Banning Driver Distractions, One By One

from the and-so-it-goes... dept

We've been falsely accused in the past of supporting the idea that people should be allowed to drive while yakking without any restrictions. The real issue isn't whether people should be allowed to talk, but what is actually being banned, and whether or not it actually solves any real problem. Banning driving while yakking is politically popular, but it ignores the bigger issue of distracted driving, by focusing on just one cause of distracted drivers. In fact, some early supporters of anti-driving and yakking laws have changed their minds after realizing that it hasn't made the roads any safer, and, in fact, has created new distractions (such as putting on the hands free kit). Of course, instead of actually dealing with the action of bad driving, it looks like lawmakers are getting exactly the wrong message and, instead, are looking to just outlaw other distractions, one by one. I'm not a smoker, but it's hard to see how banning smoking while driving will really have much of an impact. Why not just ban bad driving? Oh wait, we already do. Of course, the smoking ban is in Germany... the same nation where it's legal to have sex while driving. No wonder there are so many smoking drivers.