What is the anti-MADD quick-and-dirty smackdown?
As some of you know, I'm reading stuff that brings me into contact with MADD members. I get stuck when they say "Rights? My son is dead! Where are HIS rights?!?"
Well, unfortunately, he doesn't have any because he's dead. While true, that's a little bit in-your-face for me, and observers, if any, tend to think I "don't care". The fact is that I care about different things in a different way than they do.
But what can be said to that? Somehow, "taking away other boys' rights will do nothing for your son" leaves you open to the roadside sobriety checks and everything that can go with them aren't taking away anybody's rights!!!
Well, um, yes they are.
No they're not.
You see where I'm going here.
I'd like something snappy that will stop them in their stilettos.
All assistance appreciated.
Well, unfortunately, he doesn't have any because he's dead. While true, that's a little bit in-your-face for me, and observers, if any, tend to think I "don't care". The fact is that I care about different things in a different way than they do.
But what can be said to that? Somehow, "taking away other boys' rights will do nothing for your son" leaves you open to the roadside sobriety checks and everything that can go with them aren't taking away anybody's rights!!!
Well, um, yes they are.
No they're not.
You see where I'm going here.
I'd like something snappy that will stop them in their stilettos.
All assistance appreciated.
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If so, then consider this:
A person who attempts murder but fails due to random events is still guilty of attempted murder, right? Even if no one was hurt at all?
(Remember your answer.)
A person that can hardly walk, but decides to drive home - and kills someone along the way - has committed some kind of crime hasn't he?
Surely you don't hold that this was simply an accident - a civil court matter?
And if by sheer luck he doesn't kill someone...?
(Now remember your previous answer.)
And I agree with much of your reasoning.
I wish I had a horse!
Not random stops. Why random stops? There's no reason to think all these other people are drunk - and if he's not driving erratically - why pull him over?
Buzzed driving is NOT the same as drunk driving.
Nonsense.
When you shoot wildly into a crowd does it matter if no-one is hit?
A person who attempts a murder is guilty of attempted murder - even if he missed completely.
A person who simply PLANS a crime with another is guilty of conspiracy.
When a person is guilty of "depraved indifference" why does it matter if no-one was killed?
I will attempt to better clarify my comments on this subject.
"Personal domain" meaning your home, your property: if you decide to drive around wasted on your property, crashing into and destroying your property, running over your sheep and ending up in your own lake....well, that's up to you.
However, once you venture out/off your property and on to tax payer/public roadways, you now assume a responsibility to not jeopardize the safety of others by following precise rules and regulations that allow for all of us to go about our daily road movements in relative safety as can be expected. My point is that driving impaired is irresponsible, irresponsible to all of us that depend on coherent driving by everyone, everyday so that we can drive to work and back home without loading the risk of tragedy.
As far as your comment about the judge and the police... I think we are saying basically the same thing: the "law" is meant to be the police. The police are not "judging" but are collecting the data for the eventual judge and jury... the police are the first on the scene and, as you state, and as I said, they will be collecting the necessary data.
I hope this helps clarify my position.
Do you argue against this?
There are 2 tragic and inviolate rules about war:
Number 1 is that young men die.
Number 2 is that you can't change #1.
Maybe I should think in that direction.
Just wondering if you're totally against the rights of the people, or if you make exceptions.
MADDer is spluttering and gasping at this point, I hope.
Any day on which you get those is not a bad day, not at all.
I usually say "You can't be argued out of something you weren't argued in to." Their position is based on emotion, and logic, thought and reality have no sway there.
WHAT HARM HAS BEEN DONE?
One of the arguments raging right now is how do you prove what a person's blood alcohol level IS at the time of the stop? The only way to determine whether a person is too drunk to fail a roadside sobriety test is to give him one. There goes "reasonable search" right there.
And my position is one in which the punishment should fit the crime.
Robert Heinlein, in The Number of the Beast, I think, has a scene in which some security guards [or such, it's not clear at the time] drive out to a lonely stretch of road with a person in custody. They then break the leg of the prisoner, and leave him there for a precisely-timed 38 minutes. A waiting ambulance then takes him to a hospital. This was his punishment for having caused exactly the same thing to happen to another person.
HOWEVER
If a person keeps driving drunk, and never causes an accident, WHAT HARM HAS HE DONE? Not what harm MIGHT he have done, but what harm has he actually caused? Can we prove that every driver around him recognized his impairment and exercised extreme caution to avoid an accident? I avoid 30-something women texting, myself.
We cannot toss people into prison unless they have caused harm. period
It is sort of like environmentalists. They pretend to be interested in protecting bears and human habitat, but really they want 5.5 billion humans to die - immediately.
Thank you Neil Smith! - in his alternate universe novels, there is mention of a road owner who is going broke because they reduced the speed limit to 125 and no one will take their [toll] road any more.
Your road, your rules.
"outside of your own personal domain" is a sticky [slippery] one. What does that really mean?
I think you slipped in saying "The law to check for impairment by intoxication, should only be applied where there has been an accident and suspected or evident that the driver is impaired ..." It is not the job of the police to determine that the driver is impaired and that caused the accident. That is the job of a judge &/or jury. The problem is, we can't slip the driver into cold storage so that his blood alcohol content will be the same at his trial that is was at the time of the accident. Therefore, the law says, the police must collect the evidence immediately. There's where it REALLY starts to slip. States are finding that breathalyzer tests are unreliable, and have moved to blood draws - involuntary, if "necessary". Hos else are you going to get the proof of impairment, which is deemed necessary?
Perhaps I can get your 3rd sentence onto a bumper sticker.....
and what do we count as dependent on what?
Some statistics on #s of "gun deaths" include suicide. that makes no sense. My father, a drunk for a VERY long time [and sober for the last 37 years of his life!] died during an arterial bypass that was extended because the surgeons were having trouble finding a good vein in his legs to use, due to his years of drinking. That death would normally not be counted as "alcohol-related".
and your last sentence is completely correct. There is, in fact, no number which would be cause.
unfortunately sometimes, freedom includes the freedom to be stupid - that is, to impair your thinking abilities. I do not drink wine to impair my thinking abilities. I drink it, when I do, because it's delicious and enhances the gestalt of the meal.
I also don't think kh is encouraging others to impair their thinking. I think she is saying that until your ability IS impaired, there is no conversation. [feel free to correct me, k.]
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