More Ranting.

A bit of a ranty week, I'm afraid.

I'm beginning to hate Seattle.

Today I was walking to work and passed a shop-encrusted square. It was early: only one business was open. The entryways to the rest of the businesses - literally all of them - and most of the benches were occupied by sleeping vagrants. More than a dozen of them. All with nice sleeping bags.

The one business that was open was completely empty. It was a blue-collar job placement agency.

Oh, yeah, we're really helping people. Socialism still doesn't work. Shocker!

In January, Seattle decided it was going to enforce recycling. It's only taken nine months for them to convince my building manager to follow these amazing new rules.

"Seattle spends $28 million on moving trash to landfills, where it remains forever," they ejaculate. "Up to 25% of that trash is recyclable," they crow. "We can save our citizens $2 million if we recycle even better! So, if your trash is more than 10% recyclable by weight, you get a fine! Wheee!"

Already I'm thinking to myself, "What the fuck?"

A) This isn't enforceable unless they weigh and sort each bin before they put it into the truck. They aren't going to do that.

B) "Forever" is just a stupid thing to say. Most of the trash we throw away certainly won't last forever. In fact, most of it won't even last a hundred years.

C) Recycling produces toxic waste, as opposed to landfilling, which produces no toxins.

D) You can't save money by recycling. It costs more. There must be a federal grant involved.

So I turn over the paper and see a long list of "recycle-yes!" and "recycle-no!" materials. Paper of all varieties is "recycle-yes!" Glass of ONE variety is "recycle-yes!" Clean plastic bags are "recycle-yes!"

But almost all other kinds of plastic bags and glass are "recycle-no!" In fact, the only thing that's really on their list is PAPER. They want all kinds of paper, including microwave dinner boxes. But - get this - you can't recycle the rest of the microwave dinner package. Similarly, they want pill canisters but no pill lids. Milk cans, but no milk lids.

Okay, about 90% of their recycling advice is about paper.

Paper is not worth recycling. It costs more than creating it new, it creates all sorts of nifty toxins, and paper not only biodegrades as fast as mulch, it also helps the REST of the trash to biodegrade (if layered correctly). Moreover, paper-making uses primarily paper-farm trees - we're not deforesting anything to create new paper.

Now I'm getting really steamed. I hate shit like this.

Okay, we're not allowed to have more than 10% by weight of recyclables. There's two solutions to that:

Throw non-recyclable stuff into the recycle bin or fill your recyclable cans, jugs, and paper with water (which is non-recyclable) before throwing them away.

I hate this kind of shit. This kind of government bloat. It makes me want to throw rotting things at politicians.

Seattle is bloat city. It's very nearly socialist. It's driving me insane!