"But We Have To Do Something" Lobby Passes Bill That Will Do Nothing... - Granite Grok

“But We Have To Do Something” Lobby Passes Bill That Will Do Nothing…

Big Brother CallingThe “But We Have To Do Something” Lobby has successfully ushered a hand-held cell phone ban through the New Hampshire legislature, sort of.  The NH Senate voted to pass the legislation with an amendment that will send it back to the House before it can make its way to the governor; who will have to wipe the drool from her lips to keep it from soiling the thing in her eagerness to sign it.

The bill would continue to allow adults to talk on cell phones while driving if they use hands-free phones, devices built into the vehicle and two-way radios. The House-passed bill also would ban all cell phone use by minors behind the wheel. The ban would apply while drivers are stopped temporarily, such as at a red light, but not if they have pulled over and stopped. The bill doesn’t apply in an emergency.

Does the Bill outline what an “emergency” is?  If evil is subjective to the left, an emergency could be anything or not, depending on the will of those engaged in enforcement.

Offenders would face a $100 fine for a first offense, a $250 fine for a second offense and a $500 fine for subsequent offenses within 24 months.

State law currently bans typing and sending text messages while driving but does not prohibit reading text messages, surfing the internet, dialing phones or programming GPS devices while driving. Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Jim Rausch said the bill would prohibit those actions.

No word on whether they plan to ban conversation as well, given that it is the cause of the distraction they think they just limited with this bridge to nowhere bill.

And did you notice?  The ban goes into effect mid-2015.  After the election.  I guess passing the ban wasn’t an emergency.  So can we blame all the deaths attributed to delaying the ban until after the election on the legislators who wrote, sponsored, and voted for that language?

We can’t, because there almost no way to tell if an accident was the result of anything this bill is supposed to prevent.  Those folks have nothing to fear, not even the wrath of 750,000 otherwise competent and responsible voters who will not feel the pinch of this “But we have to do something” lobby act of force until six months after the next election.

I know.  If we’re going to educate the public we need time before we punish them arbitrarily for behavior they have engaged in without incident for years.

There’s also this rumor that in many cases, to use your phone hands free, you have to use your hand to get started.  Don’t worry, that won’t look anything like a violation of the law.

And this is, of course, behavior no legislator will ever get punished for, by the way.

Some Pigs Live Freer or Die Than Others.

 

Pull quotes Courtesy of the Concord Monitor

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