Its a fucking slippery slope that's for sure. Here's a section of the Racial Discrimination Act in Australia, and its wording and implications are actually downright fucking scary: Now the intent of that law I have no problem with, i've got no time for racist assholes and you shouldn't have to humiliate or intimidate someone to get your point across, but the rest of the wording is downright dangerous in my opinion... in this politically correct day and age people can and do get offended/insulted at just about anything. Can you imagine that shit in the US? Hell, Donald Trump would be up on charges in a fucking heartbeat just based on his twitter feed. If anyone wants to read a little more about how its been functioning in practice: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...e/news-story/03037ee74deee25572fe2fd41bccf721
I've been seeing more and more stories like this one lately: A guy stops to help the victim of a motorcycle crash and he's hit by a car and killed. The driver of the car had been drinking and had 7 (SEVEN!) previous DUI convictions. Why was that driver not in prison? Seven DUI convictions pretty much proves you have no impulse control and need constant supervision to make sure you don't hurt/kill someone with your actions. Yes, she's going to be put away now....but only after she totally destroyed another family, because we all know she certainly didn't have a license or insurance. Why has this country stopped holding people accountable when they break the law? http://www.wmcactionnews5.com/story...ath-of-pedestrian-has-7-prior-dui-convictions
Prisons are full? If every state legalized marijuana, that would help, but it would be slow. I read that about 50% of federal prisoners are in for drug crimes. However, at the federal level, there is no retroactive ameliorative relief anyway. But, then, DUI convictions aren't federal offenses, so maybe State prisons would slowly ease up on overcrowding, to make room for stiffer accountability.
The state makes a shitload of money off DUIs. It's a racket. Each DUI carries with it increased fines which start in the thousands. How she managed to accrue 7 and not declare bankruptcy is astonishing, let alone get thrown in the clink for years. Depends on the state. FL, you get 3 (don't quote me), but the second one is going to cost you 15-20k. I'm sure Dixie will regale you with DUI punishments, which I think are ludicrous. 7 is pushing it. Like, if anyone sees you in a car after 7 DUIs they have the right to open fire on you.
toytoy, could you please stop extrapolating how everyone is not held accountable from a headline. In fact, the US holds more people 'accountable' than any other nation. We have 5% of the world's population, yet 25% of the prisoners. More than any other nation. Ah, but then you'll say 'but other countries just kill them.' Nope. We are in the Top 5 in the world in that as well. Stiffer accountability? You do know that DUI's are a per se offense, right? Meaning, over the limit and you're guilty. You also know in most states that you're not entitled to a jury trial, despite there being severe consequences, right? And while there is no ameliorative relief, you can pardon drug offenders. In fact, Obama did that recently, including Broncos' receiver Daryius Thomas's mom whom had been in prison for 10 years for a drug offense. States can do it too. When I worked in the court system in NJ, probably 80% of our docket were drug offenses. It has completely destroyed the criminal justice system. As I noted above, if you want to hold people more 'accountable' then fine, increase the penalties, include jail time, but for the love of the Constitution, let's have jury trials if everyone is out for blood. Having people routinely locked up for things in a fucking traffic court is a travesty. The other big problem? Privatized prisons. Once there is profit motive, then voila, the amount of prisoners, and length of terms, has gone up. Amazing.
When it comes to DUIs, we also have a problem with how the special interests lobby them. MADD began as an attempt to get drunks off the road. The problem with this noble statement happens when your ulterior motive is puritanical and anti-alcohol. MADD has successfully lobbied to reduce the blood alcohol level of intoxication to 0.05 in some provinces, with no appreciable science proving that you function worse at 0.05 vs. 0.08. That would be bad enough, but the punishment for a non-accident drunk driving incident is borderline outrageous. In Alberta, let's say I get pulled over and blow 0.10. Just a touch over the legal limit, probably indicating that either I had one too many drinks or that my timing was bad and if I'd left the bar 20 minutes earlier I'd be okay. Here's the fallout: - My license is immediately suspended for three months, without a trial. - If I choose to plead guilty, I have a federal criminal record that makes it difficult for me to travel, and I am without my license for the next nine months. - If I chose to plead not guilty and am found guilty at trial, I have the same criminal record but they will not count my earlier three month suspension against my time, so I am without a license for 12 more months. This is all on a first offense. MADD has successfully brainwashed people, so you might read all ^ that and say, "DRUNK DRIVERS ARE THE SCUM OF EARTH WHO CARES ABOUT THEM." Well, it matters. By punishing the driver before they've had a trial, we're in violation of the Charter of Rights. By adding a punitive measure to those who plead not guilty, we're also draconian. (I.e. "How dare you plead guilty! More time for you!") Think about that. If instead of drunk driving, I was accused of assault, I would not be punished before I had a trial. Yet we do it with drunk drivers. Additionally, MADD has been the subject of many numerous complaints about their practices and their fundraising tactics, to the point where they've been suspended from fundraising (I believe) three separate times. It has a fallout with the service industry, because anyone who is responsible just refuses to drink. If your tables for two all stop ordering alcohol, it really hurts your bottom line. I'm not arguing for leniency against people who have had some kind of accident while drunk. I am referring to the literally victimless crimes where the police pull you over and everyone starts collecting money, from the fines to the lawyers. Notice that people who text and drive are not nearly as vilified as those who drink and drive, and the data suggests that texting is more dangerous. So yeah. TL;DR fuck MADD and let's not go crazy on hating people who drink alcohol and drive cars. Get mad at the people having accidents.
I hired a guy last year and I started him immediately after the interview because I was in dire need of employees. His driving record came back a few days later, and this fucker had nine DUI convictions. Nine. He's 26 years old with nine DUI's and he still had a valid driver's license.
The correction for that should be a yearly insurance rate of, like, $20,000. Sure he might legally have a license but who could afford to be insured with that record?
More people than you'd think. And therein you're saying that you can break the law and put people's lives in danger, but only if you're wealthy.
There are companies out there that will insure anyone. Sub standard carriers cater to them and bank the premiums because they can and do. Uninsured drivers with a record or none (yes there are dipshits out there that have clean records but no insurance because they "can't afford it") are everywhere and one big factor in why we all pay high premiums. What's the saying...young, dumb and full of cum, for the most part.
This right here. People will just drive without insurance. Fuck, they'll drive without licenses. If you've been in an accident or two here in New Jersey you've probably encountered this. Install interlock devices? They will drive another car or find some other way around it. Addicted people have a lot more ingenuity than you'd expect. I know plenty of people who have been in accidents and found out the other driver had no insurance. In one or two cases they had no license. I know at least one guy, with 3 DUIs, who drove without insurance or a license by copying someone else's paperwork. The only way to keep a repeat DUI offender off the roads is to jail them for a significant period of time, say after the third offense.
I do take some issue with the "they didn't get into an accident so shouldn't be an issue", the crimes shouldn't be punished based off dumb luck if whether you hit someone or whether there just didn't happen to be a car in the next lane when you slide into it a bit around a turn. Yes there should probably be different levels of punishment as your BAC rises above the limit (if there aren't already). Where I live I believe it is automatic six month suspension if you refuse a breathalyzer, so I agree some of the laws written have issues. But making it sound like just because you didn't get into an accident while someone else did means they did something worse than you is wrong in my opinion.
You also have to remember that the DUI wreck/fatality stats are skewed. If someone has a BAC of .08 and someone pulls out in front of them, crosses the yellow line, or runs a stop sign that wreck is attributed to DUI. It doesn't matter who is actually at fault in the accident. Once alcohol is involved it is automatically the impaired driver's fault which is bullshit in my opinion. Yes drunk driving sucks and is a bad thing but if Joe Blow had a few beers and someone T-bones him it shouldn't be his fault on the police report or in the statistics that MADD uses to shove prohibition down our throats.
Hoo boy, a DUI discussion. Having been through the legal system for that offense, I've got a few things to say about it, but I've got to get to work right now. I'll weigh in on this when I get home this afternoon.
In response to a few reps asking if I fired the guy with 9 DUI's, yes. I told him that I can't even afford to have him on my property. He begged me to reconsider, saying "Hey, everyone makes mistakes, I'm only human." Maybe he did learn his lesson, but it took 9 fucking times for that to happen. Not the kind of guy I want working for me.
My biggest issue with situations like that isn't so much what's on the record (within reason, talking MIPs, a DUI, theft for hot check, that kind of thing). I have an issue if they either lied about it during the interview and said they had a clean record, misrepresented what that record was, or showed no remorse when confronted with their record. Yes, everyone does make mistakes. We all should have gotten MIPs in college, I'm sure everyone has been guilty of driving with a little too much alcohol once in a while, and most of us have families to feed to a hot check or something can be explained. If you come clean, are honest about it when I ask you first thing during the interview, and show you've made some conscious action toward bettering yourself for it, then if it's no problem with licensing it's no problem with me. Honesty and integrity is important and some of the best people I've hired have backgrounds; it gave them a gut check they needed and they grew from it. But some people are just oblivious. You've got 3 DUI's and think it's the man's fault for catching you? Sorry bud, I'm not in the business of helping people get some self-awareness, you aren't for us. Think hot checks or stealing something was "just a phase"? Hmm, I went through the asshole phase (some may argue I'm still in it), but it never occurred to me to take something that didn't belong to me. TL;DR: People suck, especially when they don't own up to their mistakes.
So two unrelated things have converged for me recently: I've been biking to work every day and I've taken a big interest in self driving cars. This has made it very clear to me that we as a country have nowhere near the amount of respect for how dangerous cars are that we should. Three people are killed by cars for every one that is killed by guns in this country. We are so entitled to our privilege of driving that we've somehow construed it as a right. We are so inured to the damage it does that we accept it as inevitable, and will excuse away literally anything done behind the wheel as a "mistake." You can literally run a cyclist over intentionally, killing them, and escape with little more than a watered down conviction. The idea of prosecuting drunk driving fatalities under the felony murder rule, or prosecuting road rage or intimidation with a vehicle as assault with a deadly weapon, is utterly laughed at. You can bring a video of a driver attempting to run you off the road to the police, and they'll shrug and give you some useless defensive riding tips. Anything that threatens the absurd latitude we have granted to cars and drivers cannot be allowed to see the light of day.
I think that if a person isn't licensed, doesn't have required insurance, expired tag or otherwise not entirely legal to be on the road, any accident they are involved in should be considered 100% their fault. They aren't legal to drive, why are they on the road then? A driver cannot collide with something that is not there, and they shouldn't have been there. I had an employee rear-end an illegal vehicle driven by an unlicensed driver. My argument didn't hold up in court.