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Speaker 2: So there's a lot of issues that we're facing right
now as a state, as a country. Whole bunch of
conversations going on. I could spend the next two hours
rattling them all off. Let's just look here at North Carolina.
We have a storm in Hurricane Holena that caused an
estimated sixty billion dollars worth of damage to the western
half of the state. I would say that's a pretty
big issue. You've got a federal government that is looking
at repealing back some potential amounts that they give to
states in regards to Medicaid expansion, which could completely bust
to North Carolina's budget as they expanded that just back
a couple of years ago. That's a major topic we're
in the middle of budget conversations. We've got a brand
new governor and the former Attorney general now Governor, Josh Stein.
Lots of things going on in the state, and you've
heard about a lot of those topics. We talk about
him in the morning on the Carolina Journal News Hour,
which you can hear from five to six am. If
that's too early, I get it, you can check out
the podcast version listen throughout the day. We track the
General Assembly very closely. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I present
to you this afternoon House Bill four point twenty three,
known as the Skip the Stuff Act. It is being
introduced by Representative Julie von Heffen out of Wait County,
Representative deb Butler out of New Hanover County, Representative James
Robertson out of Wait County, and finally Representative Pricey Harrison
out of Guildford County. All four Democrats introducing this bill,
and it's got a pretty interesting name, Skip the Stuff Acts.
Are we like cutting down on something? Are we saving
some government somewhere?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: Are we skipping stuff within government? Maybe saving more money
as taxpayers? No, not at all.
Speaker 3: I would like to read for you part of the bill.
Speaker 2: A Bill to be entitled an Act to Reduce Single
Use food Wear in takeout and Delivery of Prepared Meals. Yes,
you heard me correctly, Democrats in the North Carolina General Assembly.
As you are dealing with all of the issues of
the day, all of the issues of your life, trying
to make it in middle class America, Democrats in Raleigh
are introducing legislation to reduce single use food wear aka
plastic spoons, forks, knives, and the likes in takeout and
delivery prepared meals. That is the pressing, pressing issue for
North Carolina Democrats in our great state capital of Raleigh.
The bill is about four pages long and it lists
out a whole bunch of issues that are taking place.
For example, it says, whereas this is in the bill,
whereas four million trees are cut down each year in
order to make chopsticks in China, Eliminating forests are natural
carbon sink and providers of habitats and clean air. Makes
no sense during a climate crisis. That's a line fourteen
through sixteen in the legislation. Whereas the manufacturing of napkins
require a significant amount of water. I did not know
this for instance, if fifty percent of the United States
population used three paper napkins per day, that would total
four hundred and fifty million napkins for one day, which
would require thirty one and a half million gallons of
water to manufacture. Whereas many single use food wear accessories
are made from plastic. As much as twenty three million
metric tons of plastic waste enter the ocean each year,
most of it generated in the United States. So this
is a left wing bill to reduce the ability for
you to eat with a plastic fork if you order takeout.
Sounds like a very important issue. Not only is this
bill ridiculous on its face, and I gave you the
bill numbers, you can go and read it for yourself,
House Bill four to twenty three. If you think I've
pulled this out of the Babylon Bee or the Onion
or some other parody news outlet this afternoon, it's House
Billed four to twenty three. Not only does it make
all of these ridiculous claims, but it actually wants to
hold restaurants as responsible parties if they give you these
single use items. So if you order takeout or order
delivery from a fast from a restaurant, whether it be
fast food or door Dash or grub Hub, whatever might
be well. According to this piece of legislation, a food
establishment shall not provide any single use foodwar or standard
condiments to consumers for on premise dining, takeout and delivery orders,
or when using third party food delivery platforms, unless the
consumer requests the use of single use foodwar or condiments. So,
if you are now going to order or takeout from somewhere,
you are going to have to put in those special
delivery instructions. Oh and also I need a fork to
eat this steak. Oh it might be helpful to have
a spoon to eat this soup that I'm ordering from Panera.
Speaker 3: I mean you could just eat it with your hands.
Speaker 2: I guess that would be probably better for the environment
than this evil single use plastic food wear. So this
bill would require these restaurants to ask you to opt
in to receive you to pencils with your food, and
if they don't, if they are reported, which this legislation
instructs the Department of Department of Health to spawn up
a portal for individuals to report restaurants that are not
following The law reads as fire as follows.
Speaker 3: If the Department finds.
Speaker 2: That a food establishment has failed to comply with the
requirements of this part, the Department may issue a written
notice to the food establishment in its findings and direct
the food establishment to take remedial actions to comply with
the requirement of this law. The Department shall allow the
non compliant food establishment sixty calendar days from the receipt
of notice of non compliance to demonstrate a compliance to
the satisfaction of the Department. If, after sixty days of
following receipt of notice of non compliance, fails to demonstrate
compliance with the requirement of this law, the Department may
impose administrative penalties against food establishment pursuant to general statue. So,
if I'm reading this correctly, which I believe i am,
this piece of legislation introduced by four Democrats in Raleigh
would require restaurants to ask you if you need silverware
to eat your food. If they don't ask you and
they give it to you anyway, the evil action of
providing you with paper napkins, plastic forks, knives, and spoons,
depending on what you're ordering, they will be reported to
the state government and you can guarantee that lefties across
this state will be ordering food just so they can
report restaurants. It will be reported to the state. The
restaurant or establishment will receive a notice from the state,
and if they don't do so, they will be fined
by the state government. If that is not the most
absurd thing I have ever seen, I don't know what is.
This is what we're acking right now in our North
Carolina General Assembly. We've got nothing better going on in
this state right now. We don't have a sixty billion
dollar storm that affected the western half of the state
back in September. We don't have major discussions about choice
in education, budget surpluses, budget shortfalls being projected in the
near future, huge time increases with state health plans is
set to come up here in the next year or so.
None of that is irrelevant enough. Now we need to
report these restaurants, and then we need to find them
if they are not cooperating with this legislation. Unimaginable House
Bill four to twenty three has been introduced in the
North Carolina General Assembly. The Skip the Stuff Act introduced
yesterday in Raleigh. Well, keep a very close eye on
it and pass any details along. If you think it's absurd.
Love to hear your thoughts on it. Maybe you think
this this is a great thing.
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Speaker 2: We are talking about an interesting piece of legislation introduced
in Raleigh yesterday, House Bill four twenty three, the Skip
the Stuff Act, which deals with restaurants and them providing
you with the plastic spoons, forks, knives, and other sorts
of condiments and utensils when you order takeout from them.
This is what democrats are working on in Raleigh with
all of the issues that the state is facing right now.
Seven oh four five seven oh eleven ten. That's seven
oh four, five seven oh eleven ten. Lisa is hanging online.
One Lisa, Good afternoon. You're on the Peak Counter show.
Speaker 4: Go ahead, Hello Nick, nice to meet too.
Speaker 3: Likewise, what's up.
Speaker 4: As a former food server, I totally understand about to
go forks, and I'm okay with this bill, but not
all of it. Quite often I'll order something at home.
I prefer a metal fork, and therefore I end up
stuck with a drawer full of the go forks that
I don't need. I think that they should make it
easier on the website, or they ask you on the
website do you need a fork? Or do you need condiments?
Where you don't have to you know where you just
go click click, like you would ordering your egg rolls.
As far as being a fork nazi, that is absolutely ridiculous.
The world is made of plastic. We have ziploc baggies
we buy you know, food comes in bags and then
it's into in plastic bags and it's individually wrapped in
little plastic more plastic inside plastic bags at the grocery store.
The paper straw thing is ridiculous. If you really, really,
really want to deal with the issue of plastic, forks
and straws are not the answer.
Speaker 2: It sounds like you're willing to put our environment at risk.
You know, it doesn't sound like you're taking climate change
seriously enough that all those all those plastic forks are
causing the planet's temperature to skyrocket.
Speaker 5: Are you serious?
Speaker 2: It's the most absurd thing in the world. The idea
that we're going to solve the Earth's problem of so
called man made climate change and you're no longer going
to get a spoon with your takeout. Super order is
the most absurd thing in the world. I can't imagine
that anybody thinks that this is a useful venture of government.
I do agree with you. I mean, the idea you
always and I'm just like you. I have my drawer
full of those plastic utensils. But you want why does
government need to be involved in this?
Speaker 6: Lease?
Speaker 2: I mean, that's really the kind of the question that
I'm asking myself. Why does the General Assembly need to
be involved in this at all?
Speaker 4: They're boards, they have nothing else to do. They don't
attack of real issues. Uh shall I go on?
Speaker 3: I mean it's exactly the case off they.
Speaker 4: Paid off to come up with dumb stuff. Oh I
think that judge is paid off, by the way. Somebody
got to him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, big big plastic fork the industry that us controlling
the lobbyists down at the North Carolina General Assembly. Lisa,
thanks for the call this afternoon at seven oh four
five seven eleven ten. You know, if restaurants who are
spending money, by the way on these utensils. If they
want to ask you do you want these? That's their prerogative.
It would save them some money if that was the case.
But we're now gonna be fining restaurants. We're gonna now
be sending the Department of Health into restaurants to figure
out whether they are giving out plastic utensils when you
order food. This build directs the Secretary of Environmental Quality
to go forth and and start investigating these cases. And
if a restaurant is found in compliance for the first violation,
the penalty should not exceed two hundred dollars for a
second violation five hundred dollars if it happens a third time.
This piece of legislation instructs the Attorney General to institute
a civil penalty against the county in which the restaurant operates.
Speaker 3: This we're gonna have.
Speaker 2: The Attorney General of the state going after counties to
recoup money from restaurants that are including plastic silverware. Government's
got nothing better to do. Seven four, five, seven eleven ten.
Carol is hanging online too. Carol, good afternoon. You're on
the Peak Colendar Show with Nick Craig.
Speaker 3: What's up? How are you I'm doing great things.
Speaker 7: Here's my only comment. I would actually like to report
these restaurants one day. Don't put the silverware in the bag.
Speaker 2: So wait, hold on a second, Hold out a second.
You don't like eating your food with your hands. You
don't like eating your soup by sipping it out of
a cup, Carol, Is that what I'm understanding?
Speaker 7: I know, I know, how rude of me to actually
want silverware, you know. Yeah, so like there's been many
times you go to these places and they don't give
me the soberware. We don't get to reported for not
giving the silverware. But apparently, yeah, it's it's getting so insane.
I can't even stand it anywhere. I was just listening
to the program and just like, you've got to be
kidding me, This is really not happening, But apparently it's.
Speaker 3: I thought it was fake. I'm gonna be honest with you.
Speaker 2: I saw this come across my ex feed yesterday afternoon,
after I was after I was done filling in for
Pete yesterday and I saw it come through, and I
was like, this can't possibly be real. So I went
to the General Assembly's website, typed in the bill number,
and lo and behold, not only is it real, I
got to see the faces of the representatives, the four
Democrats that introduced this legislation, and it's just it's absurd.
This is not only should government not be involved in
this at all, but the fact that Democrats think this
is a good idea with everything going on right now
is just pretty shocking to me.
Speaker 7: Well again, yeah, like you have said, like there's nothing
else going on, this is our biggest come on, Like
you know what, the Democrats they just they are just
pulling a cover straws of plastic straws to that to
find anything, just to make our lives miserable. I'm sorry,
they really are, all.
Speaker 1: Right, if you're listening to this show, you know I
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Speaker 2: We are discussing a very very important piece of legislation
out of the North Carolina General Assembly House Bill four
to twenty three, the Skip the Stuff Act.
Speaker 3: This is a.
Speaker 2: Bill introduced by four Democrats in Raleigh yesterday that would
require restaurants to ask you for your consent to give
you plastic utensils and napkins as well as condiments when
you order takeout food. If they do not ask your
consent and they continue to give you knives and forks
and spoons without asking permission first, they are to be
reported to the state and then fined by the state
for including that silverware or plastic utensils within your takeout order.
US is hanging online five this afternoon. He has the
reason as to why this might be going on Chris
Good Afternoon, Welcome to the Peak Calendar show.
Speaker 3: Enlighten US.
Speaker 5: Hello Nick. Basically, there might be a second reason why
these leftist legislators are doing this, and that is because
there's a man in North Carolina who has developed a
biodegradable flatwear that's supposed to be as strong as plastic wear.
It was featured, he was featured on a show on
PBS called Thai n C Sci Space n C play
onwards there. But he's making these biodegradable this biodegradable flatwear,
and maybe they're which I think would be on ethical,
But maybe they're trying to help this guy out so
it can spread and he can grow his market. That
might be part of it. I'm just guessing, you know,
I do find.
Speaker 2: It interesting restaurants for friend of individuals that have not
worked in and around the restaurant industry. Outside of alcohol,
it is a relatively low margin business. I mean, if
you've watched shows like Kitchen nightmares and things the things
of that nature with Gordon Ramsey. Restaurants are not the
cash cow business that it might seem. Their expenses are
very high, with all of the food costs and their
employees and the salaries and rent everything associated with running
a restaurant. If these restaurants, which operate in the free market,
if they were losing boatloads of cash handing out utensils
plastic silverware to individuals, they would in fact stop doing it.
And we had a call in the previous segment indicating
that might already be happening. I don't know why the
state needs to be involved in this at all, Chris,
thanks for the call this afternoon, appreciated at seven oh
four or five seven oh eleven ten. I just don't
know why the state needs to be involved at all.
Dan's got a pressing question online four Dan, what do
you do when a restaurant does not give you any
of this silverware, maybe even if you requested it?
Speaker 3: What do we do?
Speaker 6: Then?
Speaker 8: Let me lay out the doomsday scenario for you, please,
And first I also pointed out that whoever these four
legislators are probably got beat up a lot in grade school,
in junior high But if I pull into my favorite
chicken spot and I ordered my three piece chicken dinner
with my filthy rice and my my creole pintos and
some cools law, and I drive away, get home, not
even get home, get back to work, and find that
they didn't include a spoon, a fork, even a spork. Somebody,
somebody's going to hear about it, and in fact, I'm
going to spend all my waking hours making sure that
those four legislators don't get re elected.
Speaker 3: It's just how absurd.
Speaker 2: I wasn't kidding what I mentioned that I saw this
yesterday and I had to double take what I was reading.
I thought maybe it was a parody account. You know,
there's all these fake accounts that pop up on social
media that try and mirror somebody who's like somebody that
you actually know. They make a fake profile, they copy
their picture and everything like that. That's what I thought
I was looking at until I saw the legislation.
Speaker 6: Your previous color pointed out that it might be unethical
if these four legislators were trying to pop up this
bio prop up this biodegreeable uh dining where Shazam say
it ain't so pah unethical, unethical in our legislature. I
can't believe.
Speaker 2: It's so no, it's it's completely unbelievable. But you know,
reading through it, I'm hard to grasp.
Speaker 3: It is very hard to grasp.
Speaker 8: Dan.
Speaker 2: Well, hopefully this situation doesn't unfold for you, and if you,
if it does, I'm glad that I'm not going to
be on the other end of those phone calls. Appreciate
the call this afternoon at seven oh four, five, seven
oh eleven ten.
Speaker 3: I didn't read through.
Speaker 2: I bared you not reading through all of the ware
as is that was brought up in this legislation. But
it's all about the climate stuff. I mean, it's all
talking about plastic. Whereas the United States uses more than
thirty six billion disposable plastic utensils annually, laid end to end,
this amount of plastic utensils could wrap around the globe
one hundred and thirty nine times. It's just all weird,
wacko leftist environmental stuff. I mean, these are the same
folks that brought the biodegradable straws or the paper straws
to restaurants near you. I was out last night for
Saint Patrick's day, and I got a paper straw halfway
through my dinner. Lo and behold what's happening. The straw
is melting into my drink. Now I believe Trump signed
an executive order outlawing or attempting to ban those paper straws,
as they have been an abysmal failure. And I'll say
it one more time then and then we'll move on.
This is not what government should be spending its time doing.
This was a pretty well crafted piece of legislation. It
goes through the entire thing from start to finish, what
the process needs to be, who it needs to be
reported to, what the level of penalties are. Somebody in
the General Assembly, likely a legislative assistant who's paid for
by the taxpayers, was charged with crafting this document and
spending time doing research as to how many times you
could wrap all of the plastic disposable utensils around the earth.
Somebody was paid by your taxpayer dollars to calculate that
if you used all of it took all of the
thirty six billion disposable plastic utensils that are used in
the United States annually that you could wrap that around
the globe one hundred and thirty nine times somebody spent
their time doing that. That a good use of good
use of your money, got a good use of your
resources here across the state.
Speaker 3: I don't think so.
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Speaker 2: We've got some breaking news coming down the wire this afternoon.
A a phone call took place earlier today, between around
nine and eleven o'clock this morning, between US President Donald
Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. We are getting some
details now of that call from the White House, and
this is exactly how it's being read from the White House.
It says President Donald Trump agreed in a call with
the Russian President Vladimir Putin that the war in Ukraine
quote needs to end with lasting peace. That's according to
a description of the conversation from the White House. The
two leaders also agreed to begin immediate talks on energy
and infrastructure ceasefire. The readout did not suggest that Putin
had agreed to a thirty day ceasefire that Trump had
endorsed and which had received backing from Ukraine. Now that's
what's officially being reported from the White House. Some other
anonymous sources speaking to other media outlets indicate that there
is a thirty day ceasefire in terms of any sort
of attacks or any sort of movement on Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
Sure that is being reported by a couple of news
outlets right now. Also according to Tass, that's an international
news service. Putin apparently told Trump that a complete that
complete removal of military aid to Kiev is a key
condition in resolving the conflict in Ukraine. And Putin has
quote agreed to an initial quote energy and infrastructure ceasefire
to be followed by technical negotiations for a full ceasefire
and permanent peace with Ukraine. So the phone call, I
guess went somewhat well. That took place earlier this morning.
It was reported to be reportedly taking place between nine
and eleven o'clock this this morning. And now we are
starting to get some of the details of that phone call,
some of the back and forth between the Russian president
and Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: And I was thinking about I was thinking about.
Speaker 2: This, this phone call, and how all of this is
going to play out, and I just had to remind
myself and go back to when this all began.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 2: Of course, you had President Joe Biden at the time
mentioning that you know, depending on how big the incursion is,
if it's just a minor incursion into Ukraine, then maybe
the United States won't get involved, essentially green lighting Vladimir
Putin and the Russian government and military to begin their
war on Ukraine what three plus years ago at this point,
And I found it shocking and quite remarkable that throughout
the entire conflict, the previous administration in Joe Biden never
opened the line of communication, never opened the line of
dialogue with the Russian president. How could you not have
any sort of communication with Russia during this Now the
United States is on the tune for hundreds of billions
of dollars in what is being described as essentially a
never ending stell made of a war right now where
neither side is making any serious progress a stallmate now
for well over twelve months they have besides move here
and there a little bit, but the battle lines have
essentially stayed the same for well over a year. And
the previous guy couldn't even be bothered to talk to
the Russian president. You know this idea of peace through strength,
leadership through strength, This is the example of it right here.
Just back a couple of weeks ago, you had Zelensky
come to the United States and make a complete and
total fool out of himself. Fortunately he was able to
correct the record there with Trump and get everything squared
back together, and they have agreed, at least the Ukrainian
side has agreed to this thirty day ceasefire deal to
begin the process of full negotiations to ending this war
completely and totally. But that's what strong leadership looks like.
This is what strength appears publicly. As Trump had a
call with Putin, he is apparently agreed to an initial
energy and infrastructure ceasefire for at least thirty days. There
will be technical negotiations that take place in the near
term future, and that's where things apparently are standing right now.
I'm sure throughout the rest of the afternoon you'll get
more details, and of course you could stay tuned to
those here on WBT. I just I can't imagine how
the previous guy thought, and nobody within his ear, nobody
that was pulling the marionette strings up in Washington, d C.
How none of them thought it was a good idea
to open the line of communication with the Russian president.
And really the irony of all of this, after Vladimir Zelenski,
the Ukrainian president, was laughed out of the United States.
Was that about three weeks ago? After that happened, he
then did his tour around Europe with all of these
European leaders talking about how strongly they're going to stand
with Ukraine and how they're going to make sure that
this war comes to an end. Where have these guys
been for almost four years now? Where have all these
European countries been. None of them could have picked up
the phone and began these conversations with Putin. Nobody could
have picked up the phone and started this discussion of
a ceasefire, started this discussion of the mineral rights deal
that has been discussed here in the United States.
Speaker 3: No other leader was capable of this but Trump.
Speaker 2: It's pretty remarkable when you compare and contrast the previous
administration to the one that's been in office less than
two months. It's a stark contrast from the past, and
fortunately it looks like it's going to end up leading
to a full cease fire and a full truce entreaty
between these two countries, another hopefully huge potential win for
President Donald Trump.
Speaker 1: All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you
so much for listening. I could not do the show
without your support and the support of the businesses that
advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support
them too and tell them you heard it here. You
can also become a patron at my Patreon page or
go to Vpetecalnar show dot com. Again, thank you so
much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.