I agree to an extent – there ARE any number of things that should definitely NOT be left to the government to control. Things that spawned the term “nanny state” – things that a typical parent should – and used to – take care of themselves. But things change – not always for the better – and people today enjoy both a greater sense of freedom and a lesser sense of accountability for their actions. Can we have it both ways? Maybe, maybe not. I’m no expert, and I didn’t even sleep in a Holiday Inn last night.

But it doesn’t take an expert to recognize that there are vast differences between things that can, are, and should be controlled by legislation. if I do something stupid that only affects me – no, it shouldn’t be legislated. I should be left to take my lumps and (hopefully) learn from the experience. But if I do something stupid that can realistically affect others negatively? Who am I to infringe on THEIR rights to stay healthy and even alive? yeah, texting on the phone while driving is certainly stupid – but not the same silly, laughable stupid as what you’d see on the show Jackass. For all their recklessness, the things THOSE guys do only affects themselves. You know the disclaimers – closed set, done by experts, don’t try this at home – but in the real world there IS no closed set, things are NOT being done by experts, and things ARE being tried at home. Or on the road. And every single year there are more and more other people on the roads. The same roads where these idiots are driving recklessly while texting.
Make no mistake – texting while driving IS recklessness. I shouldn’t have to point out the difference between Careless driving and Reckless driving – Reckless is being done with intent; Careless is being done unintentionally, yet too often the terminology is academic – you don’t pay attention on the road, it’s not just you that can get hurt or killed.
And anybody who has ever had their car in an accident worse than a mere fender-bender knows, the car is NEVER the same again. the frame may be affected, the alignment may be off permanently – clearly the car was permanently affected by the accident.
It should go without saying that the human body is even more delicate than an automobile.
A person injured in an accident, no matter who caused the accident, is often injured in such a way that the injuries have a permanent affect on their health. Hurt your back? Pay the price for the rest of your life. Just about everybody knows someone with permanent back problems. So it doesn’t even matter if, when a person is injured by a driving texter, the driver’s insurance pays their medical bills. That person will never be the same again. So it’s not just a matter of our “freedoms” being put at risk by a control-hungry government – some things SHOULD be legislated. Because we, as a people, are too stupid to not do what we know we shouldn’t be doing. If we can get away with it, we will do it. And if we don’t see an immediate risk to ourselves, we don’t see any risk at all. But by no means does that mean that the risk isn’t there.

Appropriately enough, this was in the news just a few days ago:

As if people needed another example of why texting while driving is a bad idea, we have yet another example. The Associated Press is reporting about another car accident as a result of texting while driving. What makes this one really bad is the fact that the driver was operating a flat bed truck which already had another car on it. Oh, and I probably didn’t mention that not only was the guy texting on one phone, but he was also talking on another.

As a result of the man’s stupidity he ran into another car resulting in injuries to the 68-year old driver and the 8-year old niece in the car. If that wasn’t enough the truck then sideswiped a house and ended up in an in-ground pool. The 25-year old driver of the truck was charged with reckless driving, talking on a cell phone, and tailgating.
http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090731/ap_on_hi_te/us_tow_truck_in_pool (complete story from A.P.)

With the technology today, it seems a relatively simple matter to link GPS to phone movement. If the phone is moving during usage, a warning message is broadcast through the phone during a conversation as a disruption to the conversation or the letters of the text message warning is entered into the persons message. These warning messages repeate at predetermined intervals.

Pull over the phone is not moving and use of the phone can continue with out the annoyance.