Judging by Alice Waters' interview on 60 Minutes this past Sunday, the downturn in the economy has not impacted her restaurant Chez Panisse at all.  Apparently San Franciscans are still going for the roughly hundred dollar meals of grilled local squab in salmis sauce with squab liver toast and bittersweet chocolate souffle.

Because Waters is sticking to her guns. It's slow food or die at Chez Panisse. And who could argue with her core belief that eating foods without poisons on them is a right, not a privilege? Not El Dragón. And local food isn't just a lefty, Berkely cliche -- after all,  isn't it an old school Republican value to have a web of small businesses (local food systems)  networking across the country? And, for years, major hospitals have been begging Americans to eat more, fresh, green veggies in order to staunch the obesity and diabetes epidemics in this country.

The problem is that Waters doesn't explain why people think sustainable food is expensive and why it seems elitist. Without doing that, the whole argument for local/sustainable/organic foods, the whole movement, stops in its tracks like a shopper with sticker shock -- and Waters opens herself  to being called elitist. Which fellow gatekeeper Leslie Stahl does. Repeatedly.

Specifically, no where in the segment does Waters or Leslie Stahl mention that the price of organic food tends to reflect the real cost of doing business for a farmer or food producer. Why?  Because the price of organics is not subsidized. The prices of fresh ingredients, let alone organic fresh ingredients, have never been kept artifically low by federal Farm Bill subsidies -- subsidies so breathtakingly huge (and doled out over so many decades) that the Farm Bill makes the current avalanche of bailouts look cute and cuddly in comparison. Waters fails to make the most obvious argument in her movement's defense: AMERICANS ARE ALREADY PAYING THROUGH THE NOSE FOR SHIT FOOD AND HAVE BEEN DOING SO IN THE B-B-BILLIONS SINCE THE 1930's!

Waters? An elitist?? She should be shouting at Leslie Stahl, "The US government pours billions of America's tax dollars onto less than 10% of our farms -- the highest grossing operations, most of which are giant, stinking crap-factories --  and you have the nerve to call me elitist? I'm the scrappy fighter trying to earn small farmers some money and access to a bigger market. So step back, Stahl!"

But Alice Waters is too deep inside the matrix to make this argument. She's made her name serving expensive food to expensive people, and she's now so entrenched in that world  that she can't  even see this big-picture, economic argument.  She can't understand why the average American would choose to eat a Dollar Meal over a plate of rare, locally grown Bronx grapes. Well, news flash: Americans don't choose Dollar Meals because they're unenlightened, Alice. They do it because they have no other damn choice. Simple fact.

So, in the end, Alice is still partying like it's 1999, when consumers were willing pay top dollar for organic food, back when it looked like organics and local food might be financially sustainable in the market, all on their own, without federal subsidies or price supports. Back then, there was no end in sight for organics' growth -- the industry was burning along at a 20% annual growth rate. But that's over, baby (for now, anyway). The last 2 quarters of 2008? Organics growth slogged along at 5-10%. Still impressive by USDA standards, but, clearly, half as many people at best are buying the "it's worth it" argument.

Though Chez Panisse seems unaffected. Must be nice.

But if sustainabie food and farming are going to find a place beyond Chez Panisse, if organic foods are going to find their way to the average American's table, we're going to need people like Alice Waters advocating for a change in federal policy when they're in the public eye like this, not just telling people to suck it up and buy, buy, buy (an approach that reminds me, oddly, of pro-Wall Street CNBC's head-in-the-sand approach to the recession last fall and John Stewart's brilliant takedown thereof). I mean, here you are on 60 Freaking Minutes! It's not enough to ask for vegetable gardens and an organic chef at the White House. It's not enough to talk about teaching kids how compost works (cool as that is!). Heads up, Celebrity Foodies! If you're on 60 Minutes, here's your sound byte: The Farm Bill must be hotwired so it can start funding real food.

In this economic climate, we need to be asking how to make organics and sustainable foods more affordable for everyone, not putting on horse blinders and focusing solely on these decades-old talking points and strategies for making change.

Your food revolution hasn't happened yet, Alice. Not even close.