Mandating Habits...

Interesting article by Stephen Moore. He was visiting SF when he read the front page Chronicle: "S.F. Mayor Proposes Fines for Unsorted Trash"

"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." - San Francisco Chronicle

"When you're the one guy on the block with the little tag on your garbage can, everyone knows you screwed up," he said. "There's a little bit of shame, a 'Scarlet Letter' effect, to this program that seems to work with people." - San Francisco Chronicle

Does pressuring people into comformity really work? Will you stop talking to your neighbor because they didn't separate the coffee grounds from the newspaper?

Stephen Moore brings up some frightening ways the government could snoop on us:

• California is considering a plan to police the temperature settings on residents' thermostats.
  
  
• The feds are checking on the flush capacity of our toilets and the kinds of light bulbs we use.
  
  
• A new game called Climate Crime Cards urges kids to spy on and keep an online record of their family's environmental faux pas -- noting when their parents fail to turn off the TV, plug in too many appliances or use the clothes dryer on a sunny day.
  
  
• Barack Obama believes that properly inflating the tires on our cars is the solution to our energy woes. Is the government going to start giving tickets for failure to inflate?