Loathsome nanny-state mayor now considering banning styrofoam
posted at 7:11 pm on February 7, 2013 by Erika Johnsen
New York City Mayor Bloomberg’s ban on extra-large sized sodas will not come into full effect until next month, but in the meantime, he’s got his eyes on his next crusade for forcibly manipulating New Yorkers’ behavior: A ban on styrofoam. The NY Post reports:
The Bloomberg administration is considering banning Styrofoam cups and containers — popular at thousands of delis and food carts across the city— as it prepares to roll out a major recycling announcement in the coming weeks, a Sanitation Department official said yesterday. …
Mayor Bloomberg last year set a goal of recycling 30 percent of the city’s household trash by 2017, up from 15 percent now. …
But opponents — many of them restaurant and cart owners — have blasted the measure as unnecessarily intrusive. …
While the Styrofoam proposal is gaining momentum at City Hall, officials said the upcoming report on recycling recommendations might omit the measure.
Environmentalists have hated styrofoam since what feels like time immemorial, and other eco-trendy cities like Seattle already have their own styrofoam bans in place — and if the city of New York really thinks that doing so would be beneficial for them as part of their recycling quota, fine, I suppose. I’d just hope that such a quota would be a result of a careful cost vs. benefit analysis of the consequences, costs, and alternatives rather than merely Bloomberg’s desire to make up new rules that he perceives are somehow more noble than New Yorkers’ self-institutionalized way of doing things (private individuals operating out of their own self-interest kind of have a knack for figuring out a way to accomplish things cheaply and efficiently, ya’ know?).
Recycling is reliably pursued as a worthwhile goal in and of itself, whereas too often its actually just a relic of the 198os during which landfill capacity was the hip eco-crisis du jour. Recycling is a manufacturing process that consumes resources, and in plenty of cases, those resources are more valuable than the ones they are purportedly trying to cut down on. While it is certainly true that recycling technology has also improved over the years and indeed made recycling certain materials more cost-effective than trashing them in various instances, these types of recycling quotas have a habit of being arbitrary feel-good mandates rather than well-thought-out, environmentally sound practices.
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Long overdue but good to see it done.
Long may it stand.
SoRight on May 10, 2013 at 9:26 AM
Sadly, that’s probably not true.
Akzed on May 10, 2013 at 9:26 AM
…a shiny object?
KOOLAID2 on May 10, 2013 at 9:27 AM
That’s beautiful. I just hope we’re not “daft to build a castle in a swamp”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3YiPC91QUk
Chris of Rights on May 10, 2013 at 9:27 AM
Salute
Grunt on May 10, 2013 at 9:27 AM
*applause*
catmman on May 10, 2013 at 9:27 AM
That’s great- but I will not click on an NBC video.
And HA shouldn’t link to it.
Take NBC down
Bat Chain Puller on May 10, 2013 at 9:28 AM
Wait….what? Was the “signal” given by Lauer some sort of official event, because I can think of about 10,000 other people who should get the honor before Matt Freakin’ Lauer.
Bishop on May 10, 2013 at 9:34 AM
Hubby was in Newark yesterday looking over at Manhattan he asked, is the WTC finished?
Fallon on May 10, 2013 at 9:34 AM
No Imams to bless the occasion?
BL@KBIRD on May 10, 2013 at 9:40 AM
Finally.
Washington Nearsider on May 10, 2013 at 9:47 AM
Gee, that sounds like a challenge. Let’s hope that’s not the case.
Ward Cleaver on May 10, 2013 at 9:49 AM
Will it have loudspeakers, to broadcast the call to prayer?
/in the interest of diversity
Ward Cleaver on May 10, 2013 at 9:50 AM
After all the red tape, insurance claims, bickering over who has authority over the WTC site, architectural conflicts, memorial issues, and whatever else…the installation of the spire is a big step towards closure of the 9/11 attack for NY’ers, and all Americans.
JetBoy on May 10, 2013 at 9:50 AM
This is wonderful to see.
But I can’t help but thinking about the fact that this is occurring nearly 12 years after the 9/11 attacks. That it took so long to rebuild, and that the length of time was as long as it was because of all the arguing, bickering, fighting, suing, and the like, doesn’t really send a loud message to the world about our unity and our resolve.
Shump on May 10, 2013 at 9:54 AM
Outreach
Electrongod on May 10, 2013 at 9:56 AM
Wasn’t izlam supposed to be represented in the ‘museum’ or memorial that was to be built in the ground floor?
BTW, how’s that gigantic niqab up in Shanksville doing? The circle of whatever.
slickwillie2001 on May 10, 2013 at 9:57 AM
So Charlie Sheen’s uncle was in charge of this getting done? No wonder it took 12 years.
KGB on May 10, 2013 at 9:59 AM
and it only took close to 13 years !
- Mark Levin
13 years ???
- we built the Empire State Building in around 18 months during the Depression (1931)
- we built the Hoover Dam in 4 years, also during the Depression, completed in 1936
williampeck1958 on May 10, 2013 at 9:59 AM
We’re in agreement on that.
The weirdest part to me is that the Pentagon…a government building of all things…was fully repaired in what, a year? Granted, the scale of damage wasn’t equal to the WTC…but still was finished pretty quickly.
JetBoy on May 10, 2013 at 10:04 AM
We built the Pentagon in 14 months. During a war.
Happy Nomad on May 10, 2013 at 10:07 AM
Tower of Babelon
williampeck1958 on May 10, 2013 at 10:08 AM
They still have the $3 1/2 billion Calatrava ‘porcupine’/New Jesery subway headhouse still to build next to the Freedom Tower, and it’s even further behind schedule. It will probably be 2020 at least before the whole Ground Zero site’s scars are closed.
jon1979 on May 10, 2013 at 10:10 AM
Can anything good come out of New York?
1776′? Way to go,dudes.
Cleombrotus on May 10, 2013 at 10:13 AM
I thought about the PATH trains right after I hit “submit”…that’s probably the most expensive part of the whole site. Like your linked article stated, that Sandy storm really screwed things up as well. I was lucky and only lost power for a week…but much of lower Manhattan was flooded pretty bad.
And you know that 3.4 billion dollars will probably end up another billion by the time it’s done.
JetBoy on May 10, 2013 at 10:16 AM
Get used to it. In 20 years they’re going to own NY’s labor market.
That is, IF there’s still a NY.
Cleombrotus on May 10, 2013 at 10:18 AM
I built my deck in a week. During the hot summer. With beer and a lounge chair calling to me every minute.
Bishop on May 10, 2013 at 10:22 AM
After all these years, after deploying, being ‘stuck in Iraq’ according to Kerry -because I’m apparently some sort of dumbass, after living through the latest economic travails brought to us by CRA, Fannie and Freddie and the Barney Franks of America -but yet having it pinned on the ultimate bitter clinger, George Bush, after getting to ‘turn out the lights’ in Iraq and witness it being handed over to a State-and-CIA-created utterly corrupt coalition that includes Muqtada al-Sadr, and watching us move toward the same concluding, fizzling finale in Afghanistan … well …
the home of Hillary, Bloomie, Weiner, Schumer, Cuomo, Piers Morgan, the UN, and the all the other special people that hate my guts without knowing me … well … I don’t feel awesome and I don’t sense any teamwork. Cute building, though- I’m sure some wonderful unions made some wonderful money and provided some wonderful kickbacks to some wonderful politicians.
Wonderful.
M240H on May 10, 2013 at 10:31 AM
I always believed we should have built two towers, but taller. Building the towers IS the memorial. You can knock our towers down, but we will build them taller.
Oil Can on May 10, 2013 at 10:34 AM
That could get expensive.
Akzed on May 10, 2013 at 10:39 AM
At this point, what difference does it make?
MNHawk on May 10, 2013 at 11:00 AM
Amen.
PattyJ on May 10, 2013 at 11:03 AM
:Checking the White House Travel Office Schedule:
Nope.
Nut on a related note, will Ny’ers be blessed with the appearance of Obama the II marking the occasion…maybe a short 2 hour speech?
I mean, NY does has some pretty nice golf courses in Westchester County…and Michelle hasn’t been on a vacation since forever…
/sarc…maybe.
BlaxPac on May 10, 2013 at 11:13 AM
Well…uh….uh….huh…let…me…be…clear…they…built…that.
(releasing spittle, choking to speak every word)
22044 on May 10, 2013 at 11:18 AM
Agreed. I think the 1,776 gimmick is pretty silly and that it should have been 2,001 feet tall. And there should have been a second tower next to it. I always have said “build them back” not “Build it back”. That being said, I’m glad it’s finished.
thebrokenrattle on May 10, 2013 at 11:26 AM
I would agree if only because most students in NY wouldn’t even understand the relevance to 1776 nowadays.
But still, 12 years to build? And this is celebrated?
Didn’t the Empire State building get built in 1/4 that time?
BlaxPac on May 10, 2013 at 11:31 AM
Hopefully it’ll cast a shadow over that POS mosque.
Hawkerflyer on May 10, 2013 at 11:38 AM
Exactly, it should have taken 4 years, tops, to build two bigger, stronger towers.
thebrokenrattle on May 10, 2013 at 11:38 AM
10 years too late. Should have rebuilt, in same fashion, immediately.
May Bloomberg and the entire bureaucracy go to Hell. The terrorists won.
Obama’s brothers succeed, apace, the world over, with his covert help.
Wake up America. Wake up world.
Schadenfreude on May 10, 2013 at 11:49 AM
Obama says you didn’t build that. You just, um, “assembled” parts other people produced, and your energy came from, um, food other people grew, and from beer, which other people made. Unless you um, brew your own, but Obama doubts you could make decent beer. Because all good beer comes from large unionized companies that donate to Democrats.
And you probably got deck plans from and watched how-to videos on the internet, and that came from Al Gore. So there.
/s ;)
Marcola on May 10, 2013 at 11:53 AM
Yep, you can’t knock us down. 12 years later, we will put HALF as many buildings right back on the same spot – U – S – A !!!!
puhlease
PJ Emeritus on May 10, 2013 at 1:32 PM
Not to disparage capitalism or our original concept of freedom, but I am getting tired of these platitudes meant to convince us that we are still strong and free.
We don’t really have to worry about “others” knocking us down, when we have apostates in the White House and in the media doing it for them.
Sterling Holobyte on May 10, 2013 at 1:41 PM
Golf clap.
Should’ve put them back the way they were.
A symbolic height made only so by an aluminum spire is just… Well it has about as much depth as anything Nancy Pelosi says… Now Al Quaeda can point at the spire and say “See? We made that.”
And dot forget that forever free WTC museum…
Skywise on May 10, 2013 at 1:51 PM
That quote makes me weep copious tears…of bitter, bitter laughter.
Oh, irony, thou art a b!tch.
squint on May 10, 2013 at 2:40 PM
Not even. The Empire State building was done in something like 14 months. I can’t recall the exact number of days but it’s just over 400.
alchemist19 on May 10, 2013 at 4:33 PM
I wish I could have been one of those ironworkers bolting the thing into place. Sure, anonymous and unsung to all but close friends and relatives, but proud to have a hand in rebuilding an icon and sticking a thumb in the eye of all America’s enemies. It’s not impossible to knock it down again, but it damn sure won’t to be as easy as the first time, and we will still be able to put it back up again, as many times as needed.
RebeccaH on May 10, 2013 at 4:46 PM
Sheeple!
People who are Sheeple!
Are the wussiest people,
in NEW YORK CITY!!!!!!!!
So, you losers in New York going to finally wake up to the fact that your nanny nation mayor is talking out of his anus when it comes to things like sodium intake and soft drinks or what?
pilamaye on May 15, 2013 at 4:48 PM