Picayune Sentinel Extra: Restaurants are strapping on the fee bag

& Will Lightfoot play the "short" card, too?

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The menu at Romano’s Macaroni Grill notes that “a temporary $2 fee will be added to offset macroeconomic pressures.”

I get it. The chain’s costs are surging, just like they are for businesses everywhere. It needs the extra revenue to retain staff, pay suppliers, maintain quality and so on.

In “Restaurants layer on new fees to counter inflation, “ Kelly Tyko of Axios reports:

Businesses are getting creative with new fees and charges from the "fuel surcharge" to deal with high gas prices, a "noncash adjustment" for using credit instead of cash, "kitchen appreciation fees" or simply a "temporary fee."

The number of restaurants adding service fees increased by 36.4% from April 2021 to April 2022. … Mastercard and Visa raised transaction fees for many merchants in April. … (And ) ridesharing and on-demand delivery apps added fuel surcharges in March to "help drivers" combat high gas prices. …

Ted Rossman, a senior industry analyst, CreditCards.com, told Inc.com that consumers want to be presented with one price: "They don't want to be nickel and dimed for everything from the air conditioning to the cleaning supplies to their employees' health insurance," Rossman said.

“Nickel and dimed” is, of course, a vast understatement of the size of many of these add ons. The explosion of fees — baggage fees, resort fees, destination fees, facility fees, cleaning fees, processing fees, hospitality fees, booking fees — is at once understandable and unconscionable.

To my mind, menus should reflect actual prices (QR code menus could be the reference that would obviate the need for constant updates of printed menus) and all prices should reflect what you’re actually going to pay (excluding conventional sales taxes, I suppose).

Gas stations do this — if their signs advertised before-tax prices, it would knock nearly a buck off the apparent price of every gallon in Chicago (technically the taxes are paid by the station and not the consumer).

Related: Numerous sources tell me that that the “cashless” mandate at local ballparks — ostensibly instituted to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus which, we now know, doesn’t spread at all easily on money — has become scammy: That the cash price from vendors was, say $7 because the price of the dog itself t was set at a lower price, say $6.32 so that the $7 included the tax. Now, I’m told, the credit card transaction is $7 for the dog and an additional 75 cents or so for the tax.

How many embryos have the moral weight of one baby?

In one of the many discussions about abortion I’ve listened to and read lately, I came across this hypothetical dilemma:

You are working in a medical facility late at night by yourself and a fire breaks out. You must choose, as you rush out, between saving either a tray of five frozen embryos or a one week-old baby in a bassinet. Which do you save?

I would choose to save the baby over the five embryos. In fact I can’t think of a number of multi-cellular human embryos that, to me, would be more worth saving than one living baby. It wouldn’t even feel like much of a dilemma. And I suspect even most opponents of abortion rights would instinctively offer the same answer.

My reasoning: I see a continuum of rights and prerogatives from conception through birth. I don’t think an embryo has the same right to life as a newborn, though I do think it acquires those right by degrees as the months go on.

If you disagree — if you think full human rights attach at the moment of conception — then I’d like to read your answer to the hypothetical in the comment thread.

(I’ll stipulate that the scenario is farfetched (as are many morally interesting thought experiments, such as the famous “Trolly Problem.”)

Here’s another one for staunch foes of abortion rights that’s less farfetched: A 12-year-old girl who is close to you — daughter, granddaughter, niece, etc. — is raped and impregnated by a home invader. Should the law forbid her from obtaining an abortion? Would you even try to talk her into keeping the baby?

Notes and comments from readers —lightly edited —- along with my responses

Some of these messages are in reference to items in last Thursday’s Picayune Sentinel.

Steve R. — Here’s an example of something journalists write and say that always makes me wonder: “Some 83% of respondents described the state of the economy as poor or not so good.” What’s with the “some”?

I use that sort of wording in writing about poll results in order to avoid the implication that the reported result — say “82.7%” — is reliably precise. Given margins of error I would likely write “some 80%” in such a case.

Reporting vote totals to the tenth of a percentage point is unnecessary except in really close races. I’d write “Lori Lightfoot won 74% of the vote in the 2019 mayoral runoff” rather than “… won 73.7%” because it reads better rounded up.. “Nearly three quarters” works too..

Carol D. — I eagerly took up your invitation: "The video “Liberace and the Young Folk perform 'Feelin' Groovy'“ is simply mind-blowing. I wish it were on YouTube so I could embed it here. But do click. You won’t be sorry." Ouch!! I should have paid more attention to your subsequent warning that I might also be very, very sorry. In retaliation, I offer you this: 

Thank you, I think. This clip is particularly rich because Lawrence Welk refers to it afterwards as “a modern spiritual.”

Marc M — Given Mayor Lori Lightfoot's announced primary competition, she has to use all of her “cards” — race, gender and sexual orientation. I was actually surprised that she hasn't also used her height.

Don’t give her any ideas! But speaking of gender, Monday’s entry into the race of community activist Ja’Mal Green means there are now seven men and zero women who have formally announced they are challenging Lightfoot.

On “The Mincing Rascals” you said that the media does not show images of airplanes flying into the twin towers of the World Trade Center on 9/11. Wrong. I’ve seen such images hundreds of times on lots of different media.

I don’t know what media you’re consuming, but conventional media has been very sparing in showing the moment of impact as this story explained. And you’ll almost never see a major outlet showing video of the towers collapsing.

Any use of the pictures by NBC News has to be prefaced by a warning that gives time for people to turn away, said Steve Capus, NBC News president. … The ban continues at ABC News. Paul Slavin, the division's senior vice president, said he suspects that will remain so until some producer makes a compelling case in a specific instance.

True, that was 15 years ago, but I haven’t seen any relaxation of those standards. Note how this official video of the 9/11 museum doesn’t show the moment the planes struck the towers:

And if I’m remembering correctly, there’s very little if any video imagery of that nature at the museum itself.

We show vivid, fake fatal violence all the time, but we turn away or hit pause at images or video of actual fatal violence.

Lesley W— In your item on the Aurora Pride Parade you wrote, “Meanwhile, in the adult world, San Francisco Pride Parade organizers who initially also wanted to ban uniformed police from their June 26 parade have reached a compromise that will allow a small group of uniformed officers to march.” I don't disagree with your general point, but I find it distasteful and insulting to imply that those we disagree with are children. I mentally turn off whenever I hear snide remarks about needing "the adults in the room" to fix things, especially since the "non-adults" are often those refusing to compromise basic rights and pushing for radical change. Maybe the LGBTQ+ activists in Aurora were unwise or weren't thinking strategically when they tried to ban uniformed officers, but they had a powerful reason that deserves to be heard. Demeaning them as "juveniles" makes light of their legitimate concerns.It is a mean spirited, low-down trick and unworthy of you

To me, “adults” is shorthand for “people who can negotiate with those with whom they have disagreements and come to workable compromises.” And “children” is shorthand for “people who can only see their side of an issue, demand their own way with petulant shortsightedness.” And that form of childishness does involve a failure to think and act strategically, no matter how noble the long-term goals.

The decision by the city of Aurora to pay officers triple time to provide security for Sunday’s parade — thus forestalling the looming cancellation — was mature (though if I were an Aurora taxpayer I’d be a little miffed about having to pay what amounted to extortion fees to the police).

Wendy C. — Perhaps I'm not following the relevant news feeds. but the only time I hear about Rittenhouse is when Zorn talks about him. He's tabloid material now, does anyone else take that much time to pay attention to his nonsense?

It speaks well of you that you’re seeing Rittenhouse news only at the Picayune Sentinel. It means you’re not watching much Fox News, where he’s a darling pet. I suspect the reason the right fawns over him is that they know how the very image of his doughy face enrages huge numbers of liberals who think he got away with murder.

I feel the need to keep reminding my friends on the left that, no, he didn’t get away with murder. He should be neither a hero nor a villain nor a martyr for defending himself when attacked, and if some of the identities were switched — if he were a Black teen chased after by a group of pro-police protesters bent on beating the shit out of him or worse — you’d see things a lot differently. You’d probably have celebrated his acquittal.

Ya gotta see these tweets!

I often run across tweets that are too visual in nature to include in the Tweet of the Week contest (the template for the poll does not allow the use of images). Here are a few good ones I’ve come across recently:

source of the above unknown.

Yeah, that really is John Lydon, formerly of the Sex Pistols.

There’s still time to vote in the conventional Tweet of the Week poll!

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