Starting Tuesday, plastic bags illegal at big S.F. grocery stores

Starting Tuesday, plastic bags illegal at big San Francisco grocery stores: "Starting Tuesday, large grocery stores in the city can no longer use the traditional plastic bags that are a staple of the supermarket checkout line, as a city ordinance passed earlier this year to ban the bags takes effect."

Am I the only person thinking that the socialists should move to existing socialist countries, instead of trying to destroy democracy? I'm all in favor of using cloth bags (and I request paper bags at grocery stores that offer them - if I don't bring my own bags), but why is the government making that choice for consumers?

Our local "upscale" grocer offers a 5 cent discount per reused bag, whether cloth or plastic. The amazing thing about it is that they are really good about actually providing the discount, even in self-checkout, even if the customer doesn't ask for the discount. And I see customers bringing in bags to reuse. Heck, I buy dog treats at the pet store's bulk snack bar, and I reuse the same bag over and over again. Our bathroom trash can is simply a hanger for reusing grocery bags. I prefer paper bags for bagging our paper, plastic, and glass recycling. Our curbside pickup trash can is almost never full - if there is no food waste (that could become stinky), we don't bother putting the bin out, because it would waste the truck's gas stopping to pickup a 3/4 empty bin. My point being: I am not anti-environment, and I do more for the environment than a lot of these enviro-socialists do. But I am a democrat.

dem·o·crat /ˈdɛməˌkræt/ –noun
1. an advocate of democracy.

Folks, if you don't like what a store is doing, tell them so - talk to a manager, write to corporate headquarters, stop giving them your money. Good citizenship is more than election day; it's the accumulated results of all of your actions, every day, from how you allocate your charitable giving to how you shop. If you don't want to see plastic bags at checkout, shop someplace that doesn't use them.

More from the SF Gate article:
"While the absence of plastic bags may be a radical change in many parts of the city, the Rainbow Grocery Cooperative on Folsom Street has not offered customers plastic bags since it opened in 1975, said Dennis Wagner, one of the store's seven directors.

The store encourages customers to bring their own bags, as well as using their own containers for produce or bulk foods."

Note to the San Francisco supervisors: If your problem with grocery bags is litter, then tax the bags at an appropriate level to cover the costs of cleaning them up, and enforce litter laws. If your problem is simply that you don't like your constituents' retail choices, then use your position to encourage different choices or just bugger off; "the ultimate authority, wherever the derivative may be found, resides in the people alone" (Federalist Paper number 46, Madison).