Comments on More Whining from the Seattle Times

Where the hell does that guy go for walks in the "city"? I see them fly by my 4th floor office window on a regular basis. So, I don't even need to walk to see the plastic bag litter.

I didn't know the ban included styrofoam -- that's actually a good thing.

Meanwhile, on the Eastside, most stores don't even seem to offer a paper bag option anymore.

You lost, it’s over, shut the fuck up.

I wonder how many times folks at the PI and Times have wanted to post that about an issue The Stranger would never let go.

Additionally, "recycling" plastic bags generally entails shipping by the hundreds of containers full to China where huge amounts of pollution are eminated to reform them into other useful forms. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for recycling, but things that make sense to recycle like aluminum. We shouldn't be manufacturing these bags at all, eliminating any need to recycle them, period.

PITBULLS!
BLUE ANGELS!
SEXISM AGAINST HILLARY!
PLASTIC BAGS!
CRITICAL MASS!
FIXED-GEAR BIKES!
PIKE STREET FISH FRY!
Yawn.

@3 *coughMONORAILcough*

Dan, can you tell me what color this pot is? It's...uh...I mean, it looks kinda darker than gray or charcoal. What's the right word?

We suck Jeff, but seeing as we are Seattle's only blog... you're stuck with us.

Oh come on, Peter, use cloth bags for cryin out loud. We've been using ours for about 5 years now. The whole idea is to stop using plastic - get it?

You know, it's not that hard to get signatures for a citizen's initiative at any grocery store to overturn the decision.

Just saying.

Charging 20 cents with no refund if you reuse is just more tax on the Middle Class.

Give me my hemp bags!

I don't appreciate foul languge coming from Slog editors. Leave that to the commenters.

Oh Dan, come on now you know a little good-natured ribbing is always fun.

But whining about the Times whining is pretty funny, no?

I mean, last I checked your news editor leads the league in "whining."

As stated earlier: Pot meets Kettle, hilarity ensues.

A Blethen hasn't ridden a bicycle since the Taft administration.

@5, LAWRIMORE

I'm just surprised that Old Man Blethen didn't try to force the writer to tie this all in with that dratted estate tax...

@9:

Except for the fact that it's just sooooo EASY for over-taxed middle-class individuals to avoid paying teh "20 cents tax", isn't it?

Just FYI, this morning I watched a Stranger delivery guy empty out the newspaper boxes along University Way and chuck all the old papers into the trash. Not the recycling -- the trash. Several times, the papers blew open while he was tossing them in the bin, and chunks flew out onto the ground. The guy didn't bother picking them up. Tons of paper for the landfills, tons of paper littered all over the street. Nice work, Stranger guy!

So, bash on the Times for not being "pro-green" enough all you want. But why aren't your delivery people scooping up the old papers from those boxes, loading them back into their cars/vans, and taking them somewhere to be recycled? Some leftie group you guys are!

That column was on the op-ed page, where real newspapers actually let people in the community voice their own opinions.

As opposed to the Stranger, where opposing views are ridiculed and shouted down.

@16 - no, when you go to Fred Meyer to buy groceries, you can't bring your own - they bag them for you.

@19: I shop at Fred Meyer (Lake City Way one) all the time with my reusable bags and have never had a problem with getting the cashiers to use them instead of paper/plastic.

Oh honestly. It's not that hard to buy a hemp or canvas bag (you can even buy an organic one).

@19 - Will, that's why you hand them your bags before they start bagging the groceries and instruct them to use yours.

@17 that is why there needs to be a 20 cent fee on weekly newspapers.
But still, you are obviously lying, "back into their cars/vans", The Stranger is delivered by bicycle, isn't it?

An Will @19, where the hell do you shop? at the FredMyer I shop at (outside Seattle so I can get free bags if I want) they not only will use my reusable bag, they give me a nickle for binging it.

@23 -- Tis true I saw no car or van nearby and wondered how he'd gotten there, but I'm not lying about what I saw. I'm not sure I believe that riding a bike for this process offsets the litter/garbage thing, though. Save the planet! But first, throw lots of newspaper all over it!

And if the guy can bring the NEW papers on his bike, why can't he take away the OLD papers on his bike and recycle them properly?

Seattle baby boomer nonsense. They think that the sun rose and will set on them, and that they accomplished everything that needed to be accomplished by creating the fucking ride free zone and curbside recycling.

It's nice that the times exists to give cranky old boomers a place to bitch about things. Much better than the Elks club.

"You lost, get over it?"

That's what the fucktards who voted against building the Mariners a new ballpark said, too.

We'll see how this one turns out, Dan. Maybe it'll turn out like your support for invading Iraq.

Really? "Critical Mass-ively Dumb?"

Hack needs to get run over by a sensible compact sportwagon... Nobody taking credit for that--I'd've stayed anonymous too. Garbation.

Let's say we have person A in car B. And person C on bike D.

Person A drives 1.5 miles to the grocery store and get his groceries for his family of four with plastic bags, which like any Seattleite, he uses to pick up dog poo or recycles in the handy giant recycle bin. He makes one trip per week.

Person C bikes 1.5 miles to the grocery store every two days (panniers only hold so much), lugging his hemp bag, and leaves his Alsatian Pit Bull's poo on the front yard of Person A's yard cause using a plastic bag might harm the environment.

How long will it take before Person A shoots Person C's pit bull when it attacks his kids?

He's right though that the ban should have exempted biodegradable bags and containers, including regular old paper bags.

Paper bags and biodegradable starch bags can go straight into the yardwaste bin, instead of the garbage going to the landfill bin. Paper and starch bags will also degrade when some jerk throws them out his car window.

The technology to make compostable plastic bags out of starches works, but it isn't cheap enough for groceries yet. If other municipalities clone the Seattle law, then the financial impetus to develop the bags goes away - which means these environmentally safer bags won't ever get used in the secondary markets, exempt markets, and cities without bans.

We re-use plastic grocery bags for dog walking. With the bag ban we'll switch to biodegradable plastic bags we have to buy - but since they still go in the garbage, not yard waste, they will still go to an anaerobic landfill where they won't ever biodegrade.

@28, that's obviously a trick question, since Person C would clearly be intelligent enough to know banning plastic grocery bags doesn't mean there won't still be a bazillion plastic bags of other varieties all over our daily lives. Bags he used to just chuck in the trash but now will consider reusing, such as empty bread bags, produce bags, coffee bean bags, cereal bags, etc. etc. etc.

The hippies win again!

@29 - it's not cheap enough due to economies of scale - if the law provided a large enough market, then it would be a lot cheaper.

@30 - I wasn't talking about me, I was talking about Person A, he doesn't do that shite. Like you hipsters, he uses more petrocarbons from oil by consuming bottled water, even though it's from the same exact source as his tapwater. And the pit bull is still dead.

How about Nordstrom's shopping bags, dry cleaner bags, produce bags, saran-wrap, etc?

I've decided that the best course is to starve the govt out, no on parks levy, no on Pike Place Market, no on Sound Transit, etc. If they want them, they can just tax more bags.

Then stop expecting me to pay for your roads, Nappy.

@29, the whole logic behind your argument is that your carry out bags are free and should be. Disposable bags are not a civil right. The cost of not recycling them is only half the problem, it takes energy to produce them in the first place and there is no reason whatsoever that people can not use reusable bags. None. And when those cotton or hemp cloth bags wears out in 10 years (I've had mine for seven), they can go to yard waste too.

why for nobody's as angry about that shitty title?

it's really bad.

just saying.

@33: Fuck the roads. I walk to work and back every day, and have for eighteen years.

@ 34:

Nobody is claiming that disposable bags are a civil right, or that they should be free. That's bullshit, and if you didn't know it when you posted it, I'm telling you it is now.

Whether a customer gets a disposable bag or not, and whether the store charges for it or not, should be between the store and the customer. The City Council and the execrable little eco-Savonarolas who populate the Stranger staff should butt the fuck out.

Education is the key and not coercion. I have been using doubled-up paper shopping bags for years, and I always have a supply with me. Where I shop (outside the city) gives me a nickel discount every time I bring my own bag. In the city, I take them into Chinese supermarkets where all they use is plastic.

My point is, don't fucking coerce me. And don't fucking coerce people who don't want to be coerced.

Who is going to enforce this anyway, and at what cost? Are beady-eyed little ECB-lovers going to spy on checkout counters, to rat out merchants who don't comply, like the "religious police" in Saudi Arabia who have women stoned for showing an ankle?

This is why fucktards on the right like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck become popular -- because fucktards like ECB and Dan Savage never know where to stop. You always know what's best for everybody else. You're no different than the "Purity Ball" assholes who think they own their daughters' vaginas. Don't bore me with your lofty motives. It's all the same -- all about coercing other people to conform to *your* world view.

17/24 - Jane. A guy? A Stranger delivery GUY in the U District? Ha, ha. Thanks for bullshitting.

Oh, and by the way, what time this morning? Car or van? How many papers? Tons? Let's, you know, figure out who this Stranger guy is you're telling us all about.

Sadly, ivan is right.

Jane you ignorant slut: must be making it up, the above Circulation Cop implies. But I've seen the same thing - Strangers tossed from box to trash.

As for the Times piece, it could have been worse: They could have run a lame cover story ("I'm actually not that big a fan of cucumber sandwiches") by a self-appointed sports authority telling us what a swell guy he is.

@37, the face that you are comparing the stoning of women (8th amendment) for showing an ankle (1st amendment) to this issue kind of makes my point. Education is important but in this case, it doesn't work. Most people around here already know that plastic bags floating around our streets, waterways and yards are bad news but why do they not do anything about it? Because they're not being billed for the direct cost of that convenience, that's why. It's time for more direct action. We have already tried waiting for the market to help and they don't do it on any major scale.

But thanks for the great mental image of beady-eyed ECB lovers. I see a fantastic opportunity for a line of bobble-heads. Can they be made with laser beams attached to their friggin' heads?

Ivan for the win!

Feel free to call avowed Democrats Ivan, W.I.S, and me Republicans too, since that appears to be par for the course here for anyone who strays from the Slog/Capitol Hill party line...

@ 41:

You are flat full of shit. Litter is litter, whether it is biodegradable or not. If someone pays 20 cents for a plastic bag and then throws it away on the street, then what have you gained?

You lot don't give a shit about litter, or the oceans, or the fish in the fucking oceans. You just want to control people's behavior, because of your false sense of self-righteousness.

"WE have already tried waiting for the market to help. It's time for more direct action." Well aren't YOU king shit? See, you accuse me of proving your point, which I didn't, but actually you're proving mine.

I will admit it if I turn out to be mistaken, but I predict this ill-conceived foray into social engineering will flop, big time, just like Prohibition did, and for the same reasons.

Our delivery person in the U District, Mustard Man, is a woman. Not a guy. Don't let that small, Stranger logo-sized detail cloud things up for you, though.

@38: Sorry, I didn't get the guy's social security number -- my bad. I don't get the "GUY" joke in your comment, though -- are the delivery people usually women or something?

@40: Your SNL reference made me laugh out loud!

The delivery person I saw, @44, was definitely a guy. Not very tall, thin, short hair, wearing a dark colored tee-shirt. 7:50 this morning, west side of the Ave. between 45th and 50th. If that was a woman, she sure was flat-chested and manly-looking.

It was definitely a stack of Strangers the guy threw away (I've got a couple of pages from one in my recycle bin), though I suppose he might've been a Seattle Weekly delivery person instead. I didn't get a good look at the new bundle of papers he had in his hands. Do Weekly delivery guys chuck your papers sometimes to keep you from competing? And do they also not use vans or cars to deliver?

I'm not making this up -- it's not like I would assume the Stranger would actually care enough about this to change their policy, or else I would've emailed with an official complaint to them instead of dicking around on the Slog.

If you work for the Circ dept, why don't you just tell us what that policy is? What happens with the old newspapers?

@44: The delivery person I saw was definitely a guy. Not very tall, thin, short hair (I think dark-ish, close-cropped), wearing a dark colored tee-shirt. 7:50 this morning, west side of the Ave. between 45th and 50th. If that was a woman, she sure was extraordinarily flat-chested and manly-looking.

It was definitely a stack of Strangers the guy threw away (I've got a couple of pages from one in my recycle bin), though I suppose he might've been a Seattle Weekly delivery person instead. I didn't get a good look at the new bundle of papers he had in his hands. Do Weekly delivery guys chuck your papers sometimes to keep you from competing? Is the idea that you actually have to compete with the Weekly ludicrous to begin with? And do they also not use vans or cars to deliver?

I'm not making this up -- I have no motive to do so. If you work for the Circ dept, why don't you just tell us what the policy with the old newspapers is? DO your delivery people collect them and bring them back to somewhere for recycling?

Um, gee Ivan, if people actually have to PAY for every plastic bag they get, I don't suppose you'd consider the possibility that, er, people might CHOOSE to take fewer bags, or - horrors! - no bags at all, which means, ah, fewer bags to be thrown away, "accidentally lost" or whatever, which in turn, erm, reduces the amount of litter, which is good for the environment, etc., etc.

Naw, you're right. It's really all about our evil desire to control every aspect of your life - one plastic shopping bag at a time.

Again #43, your are trying to compare a constitutional rights issue (18th/22nd amendments) to a less broad one. Prohibition forced every citizen in the country to treat their bodies a way that a small group deemed proper according to their religious beliefs. In no way is any person being forced to not use plastic bags. They are simply being given a financial motive to consider the true effects of their decisions which affect us all. Some would say we are no longer being "coerced" into dealing with others' irresponsible habits of convenience.

@28 is why I hate you, Will.

@ 48, @ 49:

Neither of you have a clue. You're both oh so rational, oh so intellectual about it. You just don't get that this is a "do not keep fucking with me" gut issue.

A whole lot of people do not see things your way, or for your reasons, and they are not obliged to. I have every confidence that you will continue to ignore that.

And BTW, @ 49, you're wrong about Prohibition. The dry fundies didn't have the political clout to get Probition by themselves. They had plenty of help from "Progressive" do-gooders in getting the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act passed. Kinda like the mullahs in today's Green Taliban.

@24, I was just being a smart ass @23, I don't doubt what you saw.
I have no idea how the delivery of the Stranger is done, but it wouldn't surprise me any if it was paid on a piece work basis and the delivery person has to really hustle to make above minimum wage so they take the path of least resistance.
For every person who flies first class (or is driven around in a city owned SUV) there are a LOT of people living in studio apartments.

Whoops, thought my first comment there (46) hadn't gone through because my browser crashed.

But Circ Peep! You're going to love this! I walked by the same newspaper box on my way home tonight and guess what -- it wasn't a Stranger delivery person this morning. There's no Stranger in that box -- it was a WEEKLY delivery person.

Here's the weird thing, though: it was definitely a stack of Strangers that went into the garbage. Or, at least, the one that was on top was a Stranger -- I know because it's the one that blew open and I picked up the pages he'd left on the ground. Suppose a Stranger reader on the Ave has been stuffing the Weekly boxes with Strangers? SABOTAGE!

Anyway, I hereby apologize for assuming it was a Stranger delivery person just because they were throwing out a pile of Strangers. I didn't get a good look at the bundle he put into the box as I walked by him, so didn't see that it was the Weekly instead. But for the record, I'd still like to know what the Stranger does with the old newspapers. DO you recycle them?

Ok, Jane. I know we're 90% off-topic here, but now that we're discoursing, let's talk. I called bullshit because I know that the person you saw wasn't our circulation person (you saw a guy, our person up there is unmistakably a woman), and you were using your assumption to make your argument. Thanks for the additional details. I do believe you now, where at first I though you were just making stuff up for whatever reason.

First of all, we don't deliver that early in the U-District on Wednesdays; our delivery person gets up there somewhere around 11 AM. We also don't dump papers in the garbage -- let alone go up and down the Ave. emptying out boxes one after the other into the garbage. I don't think it would be long before we got a call from the garbage collection company or the City. Who was it that was doing that? No idea. You say it was a Weekly person. I don't know. It would be good to know if the papers were all Strangers or not all Strangers. Sometimes someone will take a copy of either paper, see the other paper's box and grab one of those, leaving the first one in the opposite box. Not uncommon. I will be following up on what you saw though. Un-bullshit, un-ha-ha and again, thanks.

We do recycle. I'm a stickler for recycling. Recycling is Stranger policy. We have recycling at our loading dock for returning drivers, and I know pretty much where every public recycling bin is from the Edmonds line to Burien and let drivers know where they can recycle along their routes. Besides newsprint, we recycle all of our poly pallet wrap, our cardboard pallet sheets and our pallets. We generate very little waste.

Yes, some stuff goes into street cans: Bundle straps, crap that people are too lazy to throw into the garbage, even some paper that's messed up for whatever reason and is unrecycleable. If one of our delivery people does throw a stack of good papers in a can, that's against the rules. I don't think we have a problem with that.

And P.S. to Epithemeus -- better than mininum. You have a van?

Let's stop coercing people with all of them libruhl statist rules and regulations! Heck, let's bring back leaded gasoline, and just educated people and let them be free to choose. With enough lead in our bloodstream, we can have more fistfights & U-lock-brainings, too! Fun all around.

There will be bag!

Circ Peep, glad to hear it! Yet another reason to love your paper!

Out of curiosity, why didn't you just identify yourself as Stranger circulation department staff in your first comment and explain that the U. District delivery person was a woman? It would've sped all of this up -- I would've believed you, been suspicious right away that I'd made a mistake, and gone back to look at the box a lot sooner. Not EVERYONE who comments on Slog posts is a total dick, you know?

The person I saw definitely had a bundle of oversized newspapers with the plastic band still around them and was heading back to the newspaper box when I passed him. The Weekly is the only oversized paper in that set of newspaper boxes (the other three were Times, PI, and a small-sized paper I didn't look closely at -- the size of the UW Daily), but I didn't get a good look at the cover of the papers in the fresh bundle, so I can't swear they were Weekly issues. At least the top paper that went in the garbage was a Stranger -- don't know about the rest of the pile underneath it.

Good point, though, that the City would be likely to complain if they were finding gazillions of newspapers in their trash cans. I hadn't thought of that, but I'm sure you are right! So, hopefully that rules out the Weekly also disposing of THEIR papers regularly that way? Maybe the delivery person was just having a particularly bad/lazy day. I'll keep an eye out for him next week, same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel, and see if it happens again.

@50 - aww, dids your feewings get hoit?

We live in an age of sound bites, and people are who they are. This is not a popular idea (bag tax) anywhere except among people who are totally out of touch with most voters.

And, yes, they do think pit bulls should be registered as dangerous weapons.

TEAM IVAN!!! Way to backpedal, Savage. Did you juggle coconuts while you were on that unicycle?