Thursday, April 24, 2008

Safety Dance - Road Edition

A curious query crossed my mind as I traversed a now much longer interstate trip than in recent times. Pretending as though there is a choice, amongst the dangers of the open road, which poses more of a threat, vehicles in the hands of the police, a drunk or an idiot? The police are out enforcing rigorous preemptive law to ensure people are more than adequately punished before they commit a crime to drive revenue to drive more per capita traffic units to drive more revenue. Now don't confuse the intent of this particular musing. There are probably a solid 10% of the police force that focuses on actual crime, but only in a very reactive state. This is not unforeseeable as the actual workforce is tied up fining citizens and ensuring they travel at 35mph as opposed to 37mph. A noble task to be sure, though I do wonder about it's effectiveness. The drunk and the idiot are sharing similar ground. An idiot is always more dangerous than a drunk on the road, but a drunken idiot obviously reigns supreme. Often, it is very hard to distinguish between these two on the open road.

My curiosity comes from the similarity of these three groups in their interactions with the road system. They each serve only their own interests but don't openly admit it. All three will tell you they are not a threat. All three cause traffic disruptions. All three ignore the laws and do as they please. The police will say the drunks are the problem, the drunks will say the police are the problem, and of course the idiots say everyone and everything else is the problem provided it is not them.