Speeding Cameras

[AzDesertRat]

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No offense dude, but attribute road rage to another with a safe and legal behavior is pushing the responsibility to the wrong person. Road rage seem to stem more from a psychological deficiency in the one that exhibits it.

As the traffic deciding I would rather expect the people in the traffic abide by the law governing driving on public road. Anything that will reduce the number of people infringing these, by issuing fines, by random testing, by cameras, will make driving safer for all. Go cameras! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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So what you are saying is you want driving to be like the NFL. If one player takes a swing at another player and none of the umpires see it, but the other guy retaliates and punches back, but one of the umpires sees it, guess who gets the flag? The other guy may be fined after the game, but during the game he gets a pass.

Unfortunately, there is no game film to see every incident while on the road (you'd like that wouldn't you [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]). There is a saying that it takes two to tango--in the case of the example we were talking about, one person was in the incorrect lane and the other person passed improperly. Both at are fault--not one as you are suggesting. Unfortunately, lawmakers aren't farsighted enough to draw this line and just go with the catchy "speed kills".

As for your last sentence, I am completely befuddled if that makes you a hard line republican or a stalinist--all I know it does not make you a libertarian. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

[Poofler]

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This was directed at the breathalyzer thing, so I can't tell your stance on speeding cameras. But the obvious difference between this and transfats/etc is that the government is taking away your ability to do previously lawful things. Speeding was never previously lawful.

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Slavery was previously lawful.

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Make a point.

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It should be fairly intuitive.

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I'm dumb. Spell it out, so I don't address issues you aren't arguing.

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Very wise on your part. At least you recognize that you're digging yourself a hole.

The point is that a particular item's "previously lawful" status is irrelevant in a moral evaluation.

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Don't be presumptious. You argue by analogy, and I'd rather not spend time addressing irrelevant examples and analogies that don't relate to my argument. Like this time.

And your comments about morality are not directed at my comments to John. John was getting annoyed by government intrusiveness restricting the things he can and cannot do in the name of saving lives. He mentioned examples where government was restricting your behavior where it already had not. Government is not making another restriction on your behavior here, it is already a restriction.

[John Kilduff]

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"Would you be offended if the government forced auto manufactures to put breathalizers in every car?"

15,000 people are killed every year by drunk drivers. Maybe it's not a bad idea. "Only" 3,000 were killed on 9/11.

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If the government did everything it could to save 15,000 lives a year every time an idea came up for a way to do it (ban transfats, put breathalyzers in cars, ration cigarettes to 2 packs a week, ration alcohol to 7 drinks per week, police write tickets if you don't use snow tires in the North, and every other little thing that might save 15,000 lives per year): we might save 1.5 million lives per year, or even more, with all those measures; but it wouldn't be worth it.

It's worth taking a bit more risk in order to be free from being constantly: watched over, guarded over, hounded, hassled, inconvenienced, busybodied, henpecked, nitpicked, bothered and bewildered by what are growing to be soon a billion regulations and rules by which we must all live our lives - or else. Aren't you starting to get sick of it, too?

Frankly, I'm getting to where I don't give a damn if 15,000 more people die or not. Just leave me alone to live in peace; and I'm sure many other Americans feel exactly the same way if they stop and think about it.

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This was directed at the breathalyzer thing, so I can't tell your stance on speeding cameras. But the obvious difference between this and transfats/etc is that the government is taking away your ability to do previously lawful things. Speeding was never previously lawful.

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Ok...my stance on speeding cameras is that they are not able to take into account things like traffic flow or safety maneuvers and I just don't like the idea of them. If they're going to be used to issue citations for going only a bit above the limit (like normal traffic flow is) then I think that would be especially bad. If they're going to be used to issue citations for going much much faster than the limit then that is not so bad.

I think cops issue tickets somewhat capriciously and as a means to raise revenue and I think both of those are bad. Unfortunately there is no way to have a truly strict speed limit because traffic flow will always go a bit above it,and to drive safely, you must drive with the flow. So I see no fair way to issue tickets except leniently.

As for the civil rights issues: I don't suppose that these cameras are actually a civil rights violation but I do think that nitpicky law enforcement is bad and that law enforcement should be saved for serious offenses. Going a little bit fast on a highway is in no way a serious offense nor does it add much to hazard. And if nearly everyone is doing it then it becomes the safest speed at which to drive.

In sum: I doubt that the cameras are a breach of civil rights, but I don't like them or the idea, and have little doubt that they will be misused to raise revenue. I also
just don't see the proper role of government as being to micromanage our lives or to keep finding new ways to raise revenue for its bloated corpulescence at our expense. Government should serve, not be served. And I'm also a bit leery of the use of government cameras in public places and the slow trend towards a possibly Orwellian future.

[Poofler]

Agree. Obviously I think the intention should be to increase safety, not raise revenue. And ticketing people for going 5 over is clearly the latter. I wouldn't support any scheme: camera, police, whoever that targeted those drivers. But cameras can calibrated to snap photos for any speed, it doesn't have to be some giant revenue venus fly trap.

[andyfox]

You use the public roads you consent to following the laws that attend to that usage and the means of enforcement. Those laws are made by our elected represenstives and, if you don't like the law, you can try to change them and/or those representatives that drafted and enacted them.

Is radar "active policing"? How about positioning two cops at two points and figuring out if you were speeding by using math?

[andyfox]

Got your point.

Mine was that I believe in being left alone in peace unless your peace threatens mine. Your freedom stops where mine begins.

[andyfox]

Couldn't have happened if they weren't alive either. So, since you oppose infanticide, it's your fault on that count to.

We can come up with all sorts of ridiculous arguments. My point is that government mandated speed limits, supported by enforcement utilizing available technology, is a reasonable protection of public safety. As is attempting to keep drunk drivers off the road.

[bkholdem]

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"Just leave me alone to live in peace"

But what if I'm one of the 15,000 who get killed by drunk drivers? By you, because you want to be left in peace?

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have we somehow been free of drunk driving deaths for the past 10 years due to our wonderful system and I have just not heard about it?

[bkholdem]

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I don't see the difference between "actively" policing and using available technology. At a retail store, there are surveillance cameras and an alarm that goes off if I attempt to walk out with something I didn't pay for.

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Might as well install video cameras in all our brains that way we will catch every theif and every murderer 100% of the time.

[bkholdem]

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This was directed at the breathalyzer thing, so I can't tell your stance on speeding cameras. But the obvious difference between this and transfats/etc is that the government is taking away your ability to do previously lawful things. Speeding was never previously lawful.

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Slavery was previously lawful.

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Make a point.

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It should be fairly intuitive.

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I'm dumb. Spell it out, so I don't address issues you aren't arguing.

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Very wise on your part. At least you recognize that you're digging yourself a hole.

The point is that a particular item's "previously lawful" status is irrelevant in a moral evaluation.

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Don't be presumptious. You argue by analogy, and I'd rather not spend time addressing irrelevant examples and analogies that don't relate to my argument. Like this time.

And your comments about morality are not directed at my comments to John. John was getting annoyed by government intrusiveness restricting the things he can and cannot do in the name of saving lives. He mentioned examples where government was restricting your behavior where it already had not. Government is not making another restriction on your behavior here, it is already a restriction.

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So if government makes little mini hover satellites for everyone that sit outside their houses to catch 'already illegal activity' and these things start hovering over our heads when we leave our houses and follow us everywhere and are programmed to take pictures the moment we do something 'already illegal' all is OK?