Taxing Your Backyard Barbecue: Government Gone Too Far

Fear of global warming is causing governments to do things which on even casual examination seem silly and counterproductive. Recently the government of the French Wallonia region of Belgium voted to slap a tax on backyard barbecuing. From now on, any person who wants to grill a steak or some frankfurters over hot coals will have to fork over twenty Euros to the government for the right to do so starting in June, 2007.

Experts suggests that each session of backyard grilling produces between fifty and a hundred grams of CO2, a greenhouse gas. Apparently all of those folks in French Wallonia the seas to rise, the the temperatures to rise, the polar bears to die, and all of the other horrible things global warming is supposed to cause simply by grilling meat over hot coals.

Now the story descends into the surreal when it is noted how the local government intends to enforce this rule. Apparently the skies of French Wallonia are going to be filled with helicopters equipped with thermal imaging equipment to catch unauthorized barbecues. No word yet what the penalty will be for grilling without a license.

The inevitable question arises. How much CO2 will be produced by this fleet of helicopters (will they be black helicopters?) that will be filling the skies over French Wallonia catching unauthorized barbequers? One wonders if the government of French Wallonia has even pondered this question. One suspects it may be because the answer may be far more CO2 than a bunch of Belgium backyard grillers.

A silly and as counterproductive as this idea is, it will no doubt sooner or later be suggested on this side of the Atlantic. The same folks who are after our light bulbs will shortly be after our barbecue grills, either telling us that we have to pay a hefty tax for the privilege of using them or else banning or restricting them outright. This move will be hailed not only by environmentalist wackos, but also by PETA and other militant vegetarians. If producing CO2 is bad for children and other living things, so is eating smoked meat. After all, it causes cancer, strokes, and heat attacks.