federal 
spending will be necessary to further 
prop up our damaged economy, Ameri-
cans face a national debt crisis at a new, 
dangerous level never seen before. While 
almost all economists agree this signifi-
cant government spending was necessary 
— and we shouldn’t hesitate to spend more 
in order to support households and busi-
nesses for the duration of the pandemic 
— we have a duty to remember the costs of 
our growing deficit at the same time.
Kenneth Rogoff, a professor at Har-
vard University and former chief econ-
omist at the International Monetary 
Fund, states, “I believe we are doing the 

right thing today by borrowing to make 
it through this tragic crisis, but make no 
mistake: It is not a free lunch, and it is 
not without its risks.” Speaking about 
the dangers of failing to manage the 
growing national debt, Rogoff added 
that in the presence of such a staggering 
deficit, it becomes extremely difficult for 
nations to spend in the midst of new crises 
and shocks. Additionally, he comments, 
“Many advanced countries are already 
likely to experience strains to help their 
populations, especially given the likely 
coming wave of corporate debt problems, 
and the need to protect banks.”
Most experts agree now is not the 
time to directly address the national 
debt crisis, when the track of the 
COVID-19 pandemic is so unpredict-
able. But once we are able to get the pan-
demic under control and this disease no 
longer poses a threat to our country, one 
of our top priorities must be addressing 
our crippling deficit.
Sadly, most issues and initiatives in 
our nation today are difficult to agree 
on, and bipartisan efforts are relatively 
rare. But everybody can agree that our 
national debt is dangerous and threatens 
the futures of all Americans. Sooner than 
later, we all will have to grapple with 
the impacts of this debt crisis.

A bipartisan solution to our debt

EVAN STERN | COLUMNIST

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Evan Stern can be reached at 

erstern@umich.edu.

KEVIN MOORE JR. | CONTACT CARTOONIST AT KEVJR@UMICH.EDU

