> With an eye toward AGW, how can paper packaging and burning refuse be seen as a responsible choice?

Plastic takes oil and therefore carbon out of the depths of the Earth, until it eventually gets burnt, biodegrades or otherwise degrades and turns into CO2 contributing to global warming.

Trees instead take CO2 from the atmosphere, turn it into solid cellulose that we make paper from, until the paper biodegrades or gets burnt and returns to the atmosphere from which it came in the first place. If a new tree is planted for each tree that gets cut for paper, as is done in most developed countries, paper can be carbon neutral (it all depends on the source of the energy used for processing it).