Free Republic

Saudi Arabia to lift ban on women drivers By Damien McElroy in Riyadh Last Updated: 9:18pm GMT 20/01/2008 Saudi Arabia is to lift its ban on women drivers in an attempt to stem a rising suffragette-style movement in the deeply conservative state. Government officials have confirmed the landmark decision and plan to issue a decree by the end of the year. The move is designed to forestall campaigns for greater freedom by women, which have recently included protesters driving cars through the Islamic state in defiance of a threat of detention and loss of livelihoods. The royal family has previously...

Way back in January, I announced a program to write Linux drivers for companies for free. When I did that, I never expected the response to be as large as it was. It turns out that there were two large groups of people who responded to the announcement, companies wanting drivers, and developers wanting to help out. I never imagined that so many different people would offer to help out. There is a real need for a place where developers can find a "real" project to work on in the Linux kernel. The Kernel Janitors project is a great place...

AMD briefed Linux.com this morning on a pending announcement regarding the open sourcing of drivers for ATI graphics cards. It's official -- AMD will make code and specifications for ATI graphics cards available on the Internet on September 10. We spoke with Phil Hester, senior vice president and CTO at AMD, and Chris Schlaeger, director of AMD's Operating System Research Center, along with Jon Carvill, AMD's manager of public relations. They confirmed the rumors reported earlier on Slashdot, that everything necessary for community-driven and -maintained 2-D and 3-D drivers for ATI Radeon X1000 and HD 2000 graphics will be made...

SYDNEY - After failing to scare young men into driving more slowly, Australian authorities have hit on a new tactic: questioning their virility. A witty advertising campaign features passengers and passersby waving their pinkie fingers -- a gesture suggesting a certain lack of physical endowment -- at show-off male drivers. "The message is: If you're trying to impress people, this doesn't impress anyone. People see you as a clown," said John Whelan, business director for road safety and policy at the New South Wales Roads and Traffic Authority.

State Sen. Carole Migden caused a panic among fellow drivers last May when she drove out of control in her state-issued SUV for 30 miles on Interstate 80, according to 911 tapes released late Friday. A series of callers between Berkeley and Fairfield, where Migden's wild ride finally ended after she rear-ended another car, described her as coming perilously close to hitting other vehicles, weaving back and forth across multiple lanes of traffic, and careening repeatedly off the center median barrier. One caller described motorists putting on their vehicles' hazard lights in an apparent attempt to warn others away from...

WASHINGTON, July 16, 2007 – Jeep is partnering with the New York Mets major league baseball team, a New York television station and New York auto dealers associations to help put both a U.S. servicemember and a support-letter writer each behind the wheel of a new vehicle. During a Military Appreciation Day pre-game ceremony at Shea Stadium in Queens, N.Y., yesterday, a Tri-State Jeep Dealers Association representative presented Operation Gratitude with symbolic keys to a 2007 Jeep Patriot Limited. The “keys” went directly into the troop-support group’s 250,000th care package. And the Jeep, donated by the carmaker in celebration...

Failure Rates Double in 3rd Annual GMAC Insurance National Drivers Test ST. LOUIS, May 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Results from the 2007 GMAC Insurance National Drivers Test indicate that one in six drivers on the road -- roughly 36 million licensed Americans -- would not pass their written DMV exam if taken today. The third annual survey by GMAC Insurance gauges driver knowledge of the rules of the road by testing licensed Americans on actual questions from state DMV license exams. According to this year's results, New York drivers ousted Rhode Island by ranking last in all 50 states and the...

The Clueless-like the demons of yore-are legion, and afflict us in myriad ways !

The driver of a tractor-trailer that lost its brakes and killed nine people has been charged with homicide after testing positive for drugs, authorities said Wednesday. Ruben Rodriguez, 44, had traces of marijuana and methamphetamine in his blood Sunday when he lost control of a rig towing two trailers loaded with 66 tons of steel tubes on a major avenue of the Monterrey suburb of Santa Catarina, Alejandro Garza, director of state investigations, said in a news release. Rodriguez faces up to nine years in prison. The rig crashed into pedestrians, cars, dozens of buildings, utility poles and traffic lights...

No is winning 3-1

There were 35 busloads from Chicago on Thursday to the State Capitol in Springfield pushing for licenses for people without social security numbers, about 2,000-2,500 protesters. No immigration police though.

D.C. Councilman Jim Graham has introduced a bill that end a D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles requirement for periodic drivers' tests for older motorists. Graham says he's gotten a lot of complaints about the written and road tests now required of drivers after age 75. The special tests are required every five years when older drivers try to renew their licenses. Graham says he's not sure the tests serve a useful purpose. Some elderly drivers have complained about needing to memorize driving rules from DMV manuals in the weeks before they show up for retesting. The District also requires drivers...

SANTA FE New Mexico is taking its fight against drunken driving to men's restrooms around the state. The state has ordered 500 talking urinal cakes that will deliver a recorded anti-D-W-I message to bar and restaurant patrons who make one last pit stop before getting behind the wheel. The top of the devices feature the state D-W-I slogan -- "You drink, you drive, you lose." Some Albuquerque bars installed the devices this week. And the state Transportation Department plans to distribute them to Santa Fe bars and restaurants as well as establishments in Farmington, Gallup and Las Cruces. The state...

Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles employees are routinely and unlawfully denying driver's licenses to immigrants who are here legally, according to a class-action law suit filed yesterday. According to the suit, Registry workers asked the immigrants for proof of legal residency when they were not authorized to do so. The workers then denied licenses to the applicants, incorrectly concluding that the immigrants had not demonstrated they were in the United States legally, the suit alleges. In all cases, the immigrants' lawyers said, the Registry workers were overstepping their legal authority and violating the immigrants' constitutional rights. "They don't have the...

SACRAMENTO — Since Oct. 1, the Department of Motor Vehicles has notified more than 180,000 car owners in California that it is moving to suspend their auto registration for not having insurance. Hundreds of thousands more suspension warnings are expected to go out in the months ahead as the state's latest effort to crack down on uninsured motorists moves into high gear. The suspension notices follow the department's first effort to systematically compare a computerized list of registered car owners with continually updated data sent by insurance companies every time a driver buys, renews or cancels a policy.

4x4 drivers face £300 bill to park outside home By Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor Last Updated: 1:38am BST 26/10/2006 Millions of drivers of sports cars and 4x4s face hefty charges to park outside their own homes under a scheme being pioneered by a local council. Town hall chiefs across the country were said last night to be closely watching a move by Liberal Democrats in Richmond upon Thames, south-west London, to target the owners of so-called "gas-guzzlers". Owners of these 4x4s parked in Richmond could face hefty charges The borough wants to introduce a sliding scale of charges for...

Thank you for sending me your email opposing SB 1162, which, among other things, included a provision to give driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants. Hearing from my fellow Californians is very important to me as I work to improve our great state. After extensive consideration and thorough deliberation from proponents and opponents of this issue, I have decided to veto this bill. To see my veto message for this bill, please visit the Official California Legislative Information website at: www.leginfo.ca.gov. Thank you again for writing to me. Your active participation in the democratic process will help ensure a brighter future...

May 20, 2000 marks the 7th anniversary of President Clinton's signing the National Voter Registration Act, popularly known as Motor Voter. The right to vote means nothing if people are not registered. Motor Voter works by reducing necessary and burdensome bureaucratic obstacles to voter registration. The law requires states to provide uniform registration services through drivers' license agencies, through public assistance and disability agencies and through mail-in registration. In 1995, the first full year of implementation, more than 11 million citizens registered to vote or updated their voting addresses under the law. This figure represents the largest single increase...

I just got a little pop-up on my system that lets me know when a driver is outdated. Have any of you received this and have you downloaded it: updates.visualnetworks.com - / -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Monday, September 12, 2005 12:06 PM 1197959 ipvnminstaller.exe

Kill `em with kindness BY DAVE BARRY (This classic Dave Barry column was originally published on June 9, 1996.) I got to thinking about courtesy the other day when a woman hit me with her car. I want to stress that this was totally my fault. I was crossing a street in Miami, in a pedestrian crosswalk, and I saw the woman's car approaching, and like a total idiot I assumed she would stop. The reason I assumed this -- you are going to laugh and laugh -- is that there was a stop sign facing her, saying (this is...