charliedon'tsurf wrote:From my experience driving a straight shot from Austin to Madison last spring I think adderall use should be mandatory for late night driving. It also makes music sound great if you combine it with weed. Got me all the way thru Oklahoma, Missouri and most of Illinois and I drove like a fucking champ.

haha I agree the adderall is a fantatsic long drive pill, did the same combo for a drive from Chicago to Norfolk a few years ago to pick up my buddy off his aircraft carrier, aside from a speeding ticket in Ohio worked like a fucking charm.

I agree about the drunk driving laws being excessive.

Lowering the BAC level allowable for driving does nothing to address the problem of drunks on the road causing accidents. Lowering the legal limit causes the number of DUI arrests to increase, by incriminating more drivers who have had small amounts of alcohol within the past few hours, but it does nothing more to stop the asshole with a .15 BAC running a red light and killing a bunch of high school kids driving home from Denny's..

What we need is reasonable liquor laws and better enforcement techniques. If the cops can't enforce the .08 BAC laws effectively enough, they're not going to keep any more dangerous drunk drivers off the road by arresting the guy who drank only 2 beers at his sister's wedding, over 3 hours ago.

Marsupialized wrote:The drunk driving laws are too strict as it is right now, the problem 3 in the afternoon drunks are gonna be problem drunks no matter what laws they pass....right now the laws are so tight that normal people are getting their lives ruined because they had a few drinks and drove home at 3 in the morning. It's all a bunch of bullshit.

I agree also. I think 25 years ago drunk driving had to be reigned in in many states, new laws were enacted, things improved, but then the push for more and more laws never stopped (a familiar pattern). What always bothers me about drunk driving death statistics (even beyond the suspect way they define a drunk driving-related death) is that they're given with no context. X-number of people died last year in drunk driving accidents, but how many people drove drunk overall, accident or not? No one knows. But just looking around, I would estimate that an enormous number of people do so all the time, given a benchmark of 2-3 drinks at a bar or restaurant. Unless you know the total number, it's hard to say whether harsher and harsher laws are justified. It's not enough to prove that drinking impairs driving, lots of things impair driving, including phones, mood of driver, sleepiness, crying kids in the back seat, age, ability, condition of vehicle, fiddling with the stereo, and on and on.

I'm not saying there shouldn't be penalties, there should be. But I know two people, one a nurse, one an elementary school teacher, who have lost their jobs in the last two years because of first-time DUI offenses (some professions have policies against employing people who have misdemeanors, or who are currently on probation). I'm not sure that's good for society.

dgrace wrote:I'm not saying there shouldn't be penalties, there should be. But I know two people, one a nurse, one an elementary school teacher, who have lost their jobs in the last two years because of first-time DUI offenses (some professions have policies against employing people who have misdemeanors, or who are currently on probation). I'm not sure that's good for society.

I'm pretty sure it's bad for society. Fuck that. Employment related drug tests are the hight of bullshit. Actually, maybe that goes to employment related credit checks now, but the drug tests are still up there.

slincire wrote:

dgrace wrote:I'm not saying there shouldn't be penalties, there should be. But I know two people, one a nurse, one an elementary school teacher, who have lost their jobs in the last two years because of first-time DUI offenses (some professions have policies against employing people who have misdemeanors, or who are currently on probation). I'm not sure that's good for society.

I'm pretty sure it's bad for society. Fuck that. Employment related drug tests are the hight of bullshit. Actually, maybe that goes to employment related credit checks now, but the drug tests are still up there.

In the cases I mentioned, the DUI convictions came to light from routine background checks. I can understand why they have them, a school would probably want to know if a teacher was just convicted for exposing himself, and with all the medical malpractice lawsuits, a hospital probably wouldn't want a nurse administring medications who had an established record of erratic behavior. But first time DUI? Neither of those people should have been fired.

charliedon'tsurf wrote:

Marsupialized wrote:The drunk driving laws are too strict as it is right now, the problem 3 in the afternoon drunks are gonna be problem drunks no matter what laws they pass....right now the laws are so tight that normal people are getting their lives ruined because they had a few drinks and drove home at 3 in the morning. It's all a bunch of bullshit.

Yeah amen to that. The penalty being based strictly on the number of offenses is bullshit. There should be lighter punishments for those who are just a little above the allowable blood alcohol level than those who are stinking wasted on booze. Also I agree the time of drunk driving could be considered. At 2 AM the only people on the road are drunks, people who work third shift and people traveling long distance through the night. You would hard pressed to find any innocent children to mow down in the dead of night.

good argument guys. wait, i mean TERRIBLE ARGUMENT!

So you're saying it's OK to kill innocent kids?

yes, exactly

Kenoki, are you saying it's a good thing that because of this delusional panic over 'drunk driving' that has swept over the country thousands of otherwise decent normal humans not fucking with anyone have their lives and finances ruined because they went to a bar one night and had a few drinks with their friends then drove home like EVERYONE on the planet does from time to time?

The penalties if you kill or injure someone while driving drunk are SEVERE as it is. You are going to prison for a long time if you hurt or kill someone while drunk driving, that's fine. Keep it that way, shit increase those if you people are so gung ho on destroying people who make stupid mistakes once and awhile.
But to be pulling people out of their cars and into jail in the middle of the night because the fucking test the cops created themselves says they had half a beer too many? Or smoked a joint last week?
That's some fucked up shit right there, right up there on the insanity meter next to throwing someone in prison for having weed in their pocket.

I have a good friend who blew one tiny point above their ever lowering limit one night at 3am after a show, this was almost 5 years ago..he's still going to court and paying fines and trying to get his shit back.
They took his car, threw him in jail, fined him thousands of dollars.
All because he drank like 4 beers over the course of 2 hours and drove home.

and you don't think the penelties are too severe?
When you hear the buzz word 'drunk driver' you think some lunatic weavign all over running over mailboxes....99.9% of the time that is not what it is. It's a person like me or you who got trapped into the fucking cocksucking cops crooked ass unfair web of bullshit.
It's all about stealing money people, that's it.
The more you people fall for their stupid scare tactics, the further you allow them to take things, the further they will push it...hence the new weed tests on the side of the road.
The cops might as well start wearing full on pirate costumes instead of their stupid boy scout outfits they wear now, that's all they are.

Marsupialized wrote:The cops might as well start wearing full on pirate costumes instead of their stupid boy scout outfits they wear now, that's all they are.

They might get confused with Pastafarians then.

Drunk driving laws are too harsh, where blood alchol is concerned. It all depends on a person's tolerance and constitution anyway. Two different people could reach two totally different levels of wastedness with the same blood alcohol, and both could get equally screwed. Job related drug testing of any sort can go fuck itself in the ass though.