The man whose drunk driving resulted in the death of my grandfather is a free man today.
And you know, I don’t really have a problem with drinking and driving. It’s not a choice I would make for myself - I know my limits and I stick to them. There have been occasions where I knew I wasn’t fit for driving after having a drink or two, and I did the appropriate thing - had someone sober drive for me.
But the consequences of your own actions should weigh equally with the poor decisions you’ve made.
The law used to be that a person who was drinking was less responsible for their actions than a non-drinking person. I can understand the origins of that reasoning, but I think that the current idea that you need to be more responsible before you become impaired is more compelling.
Yet I don’t agree with all of the pre-event legislation on drunk driving these days. States are continually under pressure from the federal government to lower their blood alcohol level limits for legal driving and enforce zero-tolerance policies. Zero-tolerance policies are backhanded ways of calling you a criminal before you’ve committed a crime.
Comparatively, federally suggested high limits on blood alcohol content are tantamount to jailing people for shoplifting when they bring a large empty bag into a store - No crime has yet been committed, and still you’re going to jail. You are also denied the ability to shop every again, regardless of whether you intended to steal anything.
Obviously I think it’s unfortunate that anyone should have to be hurt or killed because I wouldn’t want to stop a drunk driver from doing something they would regret. Instead, I would happily see jail terms for killers, such as the man who killed my grandfather, extended indefinitely. He should have thought of the consequences of his driving drunk and taken them much more seriously. If instead of a piddance of a jail term, he had been threatened with a life sentence - for that’s what he took from my grandfather - he might have thought twice about using his keys.
Generally speaking, I’m more in favor of enhancing penalties for offenders than screening everyone and making them into potential criminals. Another example of this would be driving without insurance. If you drive without insurance and you get into an accident on which your insurance should have paid out, you go to jail - for a long time.
I’m against requiring seatbelt use. Once again, you will never see me without a seatbelt in a car. Never. It has saved my life more than once. But it’s stupid to legislate its use. What possible good can come to society by enforcing the use of seat belts on people who are too stupid to ensure their own self-preservation?
Likewise with smoking. Can all of the smoking regulations. You want to smoke? Fine - when you die of lung cancer, your family doesn’t get to sue for damages. Your insurance need not pay out on your emphazema. Abolish these laws against smoking in restaurants. For what scant rights you provide to people who don’t smoke, you’ve stampeded over the rights of the business owner. Let the market prove out where smoking works. People who want smoke-free environments will dine at smoke-free restaurants. Their money will dictate smoking policy.
I’ve strayed far from the original topic, but all of these are somewhat related in my mind. You can’t be the thought police. You can’t prevent people from causing harm. Better education on what is good for you, coupled with better penalties for failing to be good to others - that’s what we need.
