wait wait wait.. Mr. Infoworld, but.. uh.. if:

then why did you write your article and spam it on /.? If not for income then it must just be an ego thing, right?

There is one company that does most of the Li Ion recycling in North America: toxco. A few years ago I looked them up, they used to have some interesting white papers posted on their website about the difficulties of the process - one such being that the batteries tend to catch fire at inconvenient moments. I can't find the white papers on their site anymore.

At current market prices for cobalt, lithium and other such raw materials (used to produce batteries) the recycling process is not profitable. There is currently only the one company because they get grants from the DOE. In 2 minutes of clicking buttons the latest I can find was for 9.5million in Aug 2009. Until cobalt production cannot keep up with battery production this won't be necessary / economical. That said it could reasonably be supported through some core fee associated with buying huge Li batteries.. (but that may be a 'tax', and if not distributed across all citizens instead of just those buying electric cars, may actually further stifle the market for such vehicles).

As far as the Lithium cells being "non-toxic", I've heard this before as well. That's pretty interesting. So how about we all dump the contents of our expired batteries in your back yard? It's non-toxic, I swear. Or maybe just in some wetland someplace... Sure it's not as evil as lead, but in the volume our society consumes things even seemingly 'harmless' byproducts can accumulate to cause unforeseeable issues.

Battery life is dependent on an array of factors, saying all batteries will last 5-6 years is pretty optimistic at this point. That guy who lives in Minnesota? His won't last 2 years unless he can keep them cozy.

And, I know it's amazing, but coal plants don't run cleaner than 5,000 little ICEs running all over the place. I used to have all the statistics on this crap because I used to work for a garage that did work like this, and people would ask these questions. Actually, with the increase in efficiency of you electric vehicle (we'll accept that ICE's only effectively convert less than 30% of chemical energy to kinetic) you come out ahead on your carbon footprint by only a smidgen - not the whopping 50-70% you'd expect. (Thus the stigma surrounding coal, and the farcical concept of 'clean coal')

If you want me to waste the time to dig up the numbers / sources for you I'm not going to do that, but.. you can do i yourself too if you're really that interested. I figure this little heads up is enough on my part.

Maybe you'll start thinking for yourself before you "shoot off at the mouth"; more care should be considered before reciting what some mouthpiece has so happily inundated you with.

This is a moot point, we all understand the consequences of reacting poorly in any tense situation. The key is not to react, but to anticipate. A child wants to understand, but often cannot. When you add the inability to comprehend a situation to the pressures of social rigidity and indignant parents: any youth will become uncomfortable. In A 3 year old this most often exhibits itself in hysteria. Anticipating this situation by justifying to the child somehow that their bear will be taken away (maybe for a checkup or some such innocuous thing) then explaining diligently the process of removing one's shoes and waddling through the metal detector - would likely alleviate most a reasonable amount of pressure on the child. If the process is handled competently, the likelihood that the child will be padded down is close to 0.

Not viral. In fact the video is struggling with copy-write issues - which would make it seem that someone was out to make a buck, not shame the TSA.

additionally, evoking stereotypes is clear evidence of rational thought.

Which comes full circle to my argument that this is indeed theater, and meant exclusively to act upon passions. By rifling through your heart so simply they've drawn in your wallet without even suggesting an alternative solution.

Seriously this is all theater - entertainment. Look at how immediately passionate everyone here becomes upon the outrage of the molestation of the poor little 3 year old girl. The fact is, she was upset - didn't understand what was going on or why, which ultimately resulted in her being subject to even more disturbing manipulations. Meanwhile her loving father - seeing a opportunity to boost his ratings / ego, stood back to watch them manhandle his daughter while he taped the whole thing for posterity.

Should a child have to be padded down? No.
Are planes going to be safer because of the TSA? No. (see brilliant comment below on how if we made the TSA disappear it would only make terrorists look more morally outrageous / unacceptable)

But what the real outrage should be:

• no one involved in that situation (other than perhaps the mother) was properly encouraging or trying to satiate the hysteria of a little girl - whom through the perusing of the following comments it's obvious we're all most concerned about.
• that her own father would exploit her situation.
• And ultimately that we should all follow so easily after the father - using the situation in a weak attempt to perpetuate our own passions / hysteria. By creating such energy around such nonsense we create value with all the wrong pressures, and a father neglects his child so he can scrape together a 'scoop'.

Off topic and ranting but..

I recently moved to Oregon from another state. If you were here, and asked why someone has to pump your gas - you will be told immediately not that 'gasoline is dangerous', but that the legislation 'creates jobs'. I often pull into an empty gas station and need to wait up to 10 minutes just for someone to swipe my credit card in the machine for me, press the button that corresponds to the grade of fuel I prefer, lift the nozzle from the machine and place it in my tank hole. They then wander off to service the next person. The pump will run more slowly if the station is busy as the attendant ineffectively tries to manage his workload by making the time to fill longer. Often when the pump does stop, you will have to remain seated for another 2 minutes before they remember to return and replace the nozzle in the pump. I drive an older car - and have actually had professional gas attendants forget to replace my gas cap before I drive off. Also, the argument could be made that this is actually more dangerous because the pump is not constantly observed / managed / stood near by the individual who is also concerned for the car. It's a wonderful example of how government can create jobs by injecting inefficiency into a market - ultimately wasting time and money that I would posit could more effectively be utilized in a free-er market.

In summary - it's just as ridiculous as it sounds.