Step forward, Chick Fil-A: a fast food chain with more than 1,600 branches across America, and roots firmly in the evangelical conservative camp. Stores don't open on Sundays, and the firm has a history of supporting anti-gay efforts, according to the lobby group Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD). They claim the company has backed groups that say being gay should be recriminalised, and others that support 'ex-gay' therapy.

But it was an interview by CEO Dan Cathy, in the Baptist Press, that has turned Chick Fil-A into a conservative cause celebre: especially the bit where he publicly affirmed his traditional views on marriage. Chick Fil-A, he said, was "very much supportive of the family - the biblical definition of the family unit".

Liberals demanded a boycott, backed by celebrities including Mia Farrow and Roseanne Barr, while some city mayors even tried to ban the chain from their district. Washington DC mayor Vincent Gray denounced what he called "hate chicken", while Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel declared the chain's values "are not Chicago values"......

......And naturally, when there's a conservative cause to bang a drum for, Sarah Palin was next on the scene, posting a photograph of herself and Todd on her Facebook page, clutching a bag of fried chicken.

While brand approval for Chick Fil-A was dropping through the floor, Palin told Fox News that the backlash was having "a chilling effect on our First Amendment rights [to free speech]".

The chicken chain isn't the first to plunge headlong into poltical controversy, although experts have warned it's rarely good for business.

Retail giant Target became a target itself back in 2010, when organisations including MoveOn.org launched pickets and protests over the firm's decision to donate $150,000 to a Republican candidate in Minnesota who had a history of opposing gay rights.

Weeks of public pressure soon got shareholders worried; democracy, said activists, was not for sale......

....As huge queues snaked around the block outside branches of Chick Fil-A, police were even called in to keep order in Madison, Alabama. Another former Presidential hopeful, Rick Santorum, picked up lunch: "OK leftists go crazy", he posted on Twitter.

As Talking Points Memo reports, it all sparked something of a media frenzy, as cable news networks sent news choppers into the sky to report the drama as it happened. Yes folks, it's August: something of a slow news month.

Yet the fact remains that a fast food chain managed to draw the kind of crowds that most politicians can only dream of.

Gay rights groups are fighting back - calling on same-sex couples to photograph themselves kissing in a Chick Fil-A branch, in protest.

In this game of chicken, who will give in first? : thousands of people may have expressed their support for Dan Cathy's firm this week, but experience shows when corporations get involved in political controversy, it rarely ends well.

Fried food, with a super-sized side of politics: it's enough to give you indigestion.