i went out before and was nearly in two major collisions with people who were talking in their cell phones/eating/not paying attention at the wheel.

i believe we as humans are prone to pick up habits very quickly. if i moved to a different part of the country, i would assimilate to living there -accent, actions, etc. i know that driving is different that assimilating to a situation, but you put people on their own behind the wheel of an automobile, and they need to assimilate to that situation.

the point i'm getting to is that some people can't handle it, and are terrible drivers. is it ethical for the government to test people on driving every say, 5 years or so? the government has a responsibility to protect it's citizens. or is it too much big government? do they not have the right to do this?

i really believe in this day and age this is a very, very tough topic to tackle.

you have really gotten preachy since you started working at fox

I've lived in the South for 4 years. No accent here.


Y'all.

maybe i went overboard with accents, but don't you think there is any assimilation to the situation you're presented with?

People down here drive like idiots. I hope I don't drive like them. People spend a lot of time rubbing me the wrong way. I don't think I've assimilated.

well my case here is people assimilate to the position of power they're put in when they get to drive an automobile. they get into bad habits because nobody is there to keep them in line. they feel protected inside their car and don't think about their actions.

this causes them to get bad habits. is testing every so often the answer?

riiiiiiiiiight, people driiiiiiiiive crazy in the south

*promises to rub you in the other direction*



(Couldn't resist. Please return to your regularly scheduled non-gutter dwelling discussions.)

Roads are one of the few arenas I consider truly public, so I wouldn't have a big problem with this philosophically. That being said, I don't know how practical it would be with costs, logistics, and all. I'd be willing to hear arguments from both sides.

During my first driving test, I made one of the dumbest mistakes: I performed a "rolling stop" through a four-way stop. My evaluator freaked out on me as I pulled out: "What are you doing! Do you realize what you've just done?"

I was so nervous, it wasn't until I had perfectly parallel-parked that I had realized my mistake.

I flunked that test, only to pass a couple of weeks later.

i don't see how a driving test would stop people from talking on the phone while they drive.
also, if you've passed it once, you're hardly going to fail in the future after you have even more driving experience. tests for elderly drivers, that's another story...

Are you still one of these ?


'Cos that might explain it.

i don't know that not being watched over while driving causes people to do the stupid things they do. i think it's more that some people feel the need to have the cell phone constantly attached to their heads: in the car, in the store, on the bus, in the hallway, at a restaurant, everywhere. we live in an on-the-go, very connected society and i'm not sure that anyone can change that. i went to a football game last weekend, and the people in front of me had their web capable cell phones out, watching clips of other games. it was ridiculous.

having said that, i don't think it's a bad idea to periodically retest drivers on both their knowledge of the rules of the road and their application of such rules. i know a lot of people study hard and get their licenses very young and then develop horrible driving habits. retesting people when they went to renew their licenses, perhaps, might allow the people who make rolling stops or tailgate or change lanes without looking to be weeded out.

Wait, you parallel-parked AFTER you rolled through a stop sign? They didn't just stop the test there? That's a pretty cruel tester you had there, making you parallel park, even though you had already failed.

On the subject of periodic testing. I'm all for it, but I don't think it would work. People act differently when they're being tested. I imagine drivers would be on their best behavior (and not talking on their phones) if there were someone from the DMV sitting next to them. Maybe a hidden camera would solve that problem.

My wife ran an errand downtown today, parked at a meter, put in a quarter, did her business, and returned to her car. She then made a phone call before she drove away, being the law in NY and all. Now there are three open spots behind her and a couple ahead of her; yet, some woman went totally apeshit on her, blowing the horn, screaming, gestures, fingers, the works. All because she wanted the last dime left on my wife's meter. Life is cheap, and too many morons proliferate. That is why I never assimilate.

I love making lurkers wait an extra long time for my spot. I'm nice about it if there is truly a lack of spaces, but if they're just being fat, lazy fucks who won't walk 100 feet to the store, they wait. And fume. And I laugh my ass off.

Funny how they're almost always driving a ridiculously huge SUV.