I remember when grocery stores switched from offering paper bags to plastic bags because--wait for it--plastic was better for the earth because we didn't have to cut down trees! Now in some jurisdictions they're not supposed to offer you any bag at all; you're supposed to bring your own, with entirely foreseeable (and foreseen) consequences:
Researchers examined these reusable totes and found significant amounts of dangerous bacteria, including, among others, E-coli. And there seems to be a correlation between plastic bag bans and increased illness, as bacteria-related deaths spiked immediately after San Francisco’s bag measure began.Liberals sometimes like to mockingly pray, "Lord, please save me from your followers." I might paraphrase their prayer to, "Lord, please save me from those who try to save me from myself."
6 comments:
You give them entirely too much credit.
I used to believe that lefties actually believed in the causes they espouse but when those causes fail they simply put those failures out of their minds and learn not a thimble-full of humility.
The same lefties who started hyperventilating at the advent of the "homelessness crisis" of the Reagan era promptly put the whole issue out of their minds when it was revealed to be a fraud.
Project housing turned out to be a gigantic, expensive catastrophe and had to be demolished wholesale? So what? The proper attitude was expressed so the neighborhoods that were destroyed, the public monies that were squandered are unimportant.
What's important is the rush of self-righteousness without which you can't be a lefty.
Genius!
"...bring your own"
Yep! San Jose is one of those "Save the Planet" from the evils of plastic bags. Fortunately, the cities surrounding San Jose will happily bag your stuff in "paper or plastic"
"Fortunately, the cities surrounding San Jose will happily bag your stuff in 'paper or plastic'"
Not all of them.
Sunnyvale now does not allow plastic and the supermarkets charge 10 cents per paper bag.
Mountain View is getting ready to follow.
My wife and I have moved a chunk (not all) of our shopping from Sunnyvale to Mountain View. We're getting ready to start purchasing most/all of our non-perishables from Amazon because on balance we expect it to be more convenient for us.
And we need to figure out what to use for garbage. The "free" paper bags we used to get our groceries in work great. With those getting phased out ... purchase Hefty plastic bags? That's going to be a lot more expensive ...
Grrr.
-Mark Roulo
On my most recent visit to San Francisco, I spent many happy-foodie hours at the Ferry Place Marketplace. Since our hotel room had a refrigerator, I was going to bring sandwich makings for our homeword flights. Shopping for baby salad greens at Ferry Place's Farmers'Market, I discovered that vendors are required to provide only biodegradable, compostable plastic bags. The vendor said that the required bags would begin to turn salad greens into compost within an hour or two - and slipped me a real bag, under the table. The locals bring their own (real) bags. What progress - you buy great local produce and it spoils before it gets home!
PS: I copied one of the FP's bakery's offerings: Cowgirl Creamery's Mt.Tam cheese, baby greens and Boccalone's salami on French bread
PPS: The 6 salamis I was bringing home set off airport nitrite alarms; they were all individually inspected (and passed) - with many chuckles.
They have begun to ban them up here in Washington too. I often shop in Bellingham, but thanks to the bag ban, I am now shopping more often in Ferndale.
I did forget about the ban, though, the other day when I made a trip to Target. The first customer in the checkout lane I was using was from Canada. He was unaware that they had instituted a bag ban and was incensed that he had to pay an additional fee for paper bags. In the end, he left some of his merchandise behind and departed in a huff. The woman behind him had brought some plastic shopping bags from home to reuse. She requested the credit for bringing her own bags, but was told that since the bags weren't specifically created to be "reusable" that she would not receive a credit. I asked what kind of bag would qualify as a reusable bag, and the clerk said it must be any sewn bag that was obviously intended as a reusable shopping bag - didn't matter if you bought the reusable bag or sewed it yourself. I told her I thought the approach was a bit nonsensical, since the woman with the plastic bags was obviously getting more than one use out of them. Didn't really want to pick an argument with the clerk, though, as they don't have any control over those decisions.
Incidentally, the plastic bags are very cheap to manufacture, which is one reason merchants turned to using them over paper bags. I read somewhere that 1 "reusable" bag costs roughly 700 times as much to manufacture as one single-use plastic bag - and that is assuming the plastic bags only get used once! So the reusable bag had better be very sturdy to make it to the break even point, costwise.
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