From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Feb 10 2003 - 10:22:51 MST
--- BillK <bill@wkidston.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
> Sun Feb 09, 2003 12:55 pm Lee Corbin wrote:
> > By *taxing* an activity, however well intentioned, you invariably
> > weaken and damage an economy.
>
> Well, yes, all taxes are bad. Shall we have a vote on that?? ;-)
> But sometimes no taxes are worse.
>
> The USA has 42,000 (and rising) traffic deaths per year. That is
> quite a
> bit of damage to the economy, and to all the families involved. This
> continuing increase in death goes along in line with the increased
> usage of large cars like SUVs. Why????????
> The large size of the cars is *not* stopping the death toll on
> American roads.
Actually, since the US road death toll has been DROPPING as a
percentage for a number of years, congruent with a rise in the use of
SUV's, your claims aren't so clear. I might also point out that the US
death toll on the roads used to be well over 50,000, but dropped
significantly in response to a society-wide campaign against drunk
driving.
It is a fact that recent studies show that 1/3 of drivers responsible
for traffic accidents are under the influence of drugs other than
alcohol, particularly marijuana. This mirrors the similar trend in the
Netherlands.
>
> It is very cynical to just shrug and say "Well, people are free to
> kill themselves if they want to." Over half of these deaths are just
> bystanders who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
> People who cause accidents don't just kill themselves.
>
> To quote Leonard Evans again:
> 'U.S. traffic policy since the 1970s has been dominated by the
> delusion that safety can be achieved by changing vehicles to increase
> survivability in crashes.
> As measured by traffic deaths per million registered vehicles, the
> U.S. was the safest nation in the world in the early 1970s. Today it
> is in 13th place. Better-performing countries have not
> done anything that is either extraordinary or draconian -- they have
> simply not fallen into the obsessive focus on marginal factors such
> as tires, vehicle defects and airbags that dominate U.S. safety
> policy.'
The paramount contributor to traffic deaths in the US is the prevalence
of youth drivers with insufficient training, and elderly drivers who
hold onto drivers licenses long after they are no longer physically
able to be responsible drivers. Other countries are much more strict
about these two groups, which cause some 80% of all accidents.
In the US, despite state claims that driving is a 'priviledge'
conferred by the state, most citizens see driving as a right that
should not be confiscated under any but the most severe circumstances.
There is the popular notion that the UN Declaration of Human Rights
declares a 'right to drive'.
ANY nation which is more free than another is going to have more of its
citizens being injured and killed from their own stupidity and
irresponsibility than those who live in the less free nation and are
coddle and protected by the state from themselves.
>
>
> By being dependent on excessive oil consumption, the USA is handing
> over billions of dollars to the oil-producing countries and
> generating huge amounts of wealth in those countries.
Irrelevant. Fuel economy has no impact on vehicle safety, nor does the
degree to which gas consumers enrich third world thugs.
I might point out that it is europe which consumes far more middle east
oil than the US does, so if anybody is enriching terrorists and
tyrants, europe is more to blame, which explains the current policies
of France and Germany.
=====
Mike Lorrey
"Live Free or Die, Death is not the Worst of Evils."
- Gen. John Stark
"Pacifists are Objectively Pro-Fascist." - George Orwell
"Treason doth never Prosper. What is the Reason?
For if it Prosper, none Dare call it Treason..." - Ovid
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