Posted on 01/25/2018 10:33:36 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Ian Calderon wants restaurateurs to think long and hard before giving you a straw.
Calderon, the Democratic majority leader in California's lower house, has introduced a bill to stop sit-down restaurants from offering customers straws with their beverages unless they specifically request one. Under Calderon's law, a waiter who serves a drink with an unrequested straw in it would face up to 6 months in jail and a fine of up to $1,000.
"We need to create awareness around the issue of one-time use plastic straws and its detrimental effects on our landfills, waterways, and oceans," Calderon explained in a press release.
This isn't just Calderon's crusade. The California cities of San Luis Obispo and Davis both passed straws-on-request laws last year, and Manhattan Beach maintains a prohibition on all disposable plastics. And up in Seattle, food service businesses won't be allowed to offer plastic straws or utensils as of July.
The Los Angeles Times has gotten behind the movement, endorsing straws-on-request policies in an editorial that also warned that "repetitive sucking may cause or exacerbate wrinkles on the lips or around the mouth." Celebrity astronomer Neil DeGrasse Tyson (always up for a little chiding) and Entourage star Adrian Grenier have appeared in videos where an octopus slaps them in the face for using a plastic straw.
The actual number of straws being used is unclear. Calderon, along with news outlets writing about this issue—from CNN to the San Francisco Chronicle—unfailingly state that Americans use 500 million plastic straws a day, many of them ending up in waterways and oceans. The 500 million figure is often attributed to the National Park Service; it in turn got it from the recycling company Eco-Cycle.
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
That is exactly the case. California politicians are far worse than most but this is happening to one degree or another all over. Basically western societies (and many in other areas such as Japan) have basically solved all basic problems. Food, shelter, and medical care are not life threatening concerns as they were centuries ago. So perceived slights such as micro agressions and carbon footprint become mortal sins in the modern age. And politicians have two ways of dealing with such awful problems. Taxation or prohibition. That’s the gamut of political creativity today.
Sounds reasonable to me.
6 months in jail for offering a straw????????
WELL!
That’s the last straw!
I always bring my organically grown, fair trade, artisan crafted bamboo straw with me.
didn’t straws used to be made of paper and wax
That sucks!
“This is what it comes to - jail terms for passing out straws.”
And yet clean needle exchanges for heroin addicts is encouraged. Bizarro-Land.
Fortunately, I can get my 500 million for $6.95 at Costco.
Perhaps they shouldn’t offer a straw but a “felching utensil”? No one in California would object to that.
Soon at a California prison:
Prisoner 1: “What are you in for?”
Prisoner 2: “I raped a 10-year-old. You?”
Prisoner 1: “I shot up a mosque.”
Prisoner 3: “I offered a straw.”
Prisoner 4: “Think that’s bad, I refused to bake a cake.”
They sure have their priorities straight there.
Waxed paper straws worked for a long time before plastics.
Ian Calderon is either nuts or a communist.
Sorry for the repetition.
5.56mm
And struggling actors in LA.
So now the snotty elite who get pissed at ever server can claim they were offered a straw.
Well, that sucks.
Be kind, these Cali’s spend a lot of time trying to entertain the rest of the country, and they’re doing a pretty good job.
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