Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Trash Politics   [Jay Nordlinger]

Was interested in this story on trash in San Francisco. “Garbage collectors would inspect San Francisco residents’ trash to make sure pizza crusts aren’t mixed in with chip bags or wine bottles under a proposal by Mayor Gavin Newsom. And if residents or businesses don’t separate the coffee grounds from the newspapers, they would face fines of up to $1,000 and eventually could have their garbage service stopped.”

This is the same city, of course, in which people are proposing to name a sewage-treatment plant after President Bush. It’s on the November ballot. (Well, say some people, conservatives specialize in cleaning up the messes of liberals, so why not?)

Was on a bus yesterday — trip from far Long Island into Manhattan. The lady in charge was collecting people’s trash. A man in front of me was depositing a plastic bottle. She put it in the bag. “You don’t recycle?” he said. She shook her head no. He was up in arms. “That’s illegal, you know.” He kind of harassed her as she made her way up the aisle. The man in front of him said, “Yeah, they don’t recycle. I e-mailed the company to complain. They never answered me. You should e-mail the company, too.” Then the two men kind of bonded, in their indignation.

Sometimes I wonder whether we conservatives — or simply normal people — go too far in our mockery of the hard-greeners and recyclers. I don’t think we do, actually. This is kind of a sick religion in America. I swear, there are people who care more about recycling than about basic human rights — or about basic human kindness. And they are a bullying, coercive sort. (You perhaps have recycling cops in your office? This is not a problem at NR.)

Barack Obama told rich people in San Francisco that Middle Americans “cling” to guns and religion (and hate foreigners, to boot). I’ll certainly take the clingers-to-guns-and-religion over the hard-recyclers and the GWB Sewage Plant people. And if John McCain tries a little — just a little — of that kind of (righteous, justified) populism — he’ll do all right.

08/05 08:47 AMShare