Drunk driving is something I have 0% tolerance for. I've been in a situation where I had to call the cops, but I would without a blink. If there is one area where the police deserve to be as overly zealous as they are, it's DUI.

Whether or not you like the police are people isn't an issue when someone is drunk behind the wheel.

Ringo seems like a stand-up dude. He did the right thing.

big_dave wrote:Drunk driving is something I have 0% tolerance for. I've been in a situation where I had to call the cops, but I would without a blink. If there is one area where the police deserve to be as overly zealous as they are, it's DUI.

You have really fallen for their bullshit.
Look at the numbers, man....this whole 'drunk driving epidemic' scare is bullshit. It doesn't exist.
It's not that there are no drunk drivers, as there obviously are some....but to say it's the number one most pressing issue the police should be concerned with and they should have unlimited powers to deal with is absolutely ridiculous. People like you who rally to give the cops more and more powers because they say they need it to keep you safe are basically giving them a license to steal.

It's a way to fleece the people, nothing else. Do you see how much the police have to gain by arresting people who are not even drunk? They lower the limit and lower the limit till what? Maybe one day they'll be able to arrest you on suspicion of maybe thinking about drinking and driving. Maybe cops can just carry credit card machines with them instead of guns, every time you see one you'll just swipe your card.
You can't see that it's all a huge fucking scam?

Make the laws if you hurt or kill someone while drinking and driving ten times worse, I'm all for it. Just stop this horseshit harassing people, pulling decent people out of their cars in the middle of the night and robbing and all but raping them because they had a few beers after work.
Stop this lazy, illegal checkpoint bullshit. How can people be ok with this practice?
because the lying, thieving police say it's for our own good?

We have the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, which says police officers have to have probable cause to stop you. They have to have a reason to believe you’ve done something criminal before they can stop and detain you. Remember?

Marsupialized wrote:

big_dave wrote:Drunk driving is something I have 0% tolerance for. I've been in a situation where I had to call the cops, but I would without a blink. If there is one area where the police deserve to be as overly zealous as they are, it's DUI.

You have really fallen for their bullshit.
Look at the numbers, man....this whole 'drunk driving epidemic' scare is bullshit. It doesn't exist.
It's not that there are no drunk drivers, as there obviously are some....but to say it's the number one most pressing issue the police should be concerned with and they should have unlimited powers to deal with is absolutely ridiculous. People like you who rally to give the cops more and more powers because they say they need it to keep you safe are basically giving them a license to steal.

There doesn't have to be an epidemic for one drunk driver to wreck property, injure or kill. The maximum number of lives at risk are the same as the maximum number of people in a vehicle at the same time, especially at chunking-out time on weekends when people share cabs to get home.

The police force profits nothing but prestige and the individual officers get nothing but the chance to wear a uniform and be the authority. They are not thieves of anything but people's time.

No one is saying unlimited powers is the way to go, but I appreciate the police being zealous when it comes to drunk driving. If they're being zealous about shoplifting, weed, underage drinking or loitering then fuck 'em. If you hang around outside a stadium you'll see countless examples of policemen being cocks, if you smoke weed in public you'll see the same. With drunk driving, its policemen saving lives, even if they're being cocks at the same time.

Maybe things things are different in the states, but over here drunk driving is a fucking blight and tragedies happen with a sickening regularity. People killed crossing the road, smashes on the motorway, property wrecked, public works damaged, etc.

I'd rather see the cops chase down drunks than hang around outside sports and music venues trying to break up fights that haven't even started yet.

I too am in the minority that would not ever call the cops on a friend to get them busted. If you gotta fight them to take their keys away fine, but calling cops on friends is a line I would never cross. Ever. And I don't even hate cops like Marsupilized since the Madison PD is the nicest bunch of cops I have ever encountered unlike Chicago pigs or the redneck pricks I grew up getting chased by. My perspective is also shaped by the fact I think the "drunk driving epidemic" is overblown media hype and the time and the place I grew up drunk driving was very common place. Everyone one of my friends I grew up with , myself included, rolled a car loaded on booze, but never killed themselves or anyone else luckily. Sometime people die partying and its sad, but people got to die from something.

I don't mean that personally Ringo and I hope the controversy in your town dies down, but you put this in crap/not crap and I stated my opinion.

Marsupialized wrote:The situation you described.....go over and say 'Man, you guys looked real fucked up, I'm just warning you there's cops all over tonight...I just saw some people get pulled over up the street and he was giving them a sobriety test, they are all over the place pulling cars over tonight'
They would have not driven and even thanked you and thought 'what a cool guy'

Exactly. Try and get the keys before you call the police. If you are going to get involved, maybe try everything you can.

Mars says, "don't call the police." I'm almost there - I 'll call the police as the very last option. I WILL try and do everything in my power to get the keys, or prevent them from driving, but if the drunk drives I'm forced to call the police. But I do everything I can to get the keys. Someone said, "Buy them a drink." It works. I remember once a guy was so stinking drunk he just sheepishly handed over the keys after I busted on him for being so fucking stupid. There's a million ways to get those keys, if you want to get involved.

I do object to people just calling the police as a first response to anything.

They have completely ripped the constitution apart and made an all new set of constantly contracting laws when it comes to DUI.
I wonder why it is the police are so concerned with this one crime? I mean there are all kinds of crimes, yet this one they are really gung ho for....hmm....I wonder why?
Maybe because they have constructed the system in whch people are found guilty of doing it themselves? They have created this crime, the laws governing the policing of it.

They arrested 1.4 MILLION people on DUI's last year.


For years now the “DUI crackdown”, along with the accompanying loss of constitutional rights, has been justified by the numbers of deaths on the highways caused by drunk drivers. As the U.S. Supreme Court in Michigan v. Sitz said, for example, DUI “sobriety checkpoints” appear to violate our Fourth Amendment right to be free of suspicionless stops by the police — but this illegal intrusion on our privacy is “outweighed” by the “carnage” on our highways of 25,000 deaths caused each year by alcohol.

From where did these statistics come?

Years ago, the statistics kept on traffic fatalities included a category for “alcohol-caused” deaths. To justify such things as sobriety checkpoints, lowered blood alcohol levels and automatic at-the-scene DUI license suspensions, however, these statistics were subtly changed to “alcohol-related”. Not “caused”, but related. This meant that a perfectly sober driver who hit and killed an intoxicated pedestrian, for example, would be involved in an “alcohol-related” incident. Similarly, a sober driver who is struck by another sober driver carrying an intoxicated passenger chalked up another “alcohol-related” death. Further, if the officer believes the driver to be intoxicated but chemical tests show he is not, the death is nevertheless reported as “alcohol-related”. In fact, if the tests indicate the presence of any alcohol at all, say .02%, the fatality will be chalked up as “alcohol-related”.

In 1999, the federal General Accounting Office (GAO) reviewed these figures from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration — and issued a report stating that they “raised methodological concerns calling their conclusions into question ”. The statistics, the GAO report said, “fall short of providing conclusive evidence that .08% BAC laws were, by themselves, responsible for reductions in alcohol related fatalities.” In other words, the statistics weren’t even valid when applied to alcohol-related fatalities, much less alcohol-caused deaths.

So what are the real numbers? The Los Angeles Times also decided to investigate the validity of these statistics. In 2002, NHTSA’s figures claimed 18,000 deaths on the nation’s highways attributable to drunk driving. The Times found that only about 5,000 of these involved a drunk driver causing the death of a sober driver, passenger or pedestrian. (Research by other groups, such as “Responsibility in DUI Laws, Inc.”, indicate the figure is actually under 3,000.)

5,000. A fraction of the number being used by the government and political pressure groups like MADD. Despite this irritating little truth, MADD, law enforcement and federal and state governments continue to use the same false statistics to justify the passage of unfair and unconstitutional DUI laws.



It's all a huge fucking scam and I wish more you you people saw it.

Of all casual crimes, drunk driving is one of the worse because it involves so many people.

How many people could a drunk with a loaded shotgun kill or injure? One.

A guy gets drunk and drives home, he's a danger to everyone. The police are right to take it seriously. Roads are public utilities and so should be kept free of people unable to control a ton of fast moving, jagged metal.

I can't comment on the constitution, if it is being used to defend a persons right to drink and drive without issue and I was American, I'd be saying "fuck the constitution"

big_dave wrote:Of all casual crimes, drunk driving is one of the worse because it involves so many people.

How many people could a drunk with a loaded shotgun kill or injure? One.

A guy gets drunk and drives home, he's a danger to everyone. The police are right to take it seriously. Roads are public utilities and so should be kept free of people unable to control a ton of fast moving, jagged metal.

I can't comment on the constitution, if it is being used to defend a persons right to drink and drive without issue and I was American, I'd be saying "fuck the constitution"

Well, I wouldn't.
and you are talking about a DRUNK driving home. I'm all for being against a DRUNK driving home.
My problem is that they are hassling and robbing people not anywhere near 'drunk' and attitudes like yours are making it very easy for them to do it.

Moreover, if someone I knew had a loaded shotgun and went out with it while drunk, I wouldn't hesitate to call the cops.

I don't think anyone is suggesting that the checkpoints are a rad idea, though I've been stopped at one and the simple solution is to not be drunk while you're driving a car. What people are saying is that this person was dangerous and a menace.

Besides, you try to take his keys away, he gets pissed off and drives away anyhow. So now he's drunk and angry and driving. Not a good combination.

Johnny C wrote:Besides, you try to take his keys away, he gets pissed off and drives away anyhow. So now he's drunk and angry and driving. Not a good combination.

You might break a nail while dialing the police...