The NH Democrat House agreed with the NH
Democrat Republican Senate and approved the Cell Phone Ban. HB 1360 forces you to acquire hands free technology in your vehicle except for your radio, environmental controls, coffee mug, make-up, lunch, random hands free hand gestures, operating windows or door locks, smoking, searching for items in the back seat, fetching that last french fry you dropped, responding to a disgruntled child…you get the point.
(Union Leader) The bill would ban the hand-held use of a cell phone, GPS, i-Pad or other communication device while operating a vehicle, sitting at a stop sign or stopped in bumper-to-bumper traffic, unless there is an emergency.
Hands-free use by speaker phone, BlueTooth or onboard car phone would be allowed, as would handsfree use of a GPS or other electronic device. Using a two-way radio is allowed under the bill.
However, those younger than 18 and driving would be banned from using any of the devices in any circumstance, except for a 911 call.
The bill will not go into effect until July 1, 2015, after an education campaign to alert drivers to the change in law.
At a public hearing last month, law enforcement, family members of victims of texting drivers, auto dealers and manufacturers, cellphone companies, businesses and advocacy groups, and state agencies turned out to support the bill.
Emphasis mine, because these are all fiscal stake-holders who stand to benefit from passage. The bill will increase profits for hands free add ons in cars, hands free tech supplied by cell manufacturers, and enforcement will result in cries for more cops and bureaucrats.
Anyone with the time should see who in state government has stock in cell manufacturers or provides hands free tech to car makers. (We already know Democrats have a stake in larger government and more taxpayer-funded union employees.)
And while any victims have my sympathy, you cannot regulate utopia into existence. The same people who allow devices to distract them, are also distracted by everything else.
This bill will have no long-term effect on motor-vehicle fatalities. None.
It does place a burden on all the sensible law-abiding, conscientious drivers who have had hundred of millions of problem-free conversations while driving with the phone next to their face. But this is a burden that will make Democrats feel better. And isn’t that what we created government for?