Really interesting argument. Honestly. But thinking it over, I have to disagree.


I don't see what's wrong about forcing people to avoid seriously courting danger for others. It is money-and-life saving pragmatism. It is illegal to put yourself in a situation where there's a damn good chance you'll kill someone else - tough shit.

You can't fly a plane untrained because there's a good chance you'll fuck up and kill someone - even if you inist "you can handle it." You can't build an unsafe bridge and wait for the collapse to get charged. You can't place a loaded gun in your nursery and let negligence charges wait until a child successfully shoots themselves.

The hazardous situation doesn't have to manifest itself to be wrong - wrong enough to legistlate against, if it's dangerous enough.

I actually think you can put a loaded gun in a nursery and wouldn't get charged unless someone got hurt or killed.

Drunk driving = bad driving.

If you chose to drive recklessly (criminally recklessly), you'll be charged. If you drive drunk, you are driving recklessly even if you don't feel it to be so. It's a seperate charge, but same principle applies.

I don't see how one can support the freedom to drive drunk without also supporting driving with blatant disregard to other's safety.

Because possessing a blood alcohol content above a .08 does not make one a reckless driver. I can only repeat this so many times before I wonder if any of you are listening. BAC can only ever raise the likelihood of one being a danger to others, it doesn't act as a guarantee.

Yeah, it sort of does. If there is no danger, then what harm or potential harm is there being commited?

Actually, no. I don't agree with the concept of "freedom from ___". There are only "freedom of" rights, really. "Freedom from hunger", ack, ridiculous.
Amazing considering you, what, read two paragraphs I wrote. If you mean I wasn't being a good libertarian, well, that's what I said from the beginning. If you mean I wasn't smart, well, your opinion. Maybe I'm being too nice in letting people online dictate to me my beliefs.
No, I'm not equating anything. Most libertarians I come across are. I make the point, perhaps, to someone not familiar that most libertarian party members are kind of crazy.

Curiously, are you a libertarian? You seem like it from virtually all of your posts (and quoting the Mises Institute) but you seem to mock it at the same time. But, you know, that might just be because mockery is big here.

You mean like the right to bear arms, the freedom of speech, and the freedom from unreasonable searches?

I'm not dictating your beliefs, I'm just telling you that you're wrong.

Most libertarians aren't even party members. Libertarians with a capital L refer to a rank and file, while libertarians are merely ideologues that usually vote republican.

I am, but there are crazy libertarians like there are crazy liberals and conservatives. In his New Year's Resolution for 1976, Murray Rothbard wished that the survivalist and free soiler libertarians would actually go off and live in the mountains or start their own country so that they wouldn't be a part of the movement that actually wanted to change things in the real world.

I can still see a justification for this sort of thing, however. It's an added punishment to curtail preventable accidents.

I don't know if the point I'm trying to make is clear, though. Yes, it seems wrong that two people making the same mistake and causing the same problem (i.e., a fatal car accident) should get different sentences. But considering one of them made a bad choice which could have prevented the accident, it does make sense to have an additional disincentive for willingly making a choice that causes high risk to others.

Economically speaking, it's an externality. Drunk drivers are more likely to incur a cost to others (in addition to themselves). A penalty for drunk driving works to shift the cost of that externality back to its source. Of course, whether or not it actually works is entirely debatable.

Additional Spam:
Let's not forget Stan Jones.

People who are hot for child porn are at a greater degree of becoming future kiddy-touchers, although it's not a guarentee.

You need to stop this now. I don't know what you think you're doing, but it needs to be put out of its misery.

Additional Spam:
Your time is too precious to read a study or two, but you have enough time to raise a tempest in a teacup over the tyranny of drunk driving laws.

I keep telling you to stop why aren't you listening to me. I only have your best interests in mind, now that it's obvious you're operating under the influence of hysterics.

Look bitch, cut this retarded shit. I don't give a fuck what you have to say at this point, especially when all you can do is tell me to "stop it" and debunk my statements with ridiculous hyperbole. Cut it out.

Because I don't care. I've mentioned several times that this is a matter of principle for me, and people are free to disagree. Yes, I don't think I should have to research other people's arguments for them, and no I'm not going to "stop it" because it will make you think less of me. I'm tired of this shit you're pulling.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. You need to stop this, Brady, for our sake as well as your own. It's gone well beyond appearances. People are starting to notice, I don't think that's something you want.

Hopefully what they notice is that I react negatively to being condescended to.

Maybe if you didn't compare drunk drivers to those complicit in child rape and didn't act like my fucking mom, I wouldn't seem so "hysterical."

No, you still would. that's the only explanation I can think of when someone makes a thread proposing dropping drunk driving laws and then insist that everyone around you comes up with evidence that you then ignore.

I don't know what crawled into the vag and I dont' want to know, so just stop this

A large body of scientific research indicates that people will act more recklessly, will react more slowly, and will be distracted more easily when they're tired or drunk (especially both). The physiological and psychological effects on people are well understood. Accidents occur when people don't react properly or quickly enough, or put themselves in a place where it's physically impossible to react quickly enough (like exceeding the tolerances of your car or your grip on the road). If you wish to deny either of those facts, you may as well say it's faeries and leprechans keeping you safe on the highway.

This is what causes the indisputable statistics that alcohol (often combined with fatigue and inexperience) is one of the most common factors in wrecks and fatalities on the road, even though most of the people on the road are sober. Alcohol reduces the very functions that are most necessary to avoid accidents, in tight situations, and often leads to putting yourself in those tight situations more than you otherwise would.

A small amount of drinking is a small amount of difference in driving habit, but the legal limit is a place where the vast majority of people will have noticeably altered driving habits. Court challenges to the law have failed (or caused it to be altered upward in some cases) because of that. It's not a totally arbitrary limit.

(It's also illegal to drive if you can't stay awake at the wheel. Are you going to claim that's not a danger to others? A lot of people doing it anyway isn't a good excuse. People are very good at rationalizing their behavior in order to get home faster, and to save their pride.)

Look, I shouldn't have to explain myself to you. I've orchestrated my arguments, very specifically in this thread. It's not my fault that your selective interpretation of shit I never said is making you think less of me.

What's crawling into my "vag" is that people (not all) keep addressing points that I didn't make. I never said that being drunk doesn't cause accidents. I never said that the studies were wrong, I questioned their science which wasn't mentioned in the report.

I'm not going to sit here and be demonized for shit I didn't say. You're turning this into the Denicalis drama all over again, so stop telling me what I can or can't argue.

Did you point out any studies that defends the point you have made? I looked over your posts, but all I saw was cockamime bullshit retoric coming from you alone.

That you defend your laziness with 'I question the validity of these studies, but that's all the effort I make' is fooling exactly no one. I can't understand why you don't listen when you're being talked to.

Denicalis drama? Don't drag me into this. You haven't threatened to ban lurker yet, so it's hardly your usual bullshit with me. This is Brady-Lurker drama. You're being utterly inept about something that doesn't involve me this time, leave it that way.

Yeah, God forbid I recall an event that was caused in part by you. You'll notice I'm not invoking you for any fault in this. This is between lurker and me.

I shouldn't need a study to illustrate that probabilities are not guarantees, and no I'm not going to root through 30 studies for an uknown number that may be scientifically sound. That the report was already using "science by consensus" should be enough to put the burden of proof on the consensus.

No, but you damn well better back up your claims when you suggest getting rid / severely overhauling a whole country's worth of traffic laws on the basis of pedantic nitpicking.

How can I back up a claim with a study that I know would be based on criteria that's impossible to measure? Are there any countries that don't have BAC laws? Can you run a survey where people are honestly going to answer that yes, they do drive drunk despite the law?

perhaps such studies don't exist because the evidence is overwhelmingly against them. Why doesn't this tip you off?

I figured it out. I told you to stop it, you wouldn't listen, and now I'm on to you.

You're a fucking terrorist.

Between getting rid of the drunk driving laws and advocating a return of the gold standard (sup depressions) you want to destroy America.

get the fuck out hajj

I don't think anyone's denying these facts. What Bradylama's argument stems from is the belief that something is only really a crime if it deprives someone else of life, liberty, or property (perhaps with some rare exceptions).

While driving with a BAC of 0.8 certainly increases the likelihood of someone committing a "crime" (i.e., destroying property, or harming someone), it should not in and of itself constitute a crime. In many ways, driving while under the influence of alcohol is identical to driving without proper sleep -- yet how many millions of people would be charged under a law that penalizes driving while tired?

My natural tendency is to lean towards Brady's style of thinking. Nowadays, too many laws are about prevention of "crime" (again, using the above limited definition) rather than the punishment or rehabilitation of those who actually commit harm to others. On the other side of the fence, there are those who feel that any steps to prevent crimes from occurring in the first place are far better than attempts to punish criminal ex post facto.

I gravitate more towards the middle on issues like this specific one, where there are significant externalities.

Well, it was fun while it lasted, guys. Looks like we can't destroy America through the internet. We have to destroy it instead.

I don't even care if the studies do exist. I doubt that they do because I don't think it's possible to perform a study that will get people to honestly admit that they've broken the law, especially one that carries as huge a stigma as drunk driving. "Overwhelming evidence" hasn't stopped studies like the 1998 WHO study which concluded that second hand smoke has no discernable negative effects. "Overwhelming evidence" hasn't silenced global warming skepticism.

I think it's clear that this thread has lost any sense of direction it may have had.

Therefore, it's closed now.