Where’s my conservation at?
The environment, it’s that thing we walk & drive around. We breathe its air, drink its water and swim in its seas. We eat the food it produces and enjoy the vitamin D the sun provides. We take all of this in and yet we do very little to protect it. It’s sort of strange when you stop and think about it. It would be like be like scoring the winning goal and begging for it to be disallowed, it just doesn’t make sense.
On a local level some folks in Brattleboro (the town I live in) are feeling victorious because Pay as you Throw was voted down. I for one am happy about not having to pay the money to dispose of my trash, but I also recycle, and I’m overly conscious about what I throw out and have become more aware about what I even bring into my home. Not everyone is like that however, yet we need to be. We as a whole need to think about this because, I hate to say it – if we’re not, it will be reflected in our taxes, and not in the form of a decrease.
The Windham Solid Waste District here in town is now able to take more of those plastic items that weren’t previously recyclable. Medicine containers, small pails, dairy tubs, yogurt, cottage cheese, deli and take-out containers, plastic lids, plastic egg cartons, and here’s the best part – curbside recycling in Brattleboro is still free. Yet only about 15 percent of the population here does it and I bet that more than 15 percent of the cars run around town with that bumper sticker that reads “think globally, act locally”. So we need to practice what we’re preaching here. We need to get the green tubs and start dragging our recyclables to the curb and start to reduce the waste.
But thinking on that “more Global” level… With what the environment provides for you and me why is it that we don’t take better care of it? Why has every President since Nixon talked about it and at the end of the day – done nothing? “W” talked about our addiction to crude, Clinton promised to leave us with a more sustainable planet, Herbert Walker Bush talked about energy conservation, Reagan stated that we will not be held hostage by the oil Merchants, Carter talked about energy uniting a nation, Ford knew increasing energy supplies wasn’t enough, Even Nixon knew that something had to be done. In September of 1969 Patrick Moynihan (a top aide to Nixon) released a memo urging that administration to push a world wide agenda of for monitoring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere – or as we call it today Global Warming.
So with all this information at our fingertips for so long it really begs the question, why hasn’t anything been done? For my entire life the environment has been an issue, for my entire life it’s been a part of a stump speech but nothing ever comes of it. Why? Well because things like the economy and peoples wallets lead the charge. My father taught me at a very young age, that if you want to hurt a man you never hit him in the face you hit him in the wallet. When money is on the line everything else gets pushed to the back burner. Bringing it back to a local issue Pay as you Throw – that $2.00 a week would have forced people to look at what they were tossing into the landfill. But I’ve got news for you – they are going to get their two bucks one way or another, and you’re in complete control of that.
There’s an organization called the Environmental Defense Fund, and they’re doing a ton of great work. At the moment President Obama has a very real chance of passing a strong energy bill. But like anything a show of support is what’s needed. And the internet has once again made it a simple 2 minute process for you to throw your support behind saving our planet, go to www.edf.org/actnow . And if we don’t, well, you can look forward to Pay as You Breath – What the hell is up with that?
