Iain: Naturally, you are correct, it is very doubtful that anyone is going to die from that amount of mercury. But that the feds would force us to use something that they view as dangerous enough to justify such a cleanup is amusing all the same.

Then again, if Congress wasn’t busy dictating the flush volume in our toilets and the energy efficiency of our light bulbs, they might start doing something really harmful to the economy, like bailing out bad mortgages and investment bankers.

Oh, wait a minute…

UPDATE — From a reader:

The debate on the corner is cute, but you are missing a much larger issue: in many localities, depositing any item containing mercury in your general garbage can be charged as a felony. But localities don’t make it easy to appropriately dispose of items including mercury– which can include light bulbs, computer monitors, old televisions, etc. In Baltimore County, MD for example, you can’t just “drop off” stuff at the transfer stations: you have to wait until they hold an “electronics recycling day”. They hold those MAYBE twice a year.
So how long before we get garbage police checking our trash?

Oh, dear reader, didn’t you know they’re already doing just that?