My Country Tis of Thee
November 3, 2012 § 10 Comments
Talking of patriotism, what humbug it is; it is a word which always commemorates a robbery. There isn’t a foot of land in the world which doesn’t represent the ousting and re-ousting of a long line of successive owners.
– Mark Twain
Who’s your favorite patriot?
It’s great to love your country (I do), but Patriotism, man, what a loaded word. Remember the flap about whether or not then-candidate Barack Obama lacked patriotic spirit because he didn’t have a flag pin on his lapel? Forevermore, we Americans will see flag pins on Presidents’ and Presidential candidates’ lapels!
Romney’s flag pin is bigger! What does that mean?
Rah rah! Remember when true patriots only bought cars made in America? Kind of a shock when it came out that many parts under the hoods of our beloved American cars came from China. Remember Freedom Fries, when those naughty French refused to support the Iraq War in 2003? Representative Walter Ney led the charge to rename French Fries and French Toast, Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast, on the menus in the Congressional cafeterias. In 2006, the names were quietly changed back, and Walter Ney pleaded guilty to conspiracy and making false statements in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal. Some patriot.
Photo: Alex Wong, Getty Images
So, here’s my nomination for True Patriot. Son of a German immigrant brew-meister who was ridiculed by his peers during World War I because of his heritage. To prove his love of country, he joined the Boy Scouts and became a top salesman of Liberty Bonds. When former U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt came to town to award medals to the top ten bond sellers — oops — there were only nine medals, and none for the son of the German immigrant, who was hustled off the stage. He suffered from a fear of public speaking for the rest of his life.
His father was a member of the Park Board in his hometown of Springfield MA, and while tagging along at the local zoo, he started a lifelong love of doodling animals, usually in an exaggerated fashion. He went on to squeak through Dartmouth and drop out of Oxford, to write ads for a pesticide company, all the while hoping to make a living drawing zany creatures. In 1937 while on a ship to Europe, he made up a limerick to go with the sound of the engines, that eventually became his first children’s book, To Think I Saw It On Mulberry Street. It was rejected 27 times by publishers who said they only wanted stories with morals, but finally picked up by a publisher, and the rest is history. He continued to write imaginatively and heroically, for the rest of his life. Oh The Places You’ll Go is one of the top gifts to graduates, and his protest against pollution, The Lorax, both raises hackles and inspires budding environmentalists to this day. We miss you Dr. Suess.
Patriotism isn’t wearing a symbol or singing a song at a baseball game. It’s working to give back to your country as much as it has given you, and in the end, helping the country give back to the world as much as it’s given us.
Who would you nominate for the honorable title of Patriot?
Written for the great GBE 2: Blog On, WEEK #76 (10-28-12 to 11-3-12): Patriotism. Join us!
Bag Hag, part 2: Bans and Best Reusable Bags
October 27, 2012 § 2 Comments
Plastic Bag Ban Update: The City council banned plastic bags this week. Not all plastic bags, just checkout counter bags, the ones that look like this:
KEZI.com 9/14/12
And this:
Yum. (Photo credit: Environment Oregon)
Not covered by the ban: plastic bags on rolls in the produce section …
Photo credit: Food Bags
… plastic bags for meat and the thicker bags you get at clothing stores. Stores are also required to charge 5 cents for paper bags.
Judging from letters to the editor, some people are pretty upset. One writes he won’t shop in our town anymore. Another that the nickel charge for paper bags will hurt low income people, and that paper bags are worse than plastic ones. Another writes that the number of bags in the rivers and oceans is exaggerated and asks why we should ban one kind of plastic if we aren’t going to ban all plastic? Someone else complained about having to wash reusable bags.
What a bunch of hooey. Forget the bickering about whether the city was right or wrong. We don’t need throwaway bags. Bring your own. Use them many times. Toss them in the washer with your socks. It’s easy. Once you get used to it, it’s fun.
KEY: buy bags you like. Don’t invest in any old thing. Any woman who carries a purse will tell you, if you hate your bag, you won’t use it. Three recommendations:
- String bags. Like a Volkswagen Beetle stuffed with clowns, you can fit an astounding number of things into string bags. They are inexpensive, washable and last forever. Store clerks like them. People ask if you’re from Europe.
Photo credit: newsRegister.com
- L.L. Bean bag. This is an investment. It starts at about $25 new, but like the string bags, these babies last for decades. Because they have sturdy sides, clerks (and you) don’t have to fiddle with holding them open when loading up, very handy at farmer’s markets. The bottom is steady enough to support cartons of eggs, berries and other delicacies. I like the long-handled version which can be carried as a shoulder bag.
- Lightweight, see-through mesh bags. My grocery store sells 3B Bags, but there are several brands out there. They weigh next to nothing, are washable, durable, and inexpensive. Use these, and there is no need for the produce bags on a roll.
Don’t wait for a city ban. Bans start fights about the law rather than discussions about sensible solutions. Move the lowly shopping bag up in the world to something worth a little thought and investment. We need fossil fuels and trees for more important things.
What do you think about the bag fights? Do you use re-usable bags? Any favorites?
Earlier post on ins and outs of the bag war: http://holdouts.wordpress.com/2012/03/05/bag-lady/
Good to Be Loved
October 11, 2012 § 4 Comments
Week 24 in the quest to cycle 104 times this year.
The weather report says that today is the last in a long line of late summer days.
 |
||
Tomorrow brings rain.
How many of us cyclers greet this news with mixed feelings? Leaf blowers are already corralling leaves into the bike lanes in anticipation of the city pickup, which won’t happen for another two months. It’s kind of fun to roll through the leaves when it’s dry, but once the rain starts, look out.
Today we ride. Tomorrow we slide.
I’m considering, in my quest to cycle 104 times this year, starting to count walking as the same as bicycling. Isn’t the point to just get out of the car?
Ah, but walking takes so long.
I take solace in the graffiti garden …
 P.M. isn’t in the graffiti dictionary. Maybe the artist’s initials? Happy Halloween to you, too. |
… which is tucked next to a field of wild fennel,
behind the jail and the train tracks …
… which reminds me that next summer, probably, coal trains will be chugging through the city. The county commissioners vote next week on whether or not to allow coal trains through town. The coal will be headed for the coastal town of Coos Bay for shipping and processing overseas. Four trains a day, up to 150 open cars each.
Coming soon to the fennel field: a veil of coal dust.
 |
| This is not what people usually mean when they call Eugene Track Town |
Coos Bay needs the 165 jobs the coal trains will bring. Get a community desperate enough for work, and worries about air pollution count for nothing.
Pedal on. Here, a small consolation, a sign next to the bike lane:
 A nod from Hummingbird Wholesale |
Are you ready for winter? How do you feel about coal trains, and coal in general? Any solution to the city’s leaf recycling program, which leaves (pun not intended) bike paths treacherous for weeks?
Update on the quest to bicycle 104 times in 52 weeks. Week 24: rode/commuted twice. Grand total: 63 (15 rides in the bank).
Gas vs. Grass: Canola War in the Willamette Valley
September 19, 2012 § 7 Comments
It’s a standoff.
In one corner, canola growers.
In the other corner, seed producers, opponents of genetically modified crops and fresh vegetable farmers.
In Oregon it’s a long-standing feud.
“Reservoir Dogs” Mexican Standoff
For the last decade or so, Oregon’s Department of Agriculture weighed in by prohibiting canola from being grown without special permission on 3.7 million acres in the Willamette Valley.
Why? Canola likes it here a little too much. It’s a good rotation crop that doesn’t need to be watered, which means it grows like, well, a weed. It takes off quickly, and happily cross pollinates with other members of the brassica family, including grasses, radish, turnip, mustard, rutabaga, cabbage. This is fine for farmers who need to give fields a rest with an alternate crop, or are looking for a quick buck with an off-season crop. It’s not so good for the $32 million a year specialty seed business, which depends on 100% pure and untainted seeds. Unlike most agricultural states which focus on a crop or two en masse, say corn or soy, Oregon farms produce over 200 crops, many grown for seed, which is internationally famous for high quality and purity. If you’re a fan of saving seed species diversity, this valley is heaven.
Canola is a problem for organic farmers. About 90% of the canola grown in the U.S. is genetically modified to be resistant to herbicides. Canola’s prolific cross-pollination means that unintended crops end up with GM genes, and organic farmers lose their licenses if their produce is crossed with a GM crop. The USDA doesn’t make a distinction between GM and non-GM canola, so Oregon’s Department of Agriculture doesn’t either, and offers no relief.
GM canola’s tendency to spread beyond its fields also causes problems if farmers re-plant tainted seeds, even if they do it unknowingly. See Monsanto v. Schmeiser. Why? Because once a company creates a genetically modified plant, all its offspring are the private property of said company, forever and ever. It sounds a little like me taking credit for my son’s senior college project, but whatever. Farmers have been sued. Courts have ruled in company-creators’ favor.
From the incomparable Willamette Valley Cartoonist J Compere
If all that isn’t enough, canola attracts cabbage maggots, is susceptible to stem cankers and black mold rot and other insidious plant illnesses, which then spread to other crops.
This issue, like all issues, is complicated. There are different kinds of canola, which is actually a variety of rapeseed, used throughout history for lamp oil, but until recent incarnations, too bitter for food. Recently developed strains are now usable for animal and human food, produced from the seeds. The name in fact comes from the abbreviation Can. O. L-A (Canadian Oil Low-Acid).
Anyway, on with the story. Canola’s well-documented problems were taken note of by Oregon’s Department of Agriculture, and a relatively small slice of the state was set aside as canola-free. All is well, right?
Enter biofuels. Rapeseed oil, it turns out, works pretty well as a biofuel, and so the pressure to open up more acreage to GM canola heated up. Permits for test plots in Rickreall and Baker were issued, with 3-mile protection zones set up around them, and all went well, according to the canola growers. Then the Department of Agriculture tried to pull a fast one.
On Friday, Aug. 3, just before 5 p.m. the department sent out a news release announcing that they were going to “refine” (i.e. shrink) the no-canola zone. Temporarily. (Making it temporary allowed the department to sidestep public notice or comments.) Planting to begin immediately.
Whoa.
Oregon, however, is not a state of slackers. Within days, seed growers, farmers and environmentalists filed suit against the temporary ruling. Over 10,000 people signed a petition asking the department to hold its horses. 23,000 people world wide signed the petition, which gives you an idea of how much people care about this, everywhere.
Given the immediacy of the question, the Oregon Court of Appeals granted a stay to the temporary rule (i.e., in favor of the no-canola plaintiffs),
which will be in effect until …
… the newly drafted permanent rule, which makes the temporary “refinement” of the no-canola zone immutable, takes effect. Follow all that? Translation: canola will be allowed into the protected zone unless in the coming month public pressure convinces the Department of Agriculture otherwise. This time the hearing will be public: 9:00 a.m., September 28, Salem, Capital building. Comments also accepted up to Oct. 5 via e-mail or by mail: canola-rulemaking@oda.state.or.us
Mail to: Canola Hearings Officer; ODA; 635 Capitol St. N.E.; Salem, OR 97301.
As with so many of the things we care about these days, the jury is out. Will canola be grown in Oregon’s protected agricultural zone? Does the need for fuel outweigh the need for untainted seeds and crops? Can canola be grown safely in areas where cross-breeding crops are grown? To be continued …
Courtesy of Organic Seed Alliance
Sources: http://www.newsregister.com/article?articleTitle=seed-growers-sue-oregon-over-canola-expansion–1345144694–4358–apnews, http://www.opb.org/news/article/court-will-rule-on-growing-canola-in-oregon/, http://www.culinate.com/articles/sift/canola_oregon, http://www.friendsoffamilyfarmers.org/?p=1622
Opal Creek
August 28, 2012 § 4 Comments
Anyone else turning off the radio and TV when presidential campaign ads or stories come on? Seems like a waste, considering how much money is spent on campaigning these days, but the content is so empty and repetitive, it isn’t worth watching.
As awful as the process is, I’m having to remind myself that it works, and not always in favor of the people with the biggest checkbooks. Here’s a template from the not too distant past when Republicans and Democrats, loggers and conservationists, righties and lefties teamed up.
Opal Creek Wilderness Area
The Opal Creek Valley includes 50 waterfalls and the largest contiguous portion of low elevation old growth left in Oregon, a remnant of the forests which once covered the western part of the state.
Starting in the 1840′s, the area was mined for gold, copper, zinc, lead and silver.
It was included in the first Wilderness bill in Congress in 1967, but didn’t make it into the final version.
In 1980, a 6’8″ Bunyan-esque* District Ranger of the Detroit Oregon region, Dave “Chainsaw” Alexander, vowed to “cut Opal Creek.” Soon after, the Forest Service laid boundary markers to clear cut the area, but the sale was halted in 1982, when (future Mayor of Salem) Mike Swaim brought a lawsuit against it. Opal Creek was included in the 1984 Wilderness bill, then pulled at the last minute by Republican Senator Mark Hatfield. A 1989 fight to make Opal Creek an Oregon state park spurred the production of an Audubon video, “Rage Over Trees.”
Industry opponents got advertisers to boycott the film, so Ted Turner showed it 6 times on his network, without commercials.
Local activists like George Atiyeh (nephew of Republican Governor Victor Atiyeh), Michael Donnelly and Jerry Rust worked to keep the issue alive, and were joined by Republicans like Oregon Logger of the Year, Tom Hirons. As public pressure grew, Mark Hatfield arranged for a group of conservationists to meet with industry representatives and a mediator from Willamette University. The upshot was a Hatfield-sponsored bill designating Opal Creek a Wilderness area. It passed in 1996.
Tens of thousands visit every year. The Opal Creek Forest Center runs education programs, an outdoor school and backpacking trips for kids, and old logging camp cabins are available to the public for rent.
It is spectacular.
If you have stories about political successes, or just want to commiserate about the politics this season, I’d love to hear from you.
Acknowledgements and resources: Eugene Register Guard Archives, *Michael Donnelly’s 1997 article “Opal Creek Preserved,” David Seideman’s book “Showdown at Opal Creek.” Photos by me.
Why ride a touring bike? Week 15, skinny tires and the Orphan Master’s Son
July 30, 2012 § 9 Comments
Here’s my trusty Giant Iguana bicycle, purchased in the early 1990′s.
It’s sensible and reliable, serves well for trips to the grocery store, visiting friends and going to the gym. Since it weighs about 100 pounds, it really should count as exercise by itself. Think of it as a mini van.
 |
| A real giant iguana |
Here’s my other bike. It’s for “touring”. We bought it in 199-something from a friend for a song when our children were small and I had illusions about keeping up with them. Think of it as a Fiat Spider.
 Note that it’s hanging from the ceiling to save space. The Man of the House rigged this up. He’s very handy. |
 The “Head Badge” (bike talk for logo) on my bike. A Vintage Bicycle site dates this 1990-96 |
This bike’s sole purpose is to race around. Compared to the Giant Iguana, it is light as air. It requires special shoes, which I like because they make my feet look small, although they are hard to walk in.
Riding this bicycle also requires special clothes.
Would you wear these pants? No, that’s not Kotex in the middle. It’s padding. After a few miles you’re grateful for it.
Note the gloves, fingerless so you can shift gears, and nice if you fall off because they protect your hands from scraping on the pavement, a.k.a., as my yoga teacher says, from bicycle stigmata.
There really should be protection for knees, too, because the special shoes “clip in”, meaning they snap onto the pedals. Disconnecting in an emergency usually takes longer than it takes to hit the ground. Knee pads, however, aren’t de rigueur. Look:
 |
|||||
| Tour de France. Thank you Boston.com for the photo |
Perhaps road raspberries are a badge of honor? Or perhaps, if you crash the rest of you is so messed up your knees don’t matter?
Photo credit Atomic Gator
I’m reading a novel about North Korea, The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson — really good by the way — which puts racy bikes into perspective. When fishermen in the book come across brand new Air Jordan Nikes floating in the ocean, they can’t figure out what they’re for. For exercise, one of them suggests. Imperialists drive everywhere and have so much food that they have to exercise or they get fat. Some even do it for fun.
It is fun.
Clearly though, there are simpler, cheaper, safer ways to exercise and have fun, even on a bicycle. So why ride a touring bike? And honestly, a fify-mmph woman riding a touring bike is maybe a little … ? OK, maybe downright foolish. Why, in fact, would anyone get on something with tires as wide across as dimes, balance on the white line on country roads while hay trucks suck you into their wake, pickup truck drivers give you the finger, and Buick drivers honk and brush your shoulder with their mirrors?
I think it makes more sense for an old person to ride one of these risky business machines than a young one. Squish your private parts on that hard seat for a couple hours and for sure you’re going to jeopardize the next generation, and besides, if you’re just starting out, you shouldn’t want to do things that might cut your time on earth short. Of course, none of us wants to do anything that would make us a burden to our children.
Let’s just say, people who ride this way are optimists.
And beside, it’s — anyone want to fill in here? I have my reasons, but this post is getting long, so I’ll pull a Charles Dickens Serial: To Be Continued.
If you ride a lightweight bike, and clip in and all the rest, why do you do it? If you don’t, feel free to try to talk sense into me, but be forewarned, I’m in pretty deep.
This is part of an ongoing series from my other blog, Week 15 of 104 rides in 52 weeks. Some readers are having trouble with Blogspot, so I’m in the process of combining the two. Last week rode/commuted 7 times. Grand total since April 15 start date: 42 (12 rides in the bank).
Cross Pollination
May 30, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Cheer me on, or better yet, join me in a quest to commute by bicycle at least 104 times in 52 weeks. Reflections and countdown on my other blog: Time Stretches Deliciously
David and Goliath: Cruise Ships in Kralendijk
April 20, 2012 § 13 Comments
Cruise Ship in Kralendijk. Credit and thank you to photographer Steve at I Am Render on Flickr
Could there be an image more iconic than a big ship docked on a small island? As the world remembers the Titanic, and as images of the sinking of Carnival Cruise’s Costa Concordia fade …
…a friend and I found ourselves sitting on a sea wall in Kralendijk on the Island of Bonaire, watching a cruise ship dock.
From my friend's IPhone
Visitors disembarked and scattered, many to the buses and taxis to be driven around to beaches, boat tours or to scuba dive. Some just rode around to see what’s what.
Later in the day everybody got back on the boat and just before sunset the ship sounded a long, mournful toot and sailed away. The tents came down, restaurants opened, all was quiet and low-key and everybody was happy.
Kralendijk at night. Source: Definitive Caribbean Guide
Or were they? Just below these sunny doings, the ecosystem is being rerouted.
The island is about 50 miles off the coast of Venezuela, 26 miles from tip to tip and about as wide as an airplane strip. Unlike it’s popular neighbors Aruba and Curacao, until recently Bonaire was considered mostly good for salt production.
Image Source: The Lodge Bonaire
Scuba divers knew better, quietly cherishing the reefs, teeming with tropical sea life, the 100 foot water clarity and easy accessibility from the shore.
Image source: guideoftravels.com
Image source: Conde Nast Traveler
- 1 million gallons of “gray water” from sinks, showers, laundries and galleys
- 210,000 gallons of “black water” or sewage from toilets
- 25,000 gallons of oily bilge water
- 100 gallons of hazardous wastes (including perchloroethylene from drycleaning, photo-processing wastes, paint waste, solvents, print shop wastes, fluorescent light bulbs, and batteries)
- 50 tons of solid wastes (plastic, paper, wood, cardboard, food waste, cans, and glass)
- Air pollution from the ship’s diesel engines equivalent to thousands of cars
For many years cruise ships paid to have raw sewage dumped inland on Bonaire, but as evidence mounted that sewage was seeping into the ocean, destroying coral reef and polluting the water (see Sponge Blog), the Dutch and Bonairean governments (Bonaire is a Dutch municipality) funded an improved sewage disposal system, which went online in 2011.
- Is it enough? Probably not, but more data needs to be collected. Volunteers are monitoring seawater around the island, and its companion, the uninhabited island Klein Bonaire. Funding is tight.
So much at stake. Not only does Bonaire have one of the healthiest marine ecosystems in the Caribbean, it is also one of four places in the world where flamingos nest …
From Sailblogs, 2006 s/v Purrfection sailing trip
… and may be the last best hope for the Yellow Shouldered Amazon Parrot (see “Parrots of the Caribbean” http://mag.audubon.org/articles/travel/parrots-caribbean)…
… and uncountable unique and fragile ecosystems (see WorldKid’s Blog, on orchids). As Bonaire is discovered by more people, construction is proceeding apace, and tensions mount between those who want to preserve Bonaire’s natural bounty, and those anxious to capitalize on Bonaire’s natural bounty.
Must we bend every wild and beautiful place to suit the tastes of people like me, who want the upsides, warm weather, beautiful beaches and natural surroundings, without having to deal with inconveniences?
It’s one thing to make ourselves safe and comfortable, to have the opportunity to explore new places and to relax. It’s another to acquiesce to the idea that in order to explore and relax, we must also subscribe to the idea that the highest good and best way to judge any enterprise is whether it makes a profit.
I was overwhelmed by the beauty of this island, and sad that it seems unlikely we’ll be able to save the way it is for future generations.
Maybe this is how it is supposed to be. Maybe we are here on the earth to change it, to gobble it up a like a yolk sac, but the trouble is, we don’t really know. We are plowing ahead, hoping for the best. Talk about faith in ourselves. I am not a scientist or a Bonairean, not a professional or a politician. All I can do is witness, and wonder, so I will.
Image source: Best Cruise Deals 2009
For a list of environmental projects on Bonaire, and how to donate to them see Support Bonaire
The Lunch Tray, the Left, the Right and the Pink Slime Revolt
March 29, 2012 § 5 Comments
“The truth? You can’t handle the truth!” Jack Nicholson as Col. Jessup in “A Few Good Men”
In July, 2010, a Houston Mom named Bettina Siegal wrote an article in her blog: One Burger, Please, Extra Ammonia and Hold the E. Coli, an expose on Finely Textured Beef, a.k.a. pink slime. She followed up in early March 2012 with a petition requesting that Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack remove pink slime from school lunch menus: Let’s Put a Stop to “Pink Slime” on School Lunch Trays. Eight days later, she’d collected over 200,000 signatures, and things started to change.
By mid March, the USDA announced schools could opt for ground beef without filler. Supermarkets and fast food restaurants began to cancel orders, and a processing plant was threatened with closure. Bettina’s life turned upside down. She was inundated with calls from the press, offers of interviews for national news and on T.V. She’d tapped into a monster of frustration that was ready to spring. She was as surprised as anyone.
Back on the ranch, meaning my house, friends and I ping-ponged over the Internet about this new hullaballoo. The R’s wrote (I’m paraphrasing, actually quotes much more ahem colorful) there’s nothing wrong with pink slime, it’s treated beef, just like all the other beef we eat, and we have no right to keep people who want to eat it, mostly people who are poor who can’t afford Grade A, from eating it.. The D’s wrote this is a massive failure of the USDA regulation, which is dominated by corporate money.
Who is correct?
A recap: pink slime starts with leftover trimmings (fat, cartilage, tendons and meat bits), and is usually contaminated with e coli and salmonella. In the past these were relegated to scrap heaps or used for dog food. In response to public demand for affordable hamburger, a researcher for a company called Beef Products, Inc. figured out a way to separate the beef bits and other things from the fat (heat and spinning in a centrifuge), and then decontaminate it with an infusion of ammonium hydroxide gas. The name pink slime was coined by a Department of Agriculture scientist in an e-mail to a colleague, later leaked.
Yuck. Sounds like the evil CAFO industry doing its work.
So are my R friends right? Ye-e-s… So are the D’s.
Ammonium hydroxide is used to kill the pathogens in Finely Textured Beef. It sounds awful, but ammonium hudroxide has a seal of approval not only from the USDA, but also from the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Health Organization (WHO). It’s added to baked goods, cheeses, chocolates, caramel and puddings. How much is too much? I don’t know, and can’t find an answer, but until then, have no grounds to argue with WHO.
Image source: chemistryland.com
How about the beef itself, infested with e coli and not too long ago considered fit only for dogs?
This “filler” has been around since the 1990′s, and if you buy ground beef, low fat hot dogs, pepperoni, lunch meats, frozen entrees, meatballs or canned foods, you’re eating it. Are you grossed out by pink slime? Stop buying these products.
How good of a job does the ammonium hydroxide do in decontaminating? Not so great. A little too much ammonia and the product smells bad. Too little and you don’t kill the e.coli and salmonella. Beef Products, Inc. has had to recall batches: Safety of Beef Processing Method Is Questioned
Are USDA regulators overly influenced by industry? Judge for yourself: The USDA approval of Finely Textured Beef was pushed through in 1991 by G.W. Bush’s USDA undersecretary Joann Smith, reputedly known for this quote,”It’s pink, therefore it’s meat”. She had a long and distinguished career in the beef products industry, which included a stint as the head of the National Cattlemen’s Association (pre-USDA) and as a member of the Board of Directors of none other than Beef Products, Inc after leaving the USDA.
Joann Smith, Image source: http://www.florida-agriculture.com/agwoman/smith.htm
Should pink slime be out of school lunches?
Image source: Eric Langhorst/Flickr; Mother Jones online "Can Your Kids School Now Opt Out of Pink Slime?"
I think so (GO BETTINA), but we’ve whittled down school funding so much that filler-free beef might be out of reach for many school budgets. Not necessarily bad if it means we ease kids away from burgers, but nobody is suggesting that, at least not on a large scale. Schools that can’t afford 100% ground beef may well opt for the cheaper stuff with pink slime.
So where does this leave me? All of us? Are we having a moment of truth, a face to face with our agricultural industry? Are we saying we don’t want cheap hamburger, pepperoni and low fat hot dogs? The next time we see that tempting package of ground beef on sale will we say wait! Let’s buy lentils instead?
Or are we just, temporarily, grossed out?
Either way, hats off, kudos and a huge thank you to Bettina for her dedication to kids and her willingness to put herself and her family in the spotlight. She inspired me to do a lot of hard thinking and reading, and might just have sparked a revolution. Disclaimer: I’m no expert in the field, and appreciate the complexity. Feel free to send corrections, additions and updates, and check out Bettina’s blog: The Lunch Tray
Detroitnews.com, March 29, 2012, "Beef consumers urged to reconsider 'pink slime'"
Bag Lady
March 5, 2012 § 7 Comments
Oh ye plastic baggers, the day of reckoning approacheth?
Oh that it were so simple. “Nothing that’s worthwhile is ever easy.” ― Nicholas Sparks, Message in a Bottle
The other day I dutifully brought cloth bags to the grocery store. While I was chatting with the checkout clerk, a bagger packed things up. ”Have a nice day!” she said and smiled, setting the groceries in a cart.
Everything, including my cloth bags, were bagged in plastic.
Serves me right you say? I should bag my own damn groceries? All right. Let’s not anybody not get their danders up. I smiled back and said, “Thank you.”
Image source: http://www.cartoonstock.com /directory/c/checkout_girl.asp
But there we have it, the plastic grocery bag, icon of American wealth and folly. There is momentum toward banning them. City councilors in our town of 150,000 recently gave the go-ahead for a draft ordinance banning single-use plastic bags. Portland, Oregon, the nearest big city, recently enacted their own plastic bag ban. Others in the club: San Francisco, Austin, the big Island in Hawaii …
Activists in Portland's city council chambers. Source: Oregonian newspaper
… And there is a veritable storm of anger, science, art and righteousness coalescing to defend or do away with the polyethylene prince.
In one corner, the (villainous?) plastics manufacturers …
Image Source: Time Magazine, "The Patron Saint of Plastic Bags"
… represented by Stephen Joseph, who points out that because most reusable bags are made overseas and most plastic bags are made in America, bag bans kill American jobs. He doesn’t believe that consumers use reusable bags as often as they should. The bags get dirty, so people don’t want to use them for food. Also, while plastic is a huge problem on land and sea, it is only a tiny portion of the total waste stream. http://www.sfgate.com/cgiin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/12/03/INC81LA627.DTL#ixzz1oHFunur4
In the other corner, the bring-your-own baggers …
… like Andy Keller, founder of a multimillion dollar company, ChicoBag, which sells trendy reusable shopping bags. In the photo above Andy is wearing his Monster Bag outfit, made of 500 bags, about the number used per person per year in the US. He tracks laws banning bags and publicizes information about the harm they cause to the environment.
Mr. Keller was recently sued by three plastic bag companies, Hilex Poly Co. LLC, Superbag Operating LTD. and Advance Polybag Inc. for “irreparable harm” to their business. He is philosophical. ”When you get sued for trying to make a difference in the world,” Keller says, “you must be doing something right.”
Image source: http://the-mound-of-sound.blogspot.com/2009/05/memo-to-self-no-more-dirty-diapers-in.html
There are controversial studies like this one:
“…a draft report by the Environment Agency, obtained by the Independent on Sunday, has found that ordinary high density polythene (HDPE) bags used by shops are actually greener than supposedly low impact choices.
“HDPE bags are, for each use, almost 200 times less damaging to the climate than cotton hold-alls favoured by environmentalists, and have less than one third of the Co2 emissions than paper bags which are given out by retailers such as Primark.” 2/20/11, http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/plastic-fantastic-carrier-bags-not-ecovillains-after-all-2220129.html?action=Popu
The researchers studied seven types of bags and the pollution caused by each of them via extraction of raw materials, production, transportation and disposal. They concluded that cloth bags are less damaging to the environment than plastic if you use them 171 times, but that most use their cloth bags only 51 times. Paper bags? You have to use them four times. This report was scheduled for publication in 2007 but is sidelined while it is peer-reviewed, or perhaps, as bag lovers claim, because of a conspiracy by environmentalists who can’t take the truth.
Image source: The Torontorist, Brian McLachlan
- There is a question of money. If grocery stores stop offering plastic bags, they will have to have reusables available. Should they charge a lot, making people value them less and thus more likely to throw them away before their 171 uses? Or charge more, and make people mad?
- We can go around and around about public policy and economics, but in the end, common sense must prevail.
We don’t need a new plastic bag for every apple we buy. Most of us have access to washing machines, and can keep cloth bags sanitary. We are, like it or not, part of a waste stream.
Here’s the rule: Use grocery bags 172 times. Yikes! Really? Really. No excuses. Use them for about a year and a half. Nobody is going to be counting for you, not if we want to keep the American Way strong and healthy. Need something for dog poop? Use compostable poop bags. Five bucks for 50. If you can afford a dog, you can afford these.
Need something to line the garbage pail in the kitchen? Newspaper works fine. So does no lining at all.
It’s not easy. Most things ahead of us aren’t. We had a great run with our plastic bags. They are light and convenient and just disappear into the garbage trucks at the end of the week — right to the landfills and the treetops and into albatross gullets.
Unaltered photo of contents of a dead baby albatross' stomach. Source: Huffington Post. Photo by Chris Jordan
No need to wait for a city ordinance. Attach yourself to some fine quality bags, and use them. Keep in mind though, you might have to help with the bagging.
