Blood Alcohol Blues

Tech Central Station ^ | December 16, 2005 | Max Borders

[Ghengis]

Since anything above 0.0 BAC is becoming the "drunk driving" standard, soon it will be the standard for any level of "alcohol impairment" for citizens.

We are seeing "zero tolerance" for parents smoking with children present with recent proposed local legislation. How long before a parent can't have a BAC above 0.0 when with their children? In public?

When I see some of the arguments for "zero tolerance" in driving, it is apparent that we're creeping towards total prohibition again.

[okie01]

It's a huge rip-off.

Precisely. And the "private companies" that run the traffic schools are run by/owned by/affiliated with the enforcement lobbies (e.g., MADD, etc).

It's nothing less than a state-sanctioned racket.

[Rubber_Duckie_27]

My husband and I limit ourselves to one drink with dinner when we're out. It's just not worth the risk of an unjustified DUI.

I got caught in one of those on my way home at around 8 PM from a business dinner during which I had two drinks over 3 hours. I was not impaired in the slightest. Fortunately I had been chewing gum (no smell of alcohol), I was dressed professionally, and had a briefcase in the front passenger seat ~ When asked by the officer what I was doing, I told him I was on my way home from school where I'd just taken a midterm, and I'd had a long day at work. He bought it, thank heavens. I have no qualms about lying; they were out on a Wednesday night looking for fodder.

If I ever got pulled over, I'd refuse the roadside sobriety test - of the standard 4 things a cop can tell you to do, many people cannot do them properly while stone-cold sober. For example, if you're more than 20 lbs overweight you're virtually guaranteed to fail the one where you hold your foot out in front of you and stare at it. I have an eye muscle disorder and cannot pass the nystagmus (eye) test, and I imagine a power-hungry local cop won't give a damn about my muscle disorder! My husband has a good friend who's a cop and he says even he can't always pass the roadside tests; it just gives police an excuse to do breathalyzers. Then if someone "fails" part of the test plus has a BAC over 0 but under the legal limit, the police can haul them in for DUI. After all, they "failed" the roadside sobriety test, so clearly they were "impaired" since there was alcohol in their system.

Anyways, I'd volunteer straight for the BAC testing, and insist on blood being drawn. Breathalyzers are notoriously unreliable.

MADD is insane prohibitionists. The founder of MADD has left the group because of their focus on stopping ALL drinking, regardless of circumstance.

[A Jovial Cad]

When I see some of the arguments for "zero tolerance" in driving, it is apparent that we're creeping towards total prohibition again

Yep. And without even the constitutional decency of a revamped eighteenth amendment.

What's shocking to me is the vociferous applauding from a few "conservatives" in this thread to the effect that that's just A-Okay.

[pollyg107]

Does anyone know whether it is true that you can fail a blood-alcohol test if you have just eaten a sugar-free breath mint containing Splenda (sugar alcohol)? I have heard of it, but am skeptical.

[Cletus.D.Yokel]

Like I said, a good lawyer.

Refusing to incriminate yourself is not considered a defacto admission in any court I know of.

[smug]

The dirty little secret is that we all did **better** at .1 BAC.

A similar test was done years ago with local T.V. and radio personalities showing similar results. Differences occurred with drivers who admitted they drank alcohol infrequently. Their abilities diminished after 4 drinks. Others who admitted drinking on a regular basis had their course scores increase slightly after the same number of drinks. However the greatest difference occurred in the editing room. When the show was broadcast on the news, only film of drivers taking out cones was shown. That only happened to a few drivers (seldom drinkers) after 6 mixed drinks. The test was very unscientific and admittedly only anecdotal. But it serves to point out why I have personal reservations against the BAC laws. That and fifty years of observation of drivers whom should have their driving privileges revoked because their reaction time sober is criminal, yet they are only ticketed and released to continue driving to the peril of the public and themselves.

[dsc]

"That only happened to a few drivers (seldom drinkers) after 6 mixed drinks."

There it is.

I think they should revamp the licensing test.

They should lay out a killer gymkhana course, and drivers should be required to get around it in a certain maximum time, in an unfamiliar, four-speed manual transmission vehicle, at a BAC of .1, while simultaneously carrying on an annoying conversation with a woman on a cell phone, drinking a coke, eating a hamburger, and smoking a cigarette or cigar.

Drop anything, fail to finish the coke or hamburger, lose track of the conversation, or knock over a pylon, and you're out.

If you succeed, you get a sticker for your car that says, "Police: Leave me alone; I can farging drive."

[smug]

I live off a frontage road that parallels I -65. Many drivers think that the entrance to the frontage road is the entrance to I-65, an honest mistake. The problem starts when they realize that they are not merging on to the highway. 10's of drivers a day at this point decide to make a u-turn right there on a blind turn. Drivers coming the other direction on the frontage road cannot see them because of brush and tree's on the inside of this turn. This would be a perfect place to begin ridding society of criminally stupid drivers. It is my opinion that anyone who turns around on a blind turn is to stupid to drive.

[Final Authority]

When I was a kid we all had BB guns. I remember a time when four or five of us made simple slingshots out of rubber bands and bent hangers. We bent hundreds of finish nails so we could hook them onto the rubber band. We made simple forts about a hundred feet apart and had a war. No safety goggles or anything. We invented paint ball wars, I guess.

I can remember throwing knives and playing tackle football with absolutely no pads. If a kid came to play with a helmet, using his face mask to tackle him was in our rule book. It was mandatory. We played ice hockey where the goalie had no face mask and street hockey on the frozen, ice covered streets with real pucks and took serious slapshots.

Over the years, I can remember only one serious broken arm, that was from being tackled by the arm in one of our football games. One kid was hit by a car and bounced off receiving a pass in the end zone. A few facial cuts playing hockey and a couple of teeth knocked out for good measure.

Over the years, more serious accidents happened to my childhood friends when older, like death behind the wheel coming home after working a late shift at the factory, or in one case, plain speeding, or in another, skidding on the ice covered highway trying to make it home for Christmas.

Kids play, although it looks dangerous is child's play when compared to what we take for granted every day, driving.

[dsc]

" It is my opinion that anyone who turns around on a blind turn is to stupid to drive."

That's two of us.

It's a grassroots movement!

[goldfinger1]

DUCKIE, In a lot of states you do not have a choice between a blood test and a breath test. That choice was many years ago and in most states is GONE. you are asked to submit to a breath test to determine BAC, and you can refuse......but if you refuse you can be found guilty of DUI/DWI without "this" evidence. The cops testimony is evidence and the judge is on his side. eg. he was weaving, his speech was slurred, he couldn't stand up, he smelled of alcohol, he ran over some wittle children and did not stop etc. I know this as a fact as I received a DUI in VA. I thought I knew it all and refused to give the cop the "evidence" thinking without it he could not prove i was drinking, impaired or drunk.....WRONG!!! His testimony was all the evidence the judge needed to convict me of not DUI, but DWI and a refusal. If i would have submitted to a breath test I would have been convicted of DUI, which is less serious than a DWI. Would have only lost my license for 6 months with a restricted license to get to work and back..........but guess what........I lost my license for 1 year for the DWI and an ADDITIONAL 1 year for the refusal,NO RESTRICTED LICENSE plus 90 days in the pokey with 88 days suspended while on probation. also, instead of the typical $250 fine , i was fined $900 plus court cost, ordered to enter vasap which is an alcohol awareness program $400, they sent me to additional group counseling, like they do with 50% of their "clients" for 26 weeks @ $30 a session plus 26 aa meetings . But there is some good news. After appealing my case and paying my lawyer another $900, the refusal was dismissed,license suspended for only 1 year this time , but did receive a restricted license for work, vasap , counseling and aa. more bad news....my insurance for 4 autos, wife, daughter, and 18 year old son went from $2000/yr to almost $6000/yr for the next 3 yrs w much less coverage..........sooooo refusing a breath test is definitely not a good idea......... Blood test is more reliable if your state allows it and also, your BAC is going to be higher going the blood test route than the breath test. After being educated as to how dangerous this "socially acceptable" gateway drug is I have learned my lesson well, and thankfully before i injured or killed some innocent victim..................in all 50 states it is illegal to operate a motor veichle after consuming alcohol period.

[Ditto]

Anyone who drives a motor vehicle while impaired by alcohol is risking "dire consequences" that have nothing to do with the DUI laws. Alcohol increases the chances of getting into an accident. The consequences can be serious injury or death.

There are any number of things that "increase" the chances of an accident. Cell phones increase the chances. Car radios increase the chances. Having a passenger increases the chances. Any speed above 25 mph increases the chances far more than all the above even combined with copious amounts of alcohol.

What level of safety do you demand? We could virtually eliminate traffic fatalities if we mandated that no vehicle be sold that could travel faster than 20 MPH. That would save tens of thousands of lives each year while the facts show that busting people for .08 has saved zero lives.

[TChris]

I can tell you from personal experience that detecting an impaired driver with even 0.1% BAC is rather tricky. Lowering it much below 0.1% is politics, not law enforcement or safety, IMO.

[jude24]

It's still far easier to refuse the BAT and take your chances in court...with a good lawyer.

Bad idea. You will lose your license - refusal to take the blood alcohol test will result in a civil hearing where you'd better have a damn good reason for refusing. A good lawyer won't be enough.

[jude24]

What the DUI laws are "working" to do is to deprive us of another freedom.

I don't give a damn about your "freedom" to drive drunk. Your rights to freedom end when you place the lives of other innocent drivers in peril.

[jude24]

Refusing to incriminate yourself is not considered a defacto admission in any court I know of.

Incrimination applies only to testimony; blood alchohol content or breathalyzer results are evidence, not testimony. They may be compelled.

[dsc]

Well, a couple of months have gone by, but I guess we can resurrect this thread...

"I don't give a damn about your "freedom" to drive drunk. Your rights to freedom end when you place the lives of other innocent drivers in peril."

If I thought it would do any good, I would lobby for laws against people missing the point of arguments.

It's not a question of driving drunk. It's a question of lowering the BAC for DUI way, way, WAY below the point at which people are actually impaired.

You want laws to criminalize driving while impaired by alcohol? Okay, let's talk about .15, .2, some level at which people are actually impaired.

A person should be able to have a beer or three on the way home from work without risking jail just because the spirit of Carrie Nation lives on.

[joebuck]

"It's still far easier to refuse the BAT and take your chances in court...with a good lawyer."

Many jurisdictions have made it a crime to refuse with penalties identical to those of a DUI, so that tactic doesn't work, in those jurisdictions at least. Whether it is best everywhere else is questionable, sometimes it's the way to go and others it's not but the typical non-lawyer pulled over for DUI has no way of knowing which is best in his situation.

[jude24]

Well, a couple of months have gone by, but I guess we can resurrect this thread...

Didn't notice how old it was. Oops. But I didn't resurrect it.

You want laws to criminalize driving while impaired by alcohol? Okay, let's talk about .15, .2, some level at which people are actually impaired.

There is no such thing as a discrete number where most people are impaired. I'd be impaired at a relatively low BAC - perhaps even .08. The law arbitrarily picks a number because then it is objective, and preferable than to the common-law definition of impairment that relied upon the officer's subjective judgment.

A person should be able to have a beer or three on the way home from work without risking jail just because the spirit of Carrie Nation lives on.

Most people can have one drink an hour and not be at .08 BAC.