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Why don't we enforce the rules of the road better than we do and make the punishments for violating them more severe?
We lose something like 40,000 people a year to auto accidents that the majority are caused by aggressive, drunk or distracted driving.
Every time you go out in a car, you are usually witnessing a near miss, a close call or someone doing something incredibly stupid and dangerous behind the wheel.
When do we say enough is enough? Why aren't the public and politicians more engaged about this? We treat it like an unavoidable fact of life.
There is one law I would like to see get harsher punishment and that is high speed chases. I would like to see that charge being upped to attempted murder. Anytime idiots run from the police they put a lot of other motorist and pedestrians at risk of losing their lives. Instead of being charged with fleeing and serving 3 years I would like them to serve 15 to 20.
We lose something like 40,000 people a year to auto accidents that the majority are caused by aggressive, drunk or distracted driving.
Poor driving habits are just as much to blame, the majority of accidents on highways are caused by the disruption of the flow of traffic which is caused by a variety of things. Get rid of the speed limit, enforce higher minimum speeds, ticket slow pokes hogging the left lane, ticket people tail gating, ticket people passing on the right, ticket people not using their turn signals etc.
Why don't we enforce the rules of the road better than we do and make the punishments for violating them more severe?
We lose something like 40,000 people a year to auto accidents that the majority are caused by aggressive, drunk or distracted driving.
Every time you go out in a car, you are usually witnessing a near miss, a close call or someone doing something incredibly stupid and dangerous behind the wheel.
When do we say enough is enough? Why aren't the public and politicians more engaged about this? We treat it like an unavoidable fact of life.
because bad drivers are voters
and voters get angry at politicians who take away their privileges.
Selective enforcement of laws which include minor offenses are intended to give police a legal rationale to stop cars for reasons other than stated or allowed by law.
You can get stopped for having a license plate frame in NJ. Those dealer and personaloized frames are apparently illegal. Sometimes the local cops will get you for a more grevious offense and if they like you you just might get a ticket for the license frame. Likewise a cop can stop you under the pretext of having a license plate frame because he doesn't like the cut of your jib.
Posting 55mph on an interstate like rt 84 near Hartford is insane. The rationale for that posting makes perfecr sense but the police rarely ever enforce that limit and any driver wishing to obey the limit would be statistical road trash. So many laws are enforced subjectively, they foster a lack of respect for laws in general.
Any municipality could earn a fortune just on stop sign violations at one location. It is a rare car that comes to a complete stop these days. Guess the reason for stop signs is no longer valid?
Either enforce it of put up yield signs. The insurance comapnies love it when the cops selectively enforce laws because it makes the citizens believe it is fine to break certain laws. Get into an accident and the insurance company will nail you for rolling thru a stop sign of doing 56 in a 55 or not using your blinker, etc. Insurance companies are the remoras which attach themselves to sharks and feed on the leftovers provided by the shark.
10K is the yearly death by alcohol out of about 20K + injuries. Lets not foget the people disabled and living in pain as a result of drunk driving.
All the police need to do is set up a winding lane of traffic cones at a drunk diving check point and have drivers negotiate the course rather than stop all cars...if they insist on having such checkpoints.
There is a law against distracted driving but feel good politicians needing votes embrace the families of the latest cell phone accident victims and pass laws banning the use of cell phones. Sure, nail people for cell phone use, but we already have a law against distracted driving. These vote getter, feel good laws keep piling up and someday someone will seriously enforce all the laws and we'll all be found guilty. At least there will be more than enough false pretexts available to any cop who just does't like the color of your car.
There should be harsher penalties for drunk and intentional wreckless driving, but aside from that, there is a more commonly pervasive issue.
Operating a motor vehicle is THE most complex (and unnatural) commonly learned skill performed by a human being. Think about it, hand/ eye/ foot coordination, distractions, 360 awareness, spatial relations, predictive behavior to judge your own speed and direction and that of others (trucks/ cars/ pedestrians) and the ability to react quickly to the unexpected. All while rolling around in a 2 - 5,000 lbs rolling around a whole bunch of others (with glaringly varied skill sets) are trying to do the same.
I've witnessed (elderly, young, or those never really bothered to master the skill) drivers who I expect have every synapse in their brains firing at once just to stay in a lane or navigate a turn at an intersection.
If the general driving population came to realize that 'anything goes and anything can happen', that they are side by side and at risk with the 'sub par to abhorrent' part of the skill spectrum there would be fewer fender benders/ serious accidents until we can figure out how to legislate the inept off the road without generating inequality lawsuits and revolt.
Last edited by AKA Bubbleup; 04-30-2014 at 10:17 AM..
Reason: sp
The reason is that each state makes its own laws regarding driving. Florida has idiots in the legislature so our laws are idiotic. It took years to get them to make texting while driving illegal. And even when they did, it is a secondary violation, not something for which one can be stopped. They also routinely vote down any law making the left lane for passing even though road rage is a big problem due to the left lane slow drivers who may be brain dead or simply obnoxious. Everyone complains about it, but nobody thinks about it when voting. The DMV here is also insane, regularly giving 6 year licenses to 80-year-olds who cannot see or are handicapped. As someone else noted, the elderly will not vote for people who are going to make it harder for them to drive and they are a huge voting block in this state.
They also routinely vote down any law making the left lane for passing even though road rage is a big problem due to the left lane slow drivers who may be brain dead or simply obnoxious. .
That's the law here but it's never enforced, never heard of anyone getting a ticket for it.
Drunk driving gets $25,000 fine, 12 months jail time and 5 year suspension. Second offence we get really barbaric.
No use of cellphones by drivers.
No eating or drinking while the vehicle is in motion.
The passing lane is for passing slower vehicles.
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