I support this, in theory, but the limousine liberals are botching it up.
Hear me out.
I don't want to spend too much time elucidating what my vision of a decent government structure would look like. I do think about this, believe it or not, but my time would be better spent flapping my arms in an attempt to fly. Let it suffice to say that my concept of an ideal government is pretty close to anarchy. Not anarchy. Close to anarchy, relative to today's standards of government. (Anyone who advocates pure anarchy is nuts. In short order, anarchy gives rise to warlords and some warlord eventually would become an emperor. In other words, you're back to square one.) The government should exist to accomplish a few narrowly defined tasks.
One of the things the government should do is require that the externalized costs of goods and services become a component of the prices for these things in the marketplace. The revenue collected, in addition to paying for the real costs associated with the good or service, should support individuals and groups who make a point of living in a sustainable manner. This starts slowly. The most egregious, wasteful and polluting goods and services get nailed first. This is stuff that impacts all members of society and may have planetary implications.
(There's really no point in discussing the details of this because if we were required to pay for all of the externalities on something like 5% of present U.S. GDP, my guess is that the global economic system would collapse. But let's take this down to the street level anyway.)
Grocery bags.
Grocery bags.
Grocery bags.
Man, nothing winds me up more than people pushing grocery bags on me. My girlfriend is absolutely militant about re-using bags, and I fully support her in this. We buy our food at two venues. We buy our fruit, vegetables and eggs from organic producers at a local farmers' market. We carry a bag-of-bags with us. (I think it's funny that even organic farmers try to give us bags.) We actually return egg cartons to the man from whom we buy our eggs. We buy everything else from Trader Joes. When we get to the checkout area, I immediately move into position to begin packing the groceries in our reusable cloth bag. I find that it's easier to head off the strong desire of the store employee to give us bags if he or she sees me using the cloth bag.
If I'm forced to shop in a conventional supermarket, I practically have to fight my way out in order to leave without bags. You politely tell the checker, "No bags please." Nope, they don't get it. Tell them again. Nope. Then a bagger shows up, "Paper or plastic?"
"No bag please."
"But you have bottles, sir. Are you sure I can't bag this up for you?"
Sometimes, when I'm on the verge of losing it, I can shoot people a pretty frightening gaze. (Maybe it's a scorpio thing?)
"N O B A G!"
The bagger looks at the checker, the checker looks at the bagger.
I'm nuts because I don't want a bag.There isn't much we can do as individuals, but I'll tell you something, you can end the madness with regard to the grocery bag atrocity.
The grocery bag situation is a metaphore for the wider Matrix in which we find ourselves. It only becomes apparent once you attempt to side step it. When you want to do something as simple as making a little less waste, notice the constant drive to get you to waste more. It's incredible!
And now, let's talk about this grocery bag tax proposal in San Francisco...
I don't like the fact that the revenue would be split between the
PHBs and the city. That's really a stupid move and it demonstrates that this proposal is nothing more than a standard, limousine liberal swindle. I wouldn't trust the PHB to establish sustainability programs any further than I could throw it. And the city gets the other half of the revenue! Oh goody. More cops.
The smart way to run this program would be to immediately transfer the funds collected from the bag tax to people who use their own bags. Don't transfer the reveune to criminal PHBs and city governments! If the people behind this genuinely wanted to make an improvement, they would pass the money right back to the consumers who act in a sane manner.
Beware of limosine liberals who talk up progressive causes, eat Ben and Jerry's ice cream and drive hybrid SUVs with Greenpeace and Kerry 2004 bumper stickers. Hold on to your wallet! They generally want to rip you off just as bad as
Cheney wants to slaughter helpless animals with a shotgun. The only difference is that the limo libs have a kinder, gentler appearance:
Supermarkets could keep up to half of the bag fees they generate to set up city-approved programs such as providing reusable bags to low-income shoppers who use food stamps or setting up in-store bag-recycling centers.
The rest of the fees would go to the city treasurer.
The Berkeley professor got it right, though:
"Christine Rosen, who teaches business history and environmental history at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, agrees.
"I think you need a reward as well as a penalty," she says. For example, stores could charge shoppers 17 cents to buy a bag or give them a 10-cent credit if they use their own.
That's the way to do it.
posted by Kevin at 6:28 PM
