Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Disregarding the people's wishes

xfloggingkylex sent me this via email.
Link

This is a pretty interesting read, especially since Oct 1 these laws go into effect in MD. Looks to me like government doing what it does, a view that contradicts their views gets presented and is then criticized, and government keeps on doing its thing. I can't believe the guy is calling the study flawed just because it goes against his campaign... actually I can.
xfloggingkylex is absolutely right: this is government being government.
Are texting bans working?

Road deaths due to texting behind the wheel, a topic widely reported on in recent months, has taken a new twist.

In a report released Tuesday, the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI), an affiliate of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, found that texting bans are not reducing crashes.

The claims that the anti-texting laws do not reduce crashes touched a nerve with U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, who responded harshly to the report, calling it misleading and flawed.

“Last Thursday, I blogged about misleading claims from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) disparaging the effectiveness of good laws and good enforcement in our campaign to end distracted driving,” LaHood wrote in his blog “The FastLane,” this morning. “Unfortunately, they're at it again today with another misleading ‘study,’ ” LaHood continued. “There are numerous flaws with this ‘study,’ but the most obvious is that they have created a cause and effect that simply doesn't exist.”
The question needs to be asked: WHO is it who has "created a cause and effect that simply doesn't exist"?  Seems to me that it's the folks seeking to ban text messaging and to force the use of hands-free devices in order to use your cell phone in the car who have done so, NOT the IHS.  The nanny state WILL tell us how to behave, and we WILL like it!

But that's just Vulture being Vulture.

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