stewie said:
your right, its not so much the states job to protect you from you, but from others. and you may very well be in the top 10% of drivers in CommieFornia. thats great, but it still leaves you with a good area for error, and more importantly a HUGE area for error of others. i dont worry about my or your driving, its just everyone else that i worry about hitting me!
im not a cop yet, but i still have helped scrape a dead guy off the interstate as a good sam until the uniformed folks arrived in fast cars, big trucks, a box van and a helo. just because the vics car rolled after being cut off, and the "hurt realy bad" guy and the dead en rout guy were ejected for not wearing belts, the state had to send out 4 utah highway patrol troopers, 3 fire rescue trucks, 3 ambulances (one spectator in shock from seeing that much blood and the human figure contorted so) and one life flight helo. sure, insurance pays for some, but not all of the states expences responding to people who put "their own lives in danger." not to mention responding to an incident is inherntly dangerous as it is- people like to cut off vehicles with flashing red and blue lights. if my wife gets hurt running code as an EMT to anyones accident scene because they didnt wear a seatbelt, i will seriously find and hurt that person.
as a former (military) and hopefully future (civilian) cop, people need to wake up and realize that its not just their own lives that they put in danger
rant off.
True. Entirely true. However, while there is a margin for error in my driving (I freely accept that,) I find it tolerably small, since I've also made an effort to take as much advanced driver training as possible (most of it in the Air Force,) and - out here, anyhow - I have noted that most drivers honestly shouldn't be. More annoying that they're doing stupid stuff, and have the nerve to get annoyed with me when THEY screw up! (Oh, the stories I could tell...)
I watch where I'm going, I try very hard not to be distracted while I'm driving (don't get me started on being on the 'phone WHILE YOU'RE DRIVING!) I carefully rig and secure all loads I carry (I've lost one, and I was taking measures to control damage once I noticed it was loose - and took action STRAIGHT AWAY to secure it again and make sure there wasn't anything left on the road!) and I was taught in Driver's Ed that, as a driver, I am responsible for all people within my vehicle as passengers, any load I'm carrying and how it may affect others, and responsible for my actions as they intersect with other people.
Driver's Ed out here, lately, is not even farcical enough to be a joke. Add to the fact that the California Driver's Test is written wrong (the "right" answers aren't even close!) and having incompetent instructors and incompetent examiners is NOT a recipe for competent drivers!
With me so far? I take seriously my responsibilities as a driver, and that seems to set me so far apart from other drivers out here that it just isn't funny.
I'm not a cop either - but I've seen my share of roads "incidents" (I have also found that most of them are not truly "accidents" in the proper definition) and helped clean up a few, and been First Responder to more than a few dozen. I've seen people get cleaned off the roadway with pressure washers, and sopped up with sponges. THIS is why I have so much trouble with incompetent drivers - I know what my "margin of error" is - while figuring out what the "margin of error" is for the typical California driver is something that I find to be a hole with no bottom.
Add in that the "typical" California driver drives like he's the only person on the whole damn road, and you can begin to understand my animus. Hell, I think most of them come from countries where a Schwinn is equivalent to a Mercedes, and cars are a rarity - AND that license examinations here are given in quite a few languages other than English (all the road signs are in English, all the cops speak English, and all the damn near everything else is in English. I'm not about to speak other languages - even if I COULD still remember them - here in my home country because someone else can't be arsed to learn mine...) and you've got accidents LOOKING for a place to happen!
So, what do you suggest I do, otherwise? I've got to stay out here for at least a couple more years, I'm in the middle of a few degrees right now...
5-90
