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I grew up on an Aroostook County, Maine, potato farm where the spud was revered.

It represented nutritional calories on the table, money in the bank and the ability to buy my own school clothes after serving my annual sentence of forced child labor.

I've been upset about the WIC program's sole exclusion of the white potato from fresh vegetable options, and am very proud of Susan Collins' effort to gain its rightful place in the WIC grocery cart.

While I am excited about this breakthrough, I have some unresolved resentment about the maligning of the white potato. And I have a proposal that will exact some revenge for all the years of unfairness.

Let's nominate some other vegetables to take their turn as forbidden WIC vegetables.

• Sweet potato - this haughty relative of the white potato has claimed superiority due to its orange color and lower carb content, parading its beta-carotine like a coat of arms. Behind closed doors, however, it has been making X-rated vegi-tales with jet-puffed porn star - the marshmallow.

• Broccoli - Nutrients are drowning in a molten sea of Velveeta.

• Green beans - "French's green been casserole" has been impersonating a healthy side dish for decades. While we are at it, let's ask Susan to sponsor a bill to make this recipe illegal.

• Onions - Let's crack down on home onion ring labs where beer-battered ecstasy is being cooked up and served to carb-craving junkies.

• Tomatoes - You start out with recreational salsa on the weekend, and before you know it, these lycopene-laden beefsteaks are plastered on pasta and pizza every day of the week.

• Carrots - Known to be glazed, candied and incorporated into cakes.

• Celery - Pretending to be high fiber and lo-cal, these hypocrites embed themselves in platters of hot wings with blue cheese dressing.

• Spinach - One word: Salmonella.

• Eggplant - Don't be fooled by this glossy purple perennial. I did a little research and was appalled to learn that they are a relative of tobacco, and their bitter-tasting seeds contain nicotinic alkaloids. Are we willing to have our most vulnerable become hooked on this addictive nightshade?

• Cucumbers - How many summer picnics have you attended where this innocent vegetable has been corrupted by carbs in a macaroni salad?

• Beets - You can try to dignify this vegetable with Ivy League status, but this is one case where Harvard is just another word for fructose.

I think you get the idea. Every vegetable has its own dirty little secret if you dig deep enough. Let's celebrate the digging of pure white potatoes, and hope that our homegrown tubers fully recover from this nightmare of discrimination.

- Molly Stevens

Molly Stevens arrived late to the writing desk, but is forever grateful her second act took this direction instead of adult tricycle racing or hoarding cats. She blogs at www.shallowreflections.com, where she skims over important topics, like her love affair with white potatoes and why she saves user manuals.