THAT'S THE LAST STRAW

As I sat with TLW (The Little Woman) over breakfast at our favorite diner, and while the waitress brought us water with straws that she gently tossed on our table, TLW asked me if I had heard of the new straw law being pressured by California.

The law being introduced this month if passed would make giving a straw to a customer in a restaurant a new crime. The penalty would be incurred on the individual waiter who violates the law:

"Under Calderon's law, a waiter who serves a drink with an unrequested straw in it would face up to 6 months in jail and a fine of up to $1,000."

Some are already pushing back on this claim stating that the fine and jail time would apply to the restaurant as an entity, not the waiter.

This bill would prohibit a food facility, where food is consumed in a restaurant from providing single-use plastic straws to consumers unless requested by the consumer.

I'm sorry, but this is stupid. Not so much that there are penalties but the out of bounds severity of those penalties.

Say for instance you work as a waiter or waitress and arrive late for work one day, due to traffic congestion and the LA traffic nightmares. Your boss reams you out in front of your co-workers or even customers, embarrassing you.

Humiliated, you plot revenge. You get your first table and immediately place an unrequested straw on the customer's table. Then you quit, who pays for this indiscretion, the boss or owner of the place?

If we are to govern ourselves, we need to govern our actions first and balance law with the consequences of what the penalty should be appropriate. But California is not the only government going nuts, Scotland of all places has a similar code to make Scotland the only plastic straw-free country in the world. Granted California should get its independence, and I'm sure the British are thinking so should Scotland.