How about Government really solves a problem.

Another from the archives. I believe his was originally published in early 2007.

I didn't make many friends with this one either.

The motivation for these columns usually comes from odd little events in my life. In this case, it’s several, completely separate events, but events that are similar and are all related to being out and about in automobiles.

The first in this particular chain of events was when I read a newspaper article about our legislature discussing the placement of a deposit on plastic cola and water bottles as a way to curb littering.

I am never in favor of government coming up with a solution which involves extracting more money, and effort, from the taxpayers. As I pondered the system of the “deposit” and how much of a hassle it truly is, I realized that it is just another “feel good” proposal that will make great headlines but will do little if anything to truly solve the problem.

The issue is that people that will throw garbage from their vehicle are societal degenerates and they will not change their behavior because the legislature passed a new law.

The whole deposit process is just like the rebate scheme utilized by manufacturers in their advertising. With rebates they know that only about 50% of the people will follow through with the entire process to get their rebate so it’s free money for the manufacturers. The deposit system is much the same. Who is going to go through the effort to hang onto their Aquafina or Pepsi plastic bottles just to get that nickel or dime back? The majority of the bottles will find their way to trash cans (or the roadside) and very few will be returned for that deposit.

Since the majority of the money will stay with the government, it is just taxation, but done with a smile on their faces.

Millions of dollars are spent every year producing commercials, print advertisements, public service announcements and billboards all trying to keep people from littering from their automobile. If all those efforts get one person to not litter, well that’s great, but there will always be a small portion of society who are just sick degenerates and they will continue to litter regardless of the situation.

I pulled into a Go-Mart yesterday and as I got out of the car there were three items on the ground. Two empty bottles of oil with their lids and there was a soiled diaper. Yes, the ground was where some individual, or individuals, chose to just drop empty oil bottles and a soiled baby diaper.

Now, these people are not well. These people are sick and don’t quite understand that they live on a planet with other people that shouldn’t have to pick up after them. Anyone that would leave a soiled diaper in the open for someone else to dispose of is a mentally defective individual and should have not only their child removed, but also their ability to reproduce.

Is some new law going to teach this caliber of people to change their behavior? Nope.

Do we really have to implement an entire system which costs everyone more time and money just so we can accommodate the worst among us? It’s truly “feel good” politics. Come up with something that will make you feel better but will truly not fix anything.

Here’s my proposal, and this is rooted in my personal observation and experience. In the last month, I don’t recall seeing more than one or two plastic bottles scattered on the roadside.

Conversely, I see dozens, if not hundreds, of cigarette butts littered everywhere. In fact, I have had 4, still burning, cigarette butts thrown from cars in front of me in the recent weeks.

Now, what is the defect in someone’s brain that leads them to believe that throwing a piece of burning compressed paper out of their moving vehicle is acceptable?

Smokers exhibit more callous disregard for their fellow man than almost any other group I can think of. In fact, I would bet a huge sum of money that whoever threw those oil containers and the soiled diaper on the ground were themselves smokers (it just fits the demographic)

The nerve of a driver finishing with their smoke and then tossing it out the window, it’s the height of anti-social behavior and I think I know a way to stop it.

We need to place a fifty-cent deposit on each cigarette butt. 20 cigarettes are contained in most packages so this would be a $10 dollar deposit for each package of cigarettes.

Now, I guarantee that if smokers had to pay $10 dollars just to get their cigarettes that they will never throw another butt out of their car window. These little pieces of paper will be cherished and treated like gold. I would wager that 90% of smokers would return each and every butt to the stores so they would get their deposit back.

This system would all but eliminate cigarette butt litter; it also might make more people think about their drug addiction and whether they want to allocate such a large portion of their income (and time) to such an addiction.

It’s time we punish the true offenders. Take up the call for my initiative to place a fifty cent deposit on the lowly cigarette butt. Stand around the door of any office building and look on the ground. There’s probably thirty dollars laying there right now.

Oh….Don’t throw things from your car.