A lousy 30 to 40 million people do something stupid and right away some jerk wants new laws!
Interesting. When a car is involved, it is the driver who kills, when an SUV is invloved, it does the killing.
I don't know if this is about freedom so much as it is about trying to legislate common sense (or out outlawing stupidity)-- and good luck on doing both. There are some things that are clearly hazardous while driving -- like reading the newspaper. But every once in a while I see some driver going down the road with a newspaper propped up on the steering wheel. Those guys drive so well that they don't even have to watch where they are going, I guess. And once in a while I'll encounter what appears to be a driverless vehicle. But then a head does pop up behind the wheel because the driver has finished digging for something under the passenger seat. And lately, I've played a little game to amuse myself on my commute. Whenever I see a driver going too slowly, or weaving in a lane, or having trouble negotiating a turn, or coming close to colliding with the car in front of them, I'll hazard a guess that that person was on a cellphone. I'm batting close to a thousand on that one.
Some people can do smoke, eat, etc. at the wheel and others can't. I have eaten, drunk coffee, taken pills, loaded a pipe with tobacco, played the kazoo, combed my hair, sung along with the radio, talked on a cellphone with a hands-free device (that should be required), had deep conversations and rollicking arguments with passengers, warned my kids "not to make me stop this car" and driven nearly a million miles without incident. Others can't do that. Drivers have to have a level of self-awareness so they know what distracts them -- and then decide not do those things while driving. I think it's foolish for a legislature to come up with a list of prohibited practices. But think about the most knuckleheaded, scatterbrained person you know. That person most likely has a driver's license. Add a distraction or two and that's probably what accounts for a person driving off into a ditch on a straight, dry road during the daytime.
Hehe...what a goof..it takes two hands to play the flute..that driver should switch to playing his organ, only need 1 hand then....
I followed a babe like that doing 20 MPH. Ciggie on the left and cell on the right. Weaving around in the center lane of a 45MPH street without a care in the world. Blah, blah, blah for 2 miles. I passed her on the right and made loud noises while doing so. These are the people cops need to send to traffic school.
Before long, they'll consider the road a distraction to driving.
Great. How am I going to change my clothes while I'm driving home now?
I think a driver's attention ought to remain mostly on the road, but a little common sense and experience should be the guideline.
Listening to the radio, smoking, drinking coffee, eating a french fry, I don't see the harm here, unless the driver takes his eyes off the road and leaves them off the road for an extended period, or when he's following another car with three feet between them.
There are already laws on the books concerning reckless driving, and any act described by these proposed laws that creates a real risk certainly is covered by these statutes.
Instead of common sense, however, we are gradually becoming subject to ridiculous government justifications for their existence that outlaw not just actual risk, but potential risk, and if followed to logical conclusion, then yes, eventually every act will be outlawed in one form or another.
This is how the Roman Empire met its end. You'd think the lesson had been learned, but it hasn't, or perhaps, a better way to put it, the lesson is being ignored by other considerations.
We have people who are simply not qualified to lead, issuing directives for the sole purpose of hiding the fact that they have no business telling others what to do.
Instead of voting them out of office, or simply taking our country back by force, we sit still and hope someone else will do it.
This isn't going to end well, per Darwin, per simple laws of nature, per basic cause and effect.
Taken on the whole, the human race is an unfit species, and it appears to me that we are at, or shortly past the top of our existential curve.
Could we put flossing your teeth in there? Saw that one last month at 50 mph.
It's not a flute, officer. It's a recorder.....
I honked at him and he nearly left the road.