FDA: You know that artisanal cheese you love, that you have to age on wood planks? That’s dangerous and we don’t approve.

Fancy Cheese Lovers: Hey, FDA, these cheese wheels will be your tombstones.

FDA: Oh. What? Did you think we meant we were going to regulate your much loved, centuries-old practices out of existence just because we’re a regulatory agency that stops people from doing things for a living? Of course we’re not doing that… right now… while the media spotlight is so bright it’s hurting our eyes… but you’d better convince us we should allow you to do that anyway.

The latter bit is what has apparently played out this morning, according to Forbes online.

But as Cato’s Walter Olson explains, this apparent victory for sanity and liberty may simply be due to the fact that the usual advocates of regulatory encroachment in every aspect of our lives happened to have been personally inconvenienced this time around, and may have had the subject-area knowledge to realize how ridiculous this encroachment was. So, for once, they pushed back instead of rooting for leviathan.

If so, let’s hope they learn a broader lesson from this experience: maybe other people should also be left to make their own choices in the areas about which they care deeply. Maybe all that stifles is not gold.