For the milky connoisseur cows come in bags, red pumps, and bad lawn furniture

I've heard of "cow in the bag" but never "bag in the cow."

Seems like officials in Gajarat, India are having a cow because plastic
bags, which litter the streets of India like rice at a funeral, have been
found in the stomachs of cows. I'm not referring to an occasional bag or
baguette that  finds a home in the udder rolls of the much maligned cow.
After a four-hour operation doctors found 4,000 plastic bags in the stomach
of one cow. Cows have a bunch of stomach but this is ridiculous.

Sadly, the problem does not stop with the bag burden. Over the last three
years cows have been known to swallow automobile tires, truck stops, and
what's washed up from the Ganges after a funeral gone wrong. Accordingly,
officials have launched a campaign against the use of plastic bags. Already
the effort is having an effect. Supermarkets no longer provide plastics
bags. Instead, shoppers must stuff a week's worth of groceries in tunics or
various body cavities for the commute home. This is particularly difficult
for the small-boned, especially during times of high celebration. Those of
low caste pay a very heavy price because they can no longer carry around
week old cheese in anything that faintly resembles sanitary conditions. 

These hardships are tolerable because of the high esteem in which the cow is
held in India. Aside from the aesthetic reasons to get rid of plastic bags
that coat a city in a cheesy serene glaze, there is a moral imperative. Cows
should not have to suffer the slings and arrows of consumer culture. As it
has done in so many areas, India is showing the way. The country should not
only get rid of plastic bags, it should ban anything made of plastic because
plastic, as science has shown,  is reincarnated and eventually will show up
as bad lawn furniture.

 Plastics cups, which cows have been known to consume by the short ton,
should be the first to go. India takes its mission very seriously indeed. It
has recently broken off diplomatic relations with China because, in the
words of a government functionary, "China produces more junk plastic
products than you can shake a stick at. We owe it to our cow culture to take
plastic off our menu." 

The United Kingdom could learn from the enlightened approach India is taking
towards the contaminated cow. Instead of murdering millions of innocent cows
because of the so-called mad cow disease, the British could have let these
poor beasts wander the countryside chewing on plastic bags and discarded
fish and chips. Better to have a stomach pumped than throat slit.  

Better still is to learn from developments in Chicago. This news is
heart-warming to all us cows lovers, in India and elsewhere. The poor cow in
the windy city has been carrying a fair bit of baggage too, beginning with
the blame for the horrific fire in 1871-cows were smoking in the barn.
Upton Sinclair immortalized the cow, in a bloody sense, in "The Jungle."
Thank goodness for the Chicago Bulls who, since Michael Jordan retired, have
been criticized as cows. But now the cow is strutting her stuff.

There are 300 hundred high-strutting fiberglass cows sitting pretty in the
middle of Michigan Avenue. Local residents love these beautiful beasts,
particularly the ones in high heels. Indeed, except for a few cases of
vandalism-unauthorized milking-this cow herd is largely revered. Exhibit
officials have forgiven locals for pulling off the occasional tail or teat
for  souvenirs.

On the other hands farmers from downstate are a littler taken back. They
leave the cows down on the farm and see bigger, better beasts on Michigan
Avenue. "The tax payer is being milked," said long-suffering Farmer Brown.
"Who's going to clean up after these animals."



 








With this exhibit American has managed to freeze history in fiberglass,
which is a cut above plastic. Perhaps the citizens of India can learn from
this example, though it's hard to imagine they would have an appetite for a
cow in smashing red pumps.

They should take some comfort, however, that when the show is over, these
cows will be auctioned off to happy homes. Probably to serve as coat racks.

Still, it's a better fate than landing in the Brooklyn Museum cut up in tiny
piece and floating in formaldehyde. The New York Mayor has every right
indeed to threaten demented liberal art lovers with a spanking.

In the meantime Indian officials have decided on an interim solution because
the border with China is so porous and that country has bigger bombs. Indian
official meditated, stared off into the distant Talamura mountains and
discovered the answer.

Goats!