TheAgitator.com
The Wake of a DUI
Tuesday, July 27th, 2004Commenter Evan Williams points to this sad but telling Washington Post article on the ways a DWI conviction can ruin lives. Note that the woman in the lead had just one drink. But because of her size, she blew a .09, leading to a first-time offense arrest that cost her thousands of dollars, her license, and is threatening her marriage.
Lots of things going on here. You have legislators lowering the legal limit. At the same time, they’re removing common criminal protections for those that get arrested. And at the same time, they’re stiffening penalties for those convicted. That’s a lethal three-pronged attack. And it’s ruining the lives of good people who were never a serious threat to begin with — to themselves or to anyone else on the road. And, cruelly, it’s drawing law enforcement resources away from catching the people who actually are a threat on the highways.
Man, only the Taliban would take things that far, and they were the enemy, last I heard.
Tobias Beecher: Criminal or Victim
UP
A DWI is threatening her marriage? Must be a very supportive husband, sounds like a solid marriage from the getgo…?
As for the one drink to blow a .09, yeah right, sure you only had one, maybe next time try a glass smaller than an aquarium.
All that aside, yes they are going nuts out there with this crap. But then logic has no place in government wielding the revenue collection machine in the DWI arena.
Why was the woman arrested for running a yellow light? You’re allowed to do that.
It’s perfectly reasonable that one drink would give a petite Vietnamese woman a 0.09 b.a.l. I only know a few Asians who can drink a single beverage without their faces reddening.
No I’m not being racist. The vast majority of the Asian population is lacking a little enzyme called alcohol dehydrogenase. That’s the beautiful bit of cellular equipment that helps us break down alcohol. As far as I know, nearly all peoples of Asian descent, as well as Native Americans and other indegenous folk are missing this enzyme. As a result, they get tipsy much more quickly and maintain higher b.a.l.s for longer than people who have the enzyme.
/here endeth the science lesson.
I’ve got a buddy that is a Doctor and has a breathalyzer. We decided to do some field testing with it. Our first test was to just blow into it with no alcohol. I blew a .04 and my buddy blew a .02. We then each had a big swig of beer and blew immediately into the device. We registered 0.13 and 0.10. We decided to let some time pass and retested with no more intake. Our levels dropped back to be close to our starting points. We did other experiments with it such as blowing softly (lowers the number) and blowing as hard as we could (pump up the numbers baby!) and concluded that we would never submit to the breathalyzer test because it is very inaccurate.
It’s not about law enforcement, it’s about revenue enhancement.
Um, is it just me or do the numbers in that article not really jibe with the conventional wisdom about BAC and the amount you drink?
My understanding is that you process about .02 (one standard sized drink) an hour. And most of those people said they had only about three drinks–yet they’re blowing a .14 BAC. How could anyone who only had three drinks possibly blow a .14?
There should be a constitutional amendment permitting people to drive drunk. This is a sacred right. Any interference with it violates our natural rights to increase the risk of fatal accidents whose consequences we can escape with underinsurance and the bankruptcy code.
This seems a stupid place to make a stand.
Cause And Effect?
Could the fact that so many of the citizens in our country are currently incarcerated have anything to do with the fact that our legislators are constantly ratcheting up the penalties for relatively minor crimes that have a social stigma…
Free markets desperately need to produce a ‘Get Sober in 5 minutes’ pill.
I think you’ve totally missed the point, Chris.
And there’s nothing in the post to inspire mocking libertarians on natural rights grounds either.
The point is, there are better ways to deal with the drunk driving problem than targeting people like the little asian woman who had one drink. Statistically, she’s not a big risk. The people who are a serious risk are the high-BAC offenders. Why waste resources on people who pose no threat to society? It isn’t a libertarian argument, and it has nothing to do with any “right” to drive drunk: lets catch the drunks who are most likely to kill.
I think it’s a pretty good place to take a stand.
roach = missing-the-point (deliberately?)-troll
Show us proof that any of these laws are actually PREVENTING fatal accidents, and I may concede to your non-point.
My 14 yo cousin was killed by a 16 yo drunk driver. My aunt and uncle who were in the accident too, have never been the same. My aunt still finds glass under her skin, and my uncle will never recover from his broken neck and back.
So what? So this kid actually KILLED someone and got nothing more than a slap on the wrist because he was a kid and obviously didn’t know any better than to drive after drinking a couple of six-packs of beer.
So what? None of these ridiculous laws on the books now would have done a damn thing to save my cousin.
Stick to wreckless endangerment, wreckless driving, vehicular manslaughter and MURDER, and we’d be fine. The rest of this .08 and breathalyzer shit is useless.
I think there’s plenty to mock, Brooke.
If you want to list 100 government depradations of our liberty, you can start with the tax code, gun control, mandatory sentencing, social security, federal regulatoins, etc. I think you’d hit 100 before DUI/DWI came up.
Road safety laws are necessary. They would exist on private roads just like public ones. When we’re on the road we create risk; criminal laws add to that risk calculus. People are massively underinsured and can escape the costs of their bad driving in bankruptcy. The criminal code exists to fill in this gap. Drunk drivers, needless to say, for basic biological reasons drive much less safely than their sober peers.
No one has to drive drunk to feed their family. It’s not like gun control where people have to weigh government punishment with the harm from crimnals. There is no moral dimension to this issue whatsoever. There is no constitutional dimension. That’s why I mocked Radley. Libertarians start weeping over every irresponsible dumb shit that breaks the law, whether that law is reasonable or not, and whether or not the behavior in question is laudable or just irresponsible.
There is a world of difference between locking people up for turning wetlands into productive businesses and locking people up for driving drunk. I’m not persuaded at all by this poor lady’s story; next time take a cab.
Bronwyn, I assume you and everyone reading this article and everyone with a lot to lose (i.e., responsible people) are more likely to take cabs, sober up, etc because of the risk of a DUI/DWI arrest. It’s basic law and economics; how to quantify it, I’m not sure, but it undoubtedly influences behavoir. Just because it doesn’t influence some people’s behavior, doesn’t mean it influences no one.
This is true across the board of all criminal law. It’s part of the reason it exists at all.
Beltway Traffic Jam
The Tuesday linkfest:
Matt Yglesias sums up Bill Clinton’s appeal, minus the “true” part.
Steven Taylor has photograph evidence that John Kerry is really spacey.
McQ compares Kerry to Woody Allen.
Eugene Volokh reveals a Jewish superhero …
Here’s some stats:
Drunk driving down as a causation factor in fatal accidents pretty much linearly since 1980.
http://www.yaerd.org/statistics.htm
Roach –
Actually, DWI fatalities began to rise again in 2000, and have consecutively risen in 2001, 2002, and 2003.
The national .08 threshhold took effect in 2000.
I’d say that’s pretty compelling correlative evidence that .08 is a misallocation of law enforcement resources. We’re siccing cops on the low-BAC people when they could be pursuing the drunks.
Also, there most certainly is a Constitutional component. DWI suspects have been stripped of their 4th, 5th, and 6th Amendment rights, as well as the presumption of innocence. They can have their cars and licenses confiscated before they’re ever brought to trial. Read my Cato commentary today.
Given that the effect of these laws (and the intent of those pushing for them) is to curb social drinking, you might also argue they violate at least the spirit of the 21st Amendment, too.
And yes, I’d say that a woman having her life ruined because she drove after one drink is something worth taking a stand over.
Finally, no one is saying this is more important than many of the other issues you list.
It just happens to be my beat.
Should we just ignore any miscarriage of justice that doesn’t make your top 100?
I have to agree with Roach on this one. I read the entire article and as much as I wanted to be, I could not get myself enraged. I love how the author would excuse the drinking with the sad sack stories “he was upset because his girlfriend broke up with him, so he drank 4 small glasses of wine”. O.K. let’s ask a simple question, why was he drinking the wine? I would say to drown his sorrows. My guess in this case is that the 4 small glasses of wine likely did that for him. Take a cab.
Roach –
The problem is not so much DUI laws, but the ridiculously low BAC levels now mandated, and the measurement tools used by law enforcement. Impairment should be measured based on driving behavior. Currently cops are pulling people over for minor traffic violations, with no reason to suspect Drunken Driving, smelling a little beer, and performing breath tests, with no discretion as to driving ability. You can not assume that everyone with a BAC of 0.08 is drunk, or impaired. Nor is there scientific proof. This arbitary BAC has been pushed by groups out to “dry out” the nation.
Radley, I didn’t take on the other stuff you said–like civil forfeiture or the changing evidentiary presumption–because I was intrigued and concerned as well. I’m glad you’re on this beat. I just think that the sob-story from the Washington Times was over the top. I like what you have to say and link to you because you often say interesting things; but sometimes I think you lack a sense of proportion, and this chick’s deal with the toxic combo of her genetics and the (alleged) one glasss of wine is one such case. (Really, why do we believe her account of things?)
As for the 2000, crime stats are always a multivariable game. A very complicated one in fact. But one countervailing factor is the massive addition of Hispanics to our population before during and after 2000. There are higher rates of drunk driving among Hispanics, who have higher demographics geared to drunk driving (i.e., young and male). So, while we might be draining the bucket on one end (by deterring whites and native-born people in general) the massive infusion of millions of people (probably at least 4mm since 2000) with different practices re drunk driving is bound to have an effect.
I saw a piece on this a ways back. http://www.vdare.com/walker/dui.htm
This might be one explanation. Hispanic groups recognize this problem and are trying to deal with it through educational efforts. Not sure if it explains everything. I think some of this is demographic driven in other ways.
The problem is not with the laws, it’s with the way in which the laws make you a criminal before you commit a crime against anyone, kinda like in “Minority Report”.
Yes, drinking and driving can be deadly. IMO, if you get caught driving while intoxicated but you haven’t hurt anyone (yet) then you should pay appropriate penalties, but not criminalization. Now, if you kill someone while you are driving intoxicated, then you should be charged with manslaughter (or something appropriate to that) and your irresponsible choice of doing so (DUI) should be taken into account during the penalty phase of your trial. The problem with our laws and judicial system is that in the name of equality and zero tolerance (you can thank Willy for that one) we have cookie cutter justice. There is no common sense being used by judges, juries, or lawyers.
But why should luck and happenstance translate into such a huge jump between high risk behavior and high risk behavior that yields bad consequences. It’s like if you shoot and miss and shoot and kill someone it shouldn’t be 1 year for the former and life for the latter. Proper deterrence would demand that the two punishments are closer together. Under that metric, one year suspended license is pretty modest for a DUI.
roach, It sounds pretty modest, but when that DUI on your record cuts your job market opps by half or more, then it becomes a really big hindrance for one little mistake. And I dont mean that to sound like DUI’s are unimportant, but some people do make just one mistake, others are habitual. My point is, where is the common sense in the court room?
Oddly, I find myself agreeing with roach. Yes, the woman who had the 0.09 BAC might not have been impaired by alcohol. But everyone else in the article was driving impaired and admitted it. Should I feel bad for you because you felt so despondent as to go get drunk and try to drive home? Nope. I don’t.
I might feel bad for you because of the reason you feel despondent.
But I’m not going to feel bad because you erred and created a potentially dangerous situation.
I know that wasn’t the point Radley was trying to make. Unless the whole article was about the ridiculousness of these low BAC limits (which it didn’t seem to be), it’s hard to get riled up or enraged. So what there were criminal and financial repercussions to driving intoxicated?
Boo hoo.
Most of the people quoted in the article weren’t just arrested and convicted on the BAC alone.
MattG – My guess is that the reporter was being sloppy with his use of the term “arrested”. IIRC, you can be ticketed for going through a yellow light if you could safely have stopped for it. Of course, I might not RC, and you see how often it happens, anyway.
I have a tempered degree of sympathy for these people. On the one hand, they did drink and drive, so they’re hardly innocent victims. On the other, the current legal BAC level is pretty arbitrary, all of them were first offenders, and none of them actually caused an accident, so the harshness of the sentences seems unwarranted.
Hi, folks, I followed a link and here I am, a retired deputy sheriff with lots of DWI arrests under my belt, most that stood up in court. I retired before the .08 limit took effect in my state.
While y’all are arguing over the breathalyzer’s accuracy or lack thereof, you are forgetting one minor detail. Actually two, anyone arrested for DWI can demand a blood test. That’s the first point, here’s number two. Unless a DWI suspect has been injured in a wreck or (rarely) during the arrest, that suspect doesn’t go NEAR a breathalyzer until he or she flunks the field sobriety tests.
That’s the hole in this argument. If someone’s motor control, reflexes and concentration is so bad that they cannot touch their nose with their finger while their eyes are closed, stand on one foor, follow a pencil with their eyes without moving their head, walk heel to toe without losing their balance, they flat don’t belong at the controls of an automobile. There are a few other tests given on the roadside, I don’t want to give away trade secrets.
Because of the way our kids were spaced and that the Boss decided early on that, if she had to work outside the home, there’d be at least one parent home with the kids I spent 22 years on the graveyard shift, 11PM to 7AM. Most of the other patrol deputies rotated shifts. Working that shift I had more DWI arrests than any other deputy, year in and year out. Nobody got put on the breathalyzer without failing the FSTs. They didn’t get the FSTs without doing something that attracted my eye first.
Now your complaints about the penalties are best directed to your state legislatures.
I live and worked a rural county. Nine times out of ten I’d get to the wrecks before the ambulance. Working a rural area I knew most of the people living and working in my sector. The mangled corpses and horribly injured people I pulled out of those cars were people I knew. When I threw away uniforms because they were too bloodstained to wear on duty, the blood was that of my friends and neighbors. You’ll pardon me if I don’t cry tears the size of horse turds for the poor put-upon drunk drivers.
Using the YAERD statistics* (and, BTW, that’s a terrible acronym), it appears that it’s mostly been a downhill trend from 1990 on. So, I got to thinking, what could have caused this?
Then I discovered when Molson’s famous “Don’t Drink and Drive” campaign began. Any guesses?
It was 1989.
How about when MADD went into the national spotlight? 1990, with the first MADD National Youth Conference, co-sponsored by the National Association of Broadcasters.
Now, have you noticed how drunk driving commercials and advertisements have petered out these last few years? Replaced, now, by the ONDCP’s vast array of misleading marijuana ads?
As one of MADD’s own website’s** says: “Although MADD has helped reduce drunk driving deaths by 40% since its founding in 1980, the current plateau in the progress to stop drunk driving is alarming. The 2000 statistics reflected an increase in alcohol-related traffic deaths and the preliminary 2001 statistics show almost no success in driving those numbers back down.”
So, wait a minute. After all the unnecessary legislation and pandering, drunk driving is INCREASING? So, what, we need more legislation? Well, no, actually. People don’t respond to laws (i.e., brute force) nearly as well as they respond to reasoning. Sure, there’s still some asshole who’ll get drunk and decide he can get home without the aid of a taxi or a friend, but mostly people are responsive to an ad campaign that tells the truth. “Don’t Drink and Drive” sparked many people into realizing the risks involved with the behavior, and when many people got drunk, they suddenly said to themselves “Wait, ‘don’t drink and drive’…”
So, far from being a commentary on the law, this is a commentary on the reason people curb their behavior. All the increased Atkin’s products and diets are the result of constant coverage that diet and health are–surprise surprise–important. So, if we stop now, stop before we implement useless obesity laws and legislation, then the problem, strangely enough, handles itself through sheer coverage of it.
No one’s concerned about drunk driving anymore. It’s now all about drugs, so the message has lost its impact and importance.
I’ve been saying it for years: People don’t want force, they want truth.
John
narphonax.com/blog
* http://www.yaerd.org/statistics.htm
** http://www.madd-nc.org/about_hist.htm
Peter the cop,
Didn’t you forget to mention that everyone fails the field sobriety test (unless for some odd reason you decide to let them pass)? So it really doesn’t mean a thing when you say that only those that fail the FST take the breathalyzer. Because that’s basically everyone!
Yes you can take the blood test, but then IF YOU PASS the blood test they then start searching for drugs in your blood, because they have to charge you with something. That’s true in california anyway.
The DUI laws are so rewarding to law enforcement that many local governments will not allow the prosecutors to drop the case even when it becomes apparent the accused was not guilty. Therefore, you must go to trial, which can be more expensive that pleading guilty, which forces you to plead guilty or plea bargin. It’s all about money, not making us safer.
The offence is driving under the influence, so it’s immaterial whether anyone has caused an accident or not.
It isn’t possible to be convicted on the strength of a breath test in britain, a positive breath test means the cops take you to the station for the more accurate blood test.
It is possible to fail the breath test and just pass the blood test. Refusing to give either a breath or blood sample will get you arrested.
Drink driving laws need to be harsh, or the message just doesn’t get through. Everyone feels that they are a better than average driver, and one of the effects of alcohol is that it boosts your confidence and lessens your ability to assess risk.
Cars kill more people than aeroplanes, and we don’t allow pilots to drink, so why drivers?
If you want to drink and drive, build or borrow your own private track.
Peter the cop,
Forty ouncer is right. Ability in a FST doesn’t mean shit. Even if you “pass” a sobriety test, if a cop smells alcohol you’re going to take a breathalyzer.
And blowing below .08 doesn’t mean you wont be arrested and charged anyway. People who blow below .08, while not legally drunk, can and often are still charged with driving while impaired.
If a cop asks you to take a FST and you have had even one drink, you’re fucked.
Can anyone tell me why DUI should be a crime in the first place?
billy-jay:
It falls under the “reckless endangerment” section of the law, where-in a person knowingly places other people in harm through their actions.
John
narphonax.com/blog
Hello, End of Threadsville.
Roach said something about the laws influencing responsible people to not DUI. . .
Actually, I don’t drive drunk because I don’t want to kill myself or somebody else. I couldn’t give two shits about prison or fines. If I’m stupid enough to risk my life and others’, I figure I deserve what I get.
The laws have nothing whatever to do with my seatbelt-wearing, sober-driving behavior.
Well Bronwyn, that was a brilliant “sample of one” study you just performed. Bravo.
So what there were criminal and financial repercussions to driving intoxicated? Boo hoo.
Yet another intelligent argument. “So what if American citizens have their civil rights stripped from them in the name of ‘national security’. Boo hoo.”
Injustice and biased/unbalanced justice can’t be ‘boo hoo’d away. The fact that these people broke the law and pay the price for their choice is not what we’re “boo hoo”-ing about. It’s not as if everyone is sitting around championing drunk driving. Instead, the issue is imbalanced and unfair legislating. It’s the same with so-called “hate” crime legislation. If I whack someone in the face with driving wood because I’m mad at them, is that any different from me whacking them in the head because I hate the color of their skin? In the eyes of the law, why should it be? In both instances, I meant to cause harm.
Conversely, if I am driving eratically, speeding, and flipping through my CD case, and I smash into another car and kill the driver, is that any different than if I was driving with a .15 bac and smashed into another car and killed the driver? No. But the punishments are different. That is called imbalanced justice. Or, in other words, no justice at all. Simply having a BAC of .08 does not automically mean that I am a hazard to other drivers. Nor does having a BAC of .00 automatically mean that I am NOT a hzard to other drivers. Therefore, when someone gets pulled over for, say, having a tail-light out, or gets to a police checkpoint, and no actual hazardous driving actions are witnessed, but the officer “smells alcohol” on his breath, and thus, gives him a FST and breathalyzer, and he blows a .08, and goes to prison, then it is imbalanced justice.
If you want a big list of glaring injustices, wherein those convicted, or even suspected, of DUI, are subject to laws and regulations that not even rapists or murderers are subject to, look at Virginia’s New Big Ol’ List of Crooked DUI Injustices.
The issue here is not that people convicted/accused of DUI infractions are poor, persecuted souls who deserve to be exonerated. Nobody is “boo hoo”-ing over their choice to drink and drive. The issue, instead, is that DUI laws are unfairly imbalanced, and that they routinely strip people of their constitutional rights, and go further than even murder or rape laws.
All you have done is build this big ass strawman, then burn him down. Good job, Supergenius. Now, care to actually address the issue at hand?
It falls under the “reckless endangerment” section of the law, where-in a person knowingly places other people in harm through their actions.
And what if I have a .08, and am driving perfectly, putting nobody in harms way, and I get to a police checkpoint. The cop smells beer on my breath, I blow a .08, and I end up going to prison. Meanwhile, as the cop is spending is time arresting me, some crazy-ass, albiet sober, driver is fumbling with his CD’s, talking on the phone, and cutting people off. Until he gets to the police checkpoint, wherein he puts away his CD’s and telephone, stops cutting people off, and makes nice with the officers. They let him through, and he goes on his way, free to drive like a maniac again. But at least I’m in prison.
No Mr. Roach sarcasm monster, it wasn’t a study and I claimed no such thing. You posited a hypothesis – no, actually an assumption thusly: Bronwyn, I assume you and everyone reading this article and everyone with a lot to lose (i.e., responsible people) are more likely to take cabs, sober up, etc because of the risk of a DUI/DWI arrest.
I spoke for myself, as I can speak for no one else, and posited that your hypothesis (assumption grounded on little evidence) may be incorrect.
MEOW! hissss
I just think that the sob-story from the Washington [Post] was over the top.
What was “over the top” about it? Did you actually read the whole thing? Or did you skim it, then assume it was championing drunk driving? It was simply reporting on facts: the fact is, the outrageously high financial costs surrounding a DUI conviction are ruining lives. Nowhere in the article does it say that these people should be let free. Actually, the article itself stops short of actually criticizing the imbalanced DUI laws that lead to these ruined lives…which, while I was disappointed, was good, considering that the piece was not an op-ed column.
I could understand your “over the top” criticism if the article had actually said “we should repeal DUI laws! Look at all these poor saps!” But it didn’t. Actually, the tone of the column didn’t even seem to lean towards the side of the anti-prohibitionists at all. If anything, it seemed like the author was leaning more towards a cautionary tale, than towards a sympathetic plea. So, tell me, Roach:
1) Did you read the entire article (it was the Wash Post, not the Times)
2) What is “over the top” about reporting facts?
This one’s an interesting case. I’m not especially enthusiastic for the rights of those who drive under the influence of alcohol, but sensible limits are clearly required both from a libertarian perspective and an economic one (throw tax payers in jail on a whim and watch while public spending balloons).
I like Ms Dani’s suggestion. Tight limits on blood-alcohol levels but only fines for small-scale offenders (drive after 4 six packs and I pretty much want you in jail whatever the other circumstances) and only harsher penalties for those whose driving is discernibly erratic or who persistently offend.
It’s not without problems, but it looks more sensible all round from where i’m sitting.
I read it. I thought by focusing on the offenders and not at all on victims, it was “over the top” by omission.
Someone above asks why not just punish reckless driving, especially when it causes accidents. The goal of this whole system is optimal deterrence, I should think. In that case, one of the cost factors is ease of prosecution. It is much easier to show BAC than really reckless driving (though less so in the age of dashboard mounted police cameras). In any case, this is a proxy. It’s a good proxy for recklessness and danger. And it’s easier (i.e., cheaper) to prove up in Court.
The point of this whole thing is not perfect justice. It’s optimal deterrence. And ease of prosecution is a relevant fator.
Bronwyn you (stupidly) called me a troll first for not drinking Radley’s Kool-Aid.
And others, why are you so suspicious of field sobriety tests. I’ve actually passed one. A cop told us he uses them. What makes you all experts? How many have you administered, passed, or failed.
Evan Williams,
I do freely admit that I skimmed through the article with a less than 100% attention span. I didn’t get the impression from the article that it was about the high cost of DUI convictions versus anything else. All I took away was a few poor little me stories about people (with the exception of the .09 BAC woman) who put themselves and others in danger needlessly. My comments were in response to my perception of the articles message.
With that said, I agree with your stance that DUI laws are unfair/unbalanced with other actions that may have the same effect (like cell phone talking, putting on make-up, etc) while driving. That’s not the message I took away from the article. It’s a risk I take by doing this kind of stuff while I’m working…;)
*sigh*
Pardon me while I feed the troll.
Ok, Roach. You started with “There should be a constitutional amendment permitting people to drive drunk. This is a sacred right. Any interference with it violates our natural rights to increase the risk of fatal accidents whose consequences we can escape with underinsurance and the bankruptcy code.”
Without a sarcasm tag, that looks very much like a typical fark-style trolling move, particularly as it had nothing whatever to do with the meat and substance of the matter at hand.
But hey, that’s ok.
Anybody else see a resemblance between Serpent and Roach, besides the obvious?
(See? Sarcasm.)
In any case, outside of the rhetoric, you haven’t shown us that any direct evidence that the DUI laws are saving any lives. Keep calling me stupid if you want, but you’re still missing the point.
Evan:
I wasn’t making an argument, I was just saying where it fits into the law.
John H.
narphonax.com/blog
I cited stats above. Check it out.
I said ‘direct evidence’. What you cited were correlative data.
I do know the difference.
I passed a field sobriety test. I was a jerk to the officer too. He made one of my passengers finish the trip home. My only guess was that he either didn’t want to ruin my life, or he didn’t want to do the paperwork. But I was successful in all of the tests…
I’ll tell you what, I’ll get you that direct evidence when you get me direct evidence criminalizing murder deters that crime.
In life we often have to make decisions, even public policy decisions, under conditions of uncertainty.
Do you doubt increases in price reduces consumption of, say, hamburgers? Any direct evidence other than correlative statistics? I don’t think we can do much better in this dep’t, though I’m all ears.
“I’ll tell you what, I’ll get you that direct evidence when you get me direct evidence criminalizing murder deters that crime.”
Ah, but I never made such a claim. You however, suggested that the laws actually decreased DD fatalities, or had some direct effect on the numbers of people driving drunk.
But if you don’t want to play, that’s cool.
:)
And yes, I doubt price increases (at least, up to a certain point) will/would reduce consumption of burgers/alcohol/gasoline/cigarettes. For instance, with gas prices so high this year (high as far as what we’re used to here in the US), gas consumption did not significantly decrease. There reports on this in several national and regional newspapers. No it’s not direct evidence, and yes it’s totally irrelevant to the question at hand.
I think the point many folks here are trying to make is that writing yet more laws is not going to solve the current problem and may in fact be making the problem worse – either by the numbers or in actual direct effects.
Sort of like the BMI problem. Change the definition, you get more or less fat people. Change the dui limits and you get more or less drunk people. . . all without actually changing the numbers of people who are driving while impaired (or are actually morbidly or even mildly obese).
Good night, everyone. Time to head home.
My suggestion–perhaps I was too oblique–is that you can never observe causation when dealing with public policies just correlation. You have to use a little imagination to figure whether those correlations are related or not.
As for gas, that just shows an inelastic demand curve. Obviously at some price there will be a change; same with criminal laws. Or so I reasonably hypothesize.
roach. The most likely scenario for me is that demand is inelastic in the short term (old habits die hard, lots of people don’t pay attention to law changes and, in the case of gas, people tend to use their cars come what may) but elastic in the long-run once more people are aware of a law, have read about cases like this or, in the case of gas, have bought a smaller car to save money.
On the minus side, more draconian laws and higher gas prices have negative consequences too.
In life we often have to make decisions, even public policy decisions, under conditions of uncertainty.
That having been said, the question remains: even if said uncertain data shows that certain laws have a “positive” effect on specific instances, does that data then justify unjust or imbalanced legislation? For example, if putting people in prison lowers murder rates, then, does that justify torture, considering that torture might decrease murder rates even more? Or is there a tipping point, at which we say yes, certain actions may bring desireable results for some, but those actions are morally unjust?
For example, what if, in your city, there were 3 times as many rapes against black women than there were against non-black women. So, the legislature, in an effort to curb rapes against black women, made the punishments much harsher for that crime than rapes on non-black women…and they started removing typical legal protections, like bail, etc., but only for rapes on black women. And they made it so that it was easier to be charged with rape on a black women than on other women. And then, they told the courts that, in cases of rape of black women, the court should “be most favorable to the prosecution”.
Now, of course, the actual crimes are similar. Rape a white woman, an asian woman, a black woman, it’s the same. But the legislature has put forth imbalanced and unjust legislation, all to curb the high rates of rape against black women.
Is this “ok”? Even if correlative data shows that the laws are cutting down on black rape? Is it OK to strip people of the constitutional rights, in order to acheive a social goal?
No, we would probably all agree that it is not.
Then why is it, if I get pulled over for driving eratically, and I have a BAC of .00, then I get a $100 ticket and go on my way, but if I get pulled over for driving eratically, and have a .08 BAC, then I go to prison and end up having thousands and thousands of dollars in fees levied upon me? Both crimes are the same: driving eratically. But this imbalance of justice is being fueled by emotion and, as you call it, “correlative data”.
No amount of correlative data justifies unjust and imbalanced laws.
The bottom line is driving drunk is not a crime. Period. No victim, no crime. The problem of drunk driving accidents – as well as all others – would be draconian, and equal, eye-for-eye penalties if you cause a wreck – be it through negligence, intoxication, or lack of driving skill. It doesn’t really matter to the person you kill if you were drunk or just stupid – why the hell does the law differ???
T
DUI laws in the dark
The Washington Post profiles various local residents who saw their lives turned upside down, sometimes losing their marriage or livelihood, after being arrested under driving-under-the-influence laws which mandate automatic license suspension for first…
Folks, there are several organizations now fighting back against these ridiculous DUI laws. RIDL (http://www.ridl.us) is one of them.
And there are hundreds and thousands of people who most certainly ARE being arrested with BAC’s of .08/.09 who are not drunk after only having one drink. And in some cases NO drinks!!! Come to our discussion forum and read some of their stories. It’s an outrage.
Why does that seem to go against the “conventional wisdom” about BAC?
Because the organizations who are creating these laws have been lying to all of us about the number of drinks it takes to reach a certain BAC level. They want you to believe it takes six drinks in a two hour period to get to .08. As a result many well intentioned people are having two or three drinks over a two to four hour period and finding themselves labelled as “dangerous criminals” when they broke no law, nor endangered no one.
Just as in the movie “Minority Report”, anti-alcohol organizations would have us believe that we have to arrest people for something they *might* do, not what they have actually done.
It is science-fiction nightmare come true. And it’s time for all of us to put a stop to it. Please join us.
Jeanne Pruett
President and CEO
Responsibility In DUI Laws, Inc.
TB responds to KipEsquire
KipEsquire of A Stitch in Haste conducted an economic analysis of zero tolerance to drinking and driving and concluded it was an appropriate “corner solution” to the problem. His reasoning is sound but his facts are flawed.