Wait! Before you pour maple syrup on your evening pancake stack: Are you sure that's real maple syrup and not some poisonous impostor? A Vermont senator wants to make selling fake syrup a felony, punishable by hard prison time.

Did you know America is plagued by a rash of fraudulent maple syrup manufacturers? So much so that Senator Patrick Leahy just introduced legislation to make selling fraudulent maple syrup a federal felony punishable by five years in prison. According to a statement posted to Leahy's website:

The MAPLE Act creates a felony offense carrying a five-year maximum penalty for fraudulently selling maple syrup that is not, in fact, maple syrup. Under current law, the sale of this fraudulent maple syrup is only a misdemeanor offense carrying only on a one-year penalty.

"Schemers should not easily be able to sully the seal of quality that is associated with genuine Vermont maple syrup," Leahy continued.

Honestly? Five years in prison is too good for these bastards. I grew up in Vermont and like all Vermonters have strong feelings about the sweet nectar that flows each spring from the sturdy maple. I'd rather drink Draino than that fake Mrs. Butterworth's bullshit that, through some weird stomach mutation, you flatlanders are able to digest. (Anyone not from Vermont is a "flatlander.") The penalty for selling fake maple syrup should be death. Death by being slowly lowered into a boiling vat of pure, A-grade Vermont Pure Maple Syrup. [LAT, image via AP]