|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*| ============================================= NEWS FROM THE LIBERTARIAN PARTY OF VIRGINIA PO Box 28263 Richmond VA 23228-0263 703-715-6230 World Wide Web: http://www.LPVA.com ============================================= For immediate release: January 28, 2009 ============================================= For additional information, contact:
Marc Montoni or Karen Kwiatkowski, Ph.D LPVA Communications Committee [email protected] LPVA Voicemail: 703-715-6230 Website: www.LPVA.com ============================================= LIBERTARIANS: END THE WAR ON CELL PHONES! There are many important transportation challenges facing the Commonwealth, and our legislators are apparently keeping busy. Senate Bill 874, proposed and passed two to one in the Committee on Transportation last week, is a case in point. SB 874 will prohibit drivers from using a cell phone, unless it is hands-free. This type of proposal to restrict driver freedom comes with no justification of increased traffic safety, because there isn't any. Instead, this bill proposes to set up innocent drivers, particularly those from out of state and average Virginians who live busy lives and don't follow the latest news from Richmond, for more tickets, more fees and additional fines. Surprise! It's a fundraiser! State troopers and cops would be exempt from this requirement. Even though SB 874 is all about "safety," if passed, truck drivers and bus drivers on I-95, I-66, I-64, and I-81 and all other roads would also be exempt. If passed, Virginia would join the likes of big tax, low-liberty states like California, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Washington, and the District of Columbia. Here's what we know: · Using a cell phone while driving - just like talking and listening to actual passengers, eating, drinking, fumbling with controls and seat belts, looking at maps or for signs, thinking about work and daydreaming - can distract a driver from his or her primary task. · A 2008 Carnegie Mellon University study found that listening on a cell phone, e.g., having a conversation, reduces the amount of brain activity dedicated to driving by 37 percent. · Hands-free cell phone legislation advocates often make the false and unscientific case that it ISN'T the talking and listening that leads to accidents, but that with hands-free phones, the driver will keep both hands on the wheel. They don't. · Happily, traffic fatalities across the country have fallen to the lowest number since 1994. In 2007, the NHSTA also reported that the fatality rate per 100 million vehicle miles traveled had declined to its lowest point in history. At the same time, between 1997 and 2007, cell phone usage in the United States quadrupled from 55 million to 250 million Americans. There is one fact that the Transportation Committee understands. Punitive laws like this will increase sales of hand free devices for a short term increasing in sales tax revenue, and it will significantly increase the state and local take through tickets, fines and court fees. Safety on the roads, as with chain saws, kitchen knives, and hot stoves, is a direct result of personal responsibility and awareness that there are serious consequences if we fail to pay attention to the task at hand. Americans in general, and Virginians in particular, are a pretty responsible group. Americans already tend to be safe drivers and responsible cell phone users. Virginia's DMV crash facts indicate that between 1971 to the present, Virginia drivers have proven to be significantly above average in driver safety. Freedom and personal responsibility works. Instead of more punitive fundraising tricks that hurt average Virginians, we need a legislature that cherishes our liberty, and fights for it. # 30 # 30 # 30 # *************************************************************************** Karen Kwiatkowski, Ph.D. is a retired USAF lieutenant colonel and regular LewRockwell.com contributor. She has written on defense issues with a libertarian perspective for a variety of publications, hosted the call-in radio show American Forum, and blogs occasionally for Huffingtonpost.com and Liberty and Power. Her archive is at http://www.lewrockwell.com/kwiatkowski/kwiatkowski-arch.html . *************************************************************************** |*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*|*| -- end -- ############################################################# Have an announcement you'd like to post? SCC members & many committee heads are all authorized to post; or you may send your announcements to the List Master: <mailto:[email protected]?subject=announcement>. ################################################## Unsubscribe: Send an email to [email protected] with no subject and "Unsubscribe Announce" as the text. ############################################################# Libertarian Party of Virginia http://www.LPVA.com Phone: 703-715-6230
