Gateway to America's Soul - Through the Eyes of a Bag of Sun Chips

What is wrong with America? Has she lost her way? In the season finale of Real Time with Bill Maher this past Friday, Maher made an excellent point about what ails America by referencing a bag of Sun Chips.

For those not familiar the story is as follows: in early 2009 Frito-Lay introduced a biodegradable packaging for Sun Chips. Made of completely plant-based material, the bag decomposed into dirt instead of remaining a bag of chips for five hundred years. A good idea, forward thinking, great PR, etc. etc. There was one hitch: this bag was damn loud, shockingly so. But who cares, right? In both the Pacific and Atlantic ocean swirls a Texas sized "island" of garbage, which certainly contains a bag of Sun Chips or two. 

Shouldn't environmental thinking trump a loud potato chip bag? I guess not. Critics, from consumers to media commentators, descended: facebook groups and youtube videos sprouted up as a grassroots campaign against the loud bag took hold. Finally, on October 5th they pulled the packaging from America's shelves.

It seems that what should have been hailed as a beacon of progress, and a wonderful sign of a corporation taking some initiative, has been relegated to the world of corporate misstep. Worse, it seems that the selfish nature of individual Americans was on display in its truest form. As Maher put it,

"Of course we could have made the ultimate sacrifice and - I dunno - poured the chips into a bowl... Sidenote: in Canada, Sun Chips is keeping the non-earth raping bag, because they are not a nation of crack babies. They get it; that sometimes you have to give up small things in order to make the world a better place. Except in America, where 'have it your way' is the rule for everything, including volume on snacks. You think we're going to reform Social Security??? haha"

Sun Chips Canada took full advantage of this PR opportunity

The silver lining in this story is that, yes, Canadian shelves will remain stocked with this loud bag. As a Canadian, of course I am proud of our great sacrifice, ha! There has been a lot of talk of late about how this is Canada's moment (http://is.gd/hdzkx), after battling domestic issues for decades we are now at the fore-front of international envy. Our banks have been lauded as the most stable in the world by the World Economic Forum three years running (http://is.gd/hdBm5). We hosted a relatively successful Olympics this past winter. Et cetera. Are we perfect? Of course not. Far from it. But we are certainly in better shape than our neighbour to the south. 

Thing is, we can't afford to ignore America's problems. Our greatest trading partner, best friend, and often times family, is in a near state of crisis. High unemployment, cumbersome national debt, a broken health care system, disastrous foreign policy, and a reeling economy; resulting in a broken and highly divisive political landscape. America's problems are quite large and threaten its position on top of the world. Worse, the electorate and politicians don't appear capable of getting anything done. Every election we see a sweeping shift in another direction. Imagine the cool kid being dethroned, with 300 million voices inside her head. They feel threatened as the number one country in the world, and with very good reason. Maybe the Sun Chips saga is not that big of a deal in the grand scheme. But Maher's point is that a solution to what ails America is impossible while American's are unwilling or unable to think of the bigger picture. And he is spot on.

The Political Capital of the Oil Spill

I read an article today in The Globe and Mail (http://tiny.cc/0nnje) suggesting that the oil spill will be a 'game changer' for the oil industry. It was quoting an analysis by the international energy agency which posited that tough new regulation might jeopardize supply in the next five years to the tune of around one million barrels a day.

It also cites a Deutsche Bank report, “this is the end of the oil age as we knew it and the Macondo [the blown well] will be seen as an enormous driver toward at least recognition that cheap, abundant, politically secure oil is no longer available and our behaviour must change to recognize that.”

Amazing. I can't wait. I've been saying it for a while that Obama needs to use the political capital associated with the spill to fulfill a campaign promise of weaning America off its addiction to oil. Is it scummy to politicize a massive disaster? No. The fact is that people respond to crisis. George Bush missed his opportunity following 9/11. In the name of national security he could have used the attack to make drastic changes to the way Americans get their energy (among other things). And lots of very smart Americans believe this is a much more effective way to counter terrorism. Ronald Reagan spent the Russians into the red to end the cold war. Now in the war on terrorism, we are funding the enemy. This is why Israel's energy policy is to be oil-free, ASAP, using electric cars, solar and wind power, etc. Anyways, of course Bush would have never tried to sever the ties between Americans and the oils powers of the middle east... his father's business connections being what they are. So let's all hope that the reason Obama is lying low so far is to calculate a measured and effective response to break the addiction to oil. Look the fact is that we are so entrenched in our oil addicted lifestyle that coming clean from oil will require us to make financial sacrifices. Massive investment in research and development to improve the technology is paramount. 

The time is now. We need to grow up and recognize that the cost of oil is far greater than just the daily price of a barrel. We subsidize the oil companies by letting them sell their product without making them pay for all the costs of using the product. Pollution, health issues related to smog, etc. Why do we do this? They make tens of billions of dollars every year from killing our planet. I love capitalism and the wealth that it creates for the masses, but this is capitalism gone awry. Let's take the needle out of our arm and get on with fixing the world.