Posted on 01/29/2010 11:45:24 AM PST by BobMcCartyWrites
Only three days after Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced the new rules that prohibit drivers of trucks and buses from using cell phones and texting while behind the wheel, officials at the Highway Loss Data Institute released study findings that show no reductions in crashes after hand-held phone bans take effect.
It shouldn’t be. But somebody decided the problem was the hand off the wheel not the brain off the task.
Driving comes with rules. I know there are those (not you) who seem to think that any rule is an unconstitutional infringement of their rights, but most of us know there are things that you just shouldn’t be allowed to do and drive, like drinking and texting. The phrase Nannystate is even losing it’s sting when people use it over every thing.
What I’m saying is that any time someone texts while driving they are dramatically increasing the likelihood of creating an accident, kind of like drinking and driving. It’s a very simple concept, if you take your eyes, and a hand, and your brain, off the task at hand you are presenting a threat.
I’m sorry.
Oh common, it’s just the latest trendy legislative toy. Yay... Stupid vapid voters just want to be assured that officials are “doing something”. So hurray, they are doing something. Once again Washington is going to ride in the passenger seat and coach driving safety. It’s for the children, it’s trendy, and gosh darn it people like it!
“Outlaw phones capable of texting”.
A strong, statist point of view. Thank God the government is empowered by people like you to protect them from their own stupidity... Sarcasm toggle ON
So when they come for your guns, or your coffee, or fat filled donuts, or your Bible, you’ve already set the precedent that the government can intervene. So what will your defense be then?
So what other distractions do you think should be eliminated? Radios? GPS? Billboards?
It’s a very simple concept, if you take your eyes, and a hand, and your brain, off the task at hand you are presenting a threat.
And another concept is that not everyone is the same. Some people can handle distractions better than others. The zero-tolerance policy of banning something because some people can't do it well is just another intrusion of the government into places that it has no business and can't really control anyway.
How about this? How about if a person is in a wreck and damages someone else's property that their penalty is triple that of a normal accident if it can be proved that they were texting. And if someone is injured or killed that the sentence be tripled.
That punishes the person that actually did something wrong rather than attempting to punish every single person whether anyone was harmed or not.
It’s about the numbers. The fact is we’re seeing more accidents, and more of the accidents involve people screwing around with a cellphone and it was time to do something about it. These people are presenting a clear and present danger. Kind of like when we decided to make the drunk driving laws useful, it had been too big a problem for too long killing too many people that weren’t drinking and it was time to do something.
Yes not everybody is the same. But laws can’t take that into account. We can’t put everybody through a battery of psychological tests and figure out how fast, drunk and distracted the person can drive before they become a problem. This isn’t the NBA, we get one set of law books.
Because of how driving laws get enforced the system really is close to what you outlined. The fact is if you aren’t at least weaving around cops aren’t going to be able to tell you’re texting, if you can talk on your cell and maintain control you’ll never get busted under these laws. It’s the people who draw attention to themselves who get caught by all the driving laws.
For that matter, passengers in the car conversing with the driver would raise the same concerns.
I'm glad you brought this up. Mother's Against Drunk Driving originally started out as a group that was in favor of passing laws against drunk driving. They claimed that so many people were dying that somebody HAD TO DO SOMETHING.
And so we got DUI laws that specified that at a certain Blood Alcohol Content level that a person was drunk and then criminal penalties would entail.
But then something else started to happen. Once they got all of the states to have laws that banned drunk driving and specify a certain BAC they didn't quit. They started pushing for lower and lower BAC level to the point where they were asking to have people jailed for BAC levels that were so low that no impairment could exist.
They ceased being about public safety and became an anti-alcohol organization and due to being in the middle of the DUI battle for years, they had a lot of sway in the political process. In many states they got their lower BAC levels.
The fact is if you aren’t at least weaving around cops aren’t going to be able to tell you’re texting, if you can talk on your cell and maintain control you’ll never get busted under these laws.
And here is the point I was making. It's possible to text and drive or talk on a cell and drive and not hurt anyone. So the laws banning texting and talking on cell phones aren't about public safety, they are about control.
And I'll chime in with what another posted alluded to:
If talking on a device while driving is dangerous and needs to be banned, when do two-way radios get pulled from police cars?
weaving around falls under failure to control a vehicle - you don’t need the texting laws.
Failure to control is a hard one to push if you don’t actually run into something. But failure to control that leads to them pulling you over to find you texting and or drunk, that’s an easy one to win.
That’s the problem with political action groups, nobody ever declares victory and disbands. But that doesn’t change the fact that drunk driving was a serious problem in the 70s that cops just weren’t doing much of anything about. Most states had drunk driving laws that couldn’t even manage a slap on the wrist unless you actually killed somebody, there was no deterrent and less enforcement. There was a real nod and wink mentality towards it, on some levels it seemed like we thought it was cool. Part of the increased enforcement was changing that basic mentality, now even people that do drink and drive on some level know they shouldn’t, it’s no longer considered a proof of manhood to see how drunk you can get and still make it home alive.
No they’re about public safety. People who present a threat while doing these things will get in trouble, people who don’t won’t. Just like with drunk driving, if you can knock down a fifth of Jack and somehow keep it together to drive you won’t get busted for drunk driving, if you sip a rum and coke and can’t keep it between the lines you will get busted.
Cops get extra training in handling vehicles and their devices. And even they are encouraged to pull over and have the vehicle stopped before playing with their toys when possible. So sorry that example just plain don’t fly.
Nonsense. Almost every cop car on the road has a dash-mounted video camera.
We already have a law that states that you have to maintain control of your vehicle. If a cop sees you weaving around he flips on the camera and records it.
The judge sees the recording and you get a fine.
Even easier to win. You don't have to worry about pulling the guy over to find out that he doesn't have a phone in his hand. What do you do, search the car?
Ah, that old chestnut. Sorry, that's not going to fly anymore than the argument that since cops get special firearms training that ONLY THEY can safely handle firearms.
Anyone who has been at a shooting range with cops knows that that is garbage. I'm a much better shot than the vast majority of cops that come to the range.
So tell me this: If I get some special training in operating text and voice devices while driving do I get to be exempt too?
Ah, that old chestnut. Sorry, that's not going to fly anymore than the argument that since cops get special firearms training that ONLY THEY can safely handle firearms.
Anyone who has been at a shooting range with cops knows that that is garbage. I'm a much better shot than the vast majority of cops that come to the range.
So tell me this: If I get some special training in operating text and voice devices while driving do I get to be exempt too?
Sorry about the double post. I got a proxy error so I resubmitted.
I never said anything about cops being the only people able to handle it. Try to stick with what’s actually said.
How about admitting that just passing a law against something isn't going to solve the problem, is inherently invasive and probably will grow into something worse?
How about we just pass laws that require drivers education programs to provide your magical special training to all drivers before they can get a license?
Did you actually read the post you replied to? Way back in post #2 I said that.
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