A Confluence of Two Ideas
In an article on texting while driving in the Christian Science Monitor yesterday, two ideas that I talk about on this blog came together.
First, the idea of politicians not understanding unintended consequences of the laws they pass. I have no doubt that most politicians (including my opponent Senator Shapiro) truly want to help their fellow human beings. My questions of course are a) is it government’s job to protect people from a safety perspective and b) what are the possible unintended consequences of any law?
In the case of texting while driving, I think it is clear that these laws are not needed. Distracted driving is already illegal why pass a special law about texting. If a cop sees someone texting while driving, simply pull the person over and issue a summons for the law that is already on the books.
The unintended consequences are also obvious if you give it some thought. Instead of not texting, people will continue to text, but hold the phone lower so as to elude getting caught. This in turn increases the number of accidents because the driver in now looking down farther and the line of sight is more impeded.
The second idea this article mentions is anticollision devices in cars which are part of driverless car technology about which I have written. A video from Kelley Blue Book demonstrates this idea.
The problem is that some laws prohibit the operator not been in control of the vehicle at all times. This might make this technology, which would actually improve safety, illegal. (BTW – I would not be in favor of requiring this on all cars.)
Ultimately though, this is a rights issue, not a safety issue. We could have a law that would reduce traffic fatalities to near zero and would be simple and of little cost to implement. If the purpose of government and laws are to protect our safety, simply pass a law requiring all steering wheels have a huge metal spike attached which is aimed at the chest of the driver.
Traffic fatalities would plummet, but the impact (pun intended) on our freedom would be disastrous and unacceptable.