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Posted on 11/29/2004 7:57:39 PM PST by Stoat
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About par for the revolving door drunk drivers we have here in New Mexico. There is a whole class of attorneys who do nothing but get charges dismissed or delayed so that judges have no choice but to dismiss them. The drivers are seen as victims rather than criminals.
I feel so sad for the families of their victims, and of the innocents who have been mutilated or killed on the highways. Such a senseless tragedy, and as you say much of it can be traced back to John Edwards' friends at the Trial Lawyers Association.
God forbid any girl named Mary Jo take a ride with this Euro Ted Kennedy!
Funny thing about this is, it doesn't seem like he's ever been in an accident, much less hurt anyone.
If there are legit and bona fide actuarial statistics that implicate a greater risk to insurers for those who chose to operate motor vehicles while intoxicated, their insurance rates should be commensurate with not the statistical risk of such harm being caused, but by the commensurate liablity posed to the insurer. Driving without insurance should be a no plea-bargainable offense (similiar to possesson of a firearm while committing a crime) punishable by 3 years in jail for the first offense (second offense being 9 years, with a third offense being 36 years incarceration). Furthermore, insurance companies should be law compelled to cover the full brunt of any and all catastrophic claims that may arise as being a carrier for a driver convicted of a drunk driving misdemeanor.
That's where the real harm is incurred (under-insured drivers) by society. I believe the blame should be squarely placed where its deserved. I believe that my thinking is exquisite, in that only those people who lack the skill and ability to drive while intoxicated will get pulled over in the first place.
What greater deterent can there possibly be than knowing that operation of heavy machinery while intoxicated might result death to innocent bystanders (and there already are laws on the books about that), aside from perphaps making driving while intoxicated a capital offense? But even so, as in the case of waking somebody needlessly, the first offense shouldn't be treated as being such a crime. As in the case of needlessly waking somebody, a nice stern warning delivered with a resounding alacrity (whereby the offending party full well knows the ramifications of a repeat offense) should be most often sufficient. If that's insufficient, than why not make stupidity outright illegal?
How many murders are committed annually? How many of those murders are comitted with firearms? Of all those murders, how many are illegal? What's the solution to that problem? Should it be more illegal to murder, or to murder with a firearm, or to murder with an illegal firearm? Consider the odds:
3/5 of all people will be involved in an alchohol related accident.
1:1 ratio of all people during their driving career who will be injured in some accident (provided they wear seatbelts)
1:200 ratio of baby fatality that are alchohol related
16:10 (ratio of alchohol related crash fatalities to firearm deaths)
33 minutes (average period between alchohol related fatalities)
. 3 minutes (average period between alchohol related injuries)
The rate of alchohol traffic fatalities is equivalent to two fully loaded jet-airliners crashing each week.
The foregoing notwithstanding, I sympathize greatly with those who suffer pain and grief as a result of drunken drivers. Such is truly a horrific tragedy and there's nothing I can say or do to ameliorate, assuage or mitigate such pain. A hole in ones heart is just that.
Nevertheless, I believe that when one considers that at least 10% of the drivers on the road at any particular time (in any particular local) are intoxicated, and that this number is at least 50% greater during the period Friday night to Monday morning, and that any arbitrary drunken driver would agree that they've been drunk at a minimum of 2000 times prior to the drunk driving charge - contrasting that with how many fatalities/injuries there are annually - I throw my hands up in exasperation. I do not believe that drunken driving laws are the least bit effective.
'IT WAS A NIGHTMARE'
By MATTHEW SWEENEY, ERIN CALABRESE and CYNTHIA R. FAGEN
November 29, 2004 -- A tour bus carrying a visiting dance troupe took a wrong turn onto the FDR Drive yesterday and bulldozed into a low-hanging overpass, shearing off part of its roof and injuring 50 passengers — including a 10-year-old boy pinned under twisted metal.
The bus, which is 13 feet high, was heading south just before 2:30 p.m. when it smashed the 9-foot-6 overpass at East 61st Street.....
Witnesses said the front of the roof peeled away like a sardine can. The impact blew out all the windows.
The bus was not supposed to be on the drive, which is off-limits to all commercial vehicles.
But the driver, Wu Wuk-Ho, 56, of Ontario-based Preference Coachlines, told cops that a gas-station attendant told him it was OK to be on it.
He then apparently ignored signs warning of low-hanging overpasses.
"There's a sign around 96th Street warning [tall vehicles] to get off at that location," Fire Chief Thomas Galvin said. "He hit the underpass probably going about 15 to 20 mph.
"You gather from talking to him that he tried to get off, but with the traffic moving so fast, he didn't have time to get off."
The driver was later slapped with five summonses....
I suppose someone had to take up the slack after Richard Harris died...
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