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Plastic shopping bags

Eco-Hysteria We Pay For, Again



Not long ago, I wrote about the hysteria environmentalists cause in order to create “awareness”. Years ago, we were all told we were using way too many paper bags at the supermarket.

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We were selfish, greedy, and responsible for the cutting down of trees. Now I don’t remember, as a consumer, being responsible for the introduction of paper bags to the supermarkets in the first place, yet we were the ones blamed for their use. We were told plastic bags were the most responsible alternative, and we were forced to comply. According to Wednesday’s Boston Herald,
State Sen. Brian A. Joyce (D-Milton) wants to place a levy on plastic shopping bags, calling the ubiquitous carryalls an environmental hazard. Each bag would be taxed 2 cents at the checkout at first. In seven years, that tax would climb to 15 cents. The idea is to get you, the shopper, to stop using them. “I think we’ve come up with a fairly modest stipend,” Joyce said.
Besides the fact this is a money-grab from a revenue-strapped state legislature, why are we being made out to be the guilty party for using this “powerful symbol of consumerism gone wild”? We, the consumer, never lobbied politicians to make the change from paper to plastic bags. If memory serves, we were all told that plastic bags were the best way to save tress, thus the environment. Why is it when politicians screw up, we are the ones made to feel guilty before we are forced to pay for their errors in judgment?
Shoppers who use paper, biodegradable or reusable bags would be exempt from the tax. His proposal will be aired in a hearing at the State House tomorrow. “We’re not trying to make money off this,” he insisted. “We’re trying to gently prod the consumer.” Joyce cited a litany of bag evils: They’re made from petroleum, in a process that produces pollutants. A single bag takes 1,000 years to biodegrade, and if they are buried, they block groundwater. Americans use a staggering 380 billion plastic bags a year, most of which wind up as trash or litter.
What I would love to see (and this is a pipedream, so work with me here) is responsibility in legislation. If a lobbying group prods politicians into making decisions that affect all of us and they are later proven to be wrong, THEY should be the ones to incur the cost of reverting back. Not the citizens who had legislation rammed down our throats, only later be guilt-tripped into paying taxes to alter the behavior they forced us into.
But Barbara Anderson of Citizens for Limited Taxation says the government can’t be trusted to figure its way out of this plastic bag. Whole Foods supermarkets recently announced plans to stop offering plastic bags altogether, and Anderson said the private sector should be left alone to deal with the issue. Anderson said she uses reusable bags herself, but she’s considering going back to plastic in protest.
Arrogant politicians revel in their ability to alter our behavior by force. I just find it maddening that these same political bodies, whipped by enviro-screeching, forced us to use plastic bags in the first place. Again, I contend if they were held financially responsible for their error in judgment, future decisions would be made more responsibly. If all the environmental groups were held financially responsible for the hysteria they cause over the use of products they now have problems with, they may do impacts studies to get an idea of what their changes may cause. That is, if they can see that far. It’s usually all about what they want now. And should they screw up, oh well…. Environmentalists are never held accountable for their errors when we later realize just how wrong they were again. And don’t get me started on those compact fluorescent lamps that we were told would save the world, just to find out they contain potentially toxic amounts of mercury that’s released when broken. How long will it be before those who use them now are called “killers”, just to be taxed until they change back to the traditional light bulb?
“I don’t understand what the love affair with plastic bags is,” said Boston City Councilor Rob Consalvo, who is drafting his own legislation to ban the bags in Boston. “I spent $90 on groceries yesterday, and I got them all home in two reusable bags.”
It was the environmentalists that initially created the love affair with anything that spared trees. According to the panic they caused back then, we should be a virtual desert by now, with trees now a distant memory like the record player. However, trees are in abundance, we are still breathing, and no retraction from environmentalist hysteria has ever been issued. Maybe one day, those who put “recycle” bumper stickers on their cars and force children to learn “green” will be the ones taxed for the environmental damage their knee jerking caused. Maybe one day those who implement their wishes on the public, without exploring the possible impact, will be held accountable for their lapse in judgment. Who am I kidding?


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Bob Parks -- Bio and Archives

Bob Parks is a is a member/writer of the National Advisory Council of Project 21. Bob’s websites are Black & Right and youtube.com/BlackAndRight


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