Kalifornya’s STOOPID Lawz (and other criticisms)
Posted: January 17, 2009 5:43 amFiled under: Kevin, amateur radio, photo, rant
According to a news article which I’ve recently read, in the last year, 
144,000 people have moved OUT of California.
Imagine that!
However, as the story points out, that’s a drop in the bucket for a state with a population of 38,000,000. In fact, it’s less than a drop in the bucket at slightly over 3/10ths of one percent - 0.003789473684, to be exact.
But it is significant.
A friend whom owns a couple of businesses in Texas and Alabama recently moved across the state line from California to Nevada in the Lake Tahoe area. Taxes were too high, he said. Nevada doesn’t have a state income tax, and I can only presume their property taxes are lower, though I don’t know.
Recently, a law which had previously been enacted came into effect in California January 1st. Specifically, it forbids drivers from “texting,” or sending text messages on their cell phones. Presumably - though I’m not certain - it also forbids them from reading them.
I remain critical of that law.
Why?
It’s STOOPID! That’s why.
Should people be fiddling with text messages while driving? Hell no! So why is it STOOPID?
It’s STOOPID because it’s unnecessary. Consider Sweet Home Alabama, for example. Alabama’s State Troopers and other AL LEOs (Law Enforcement Officers) have broad leeway in writing tickets for behavior or activity which, in their professional opinion, demonstrates unsafe behavior on the roadways. Their discretion allows them to “make the call” about whether a driver is operating a vehicle in an unsafe manner - and thus jeopardizing their lives or the lives of others - or not.
Thus, for example, farding - the application of makeup - while driving is (in my opinion) unsafe, and any woman so observed while driving should be ticketed for unsafe operation.
Also, reading the newspaper while driving is, in my opinion, unsafe and anyone so observed should be ticketed for unsafe operation.
Now, on the Redstone Arsenal, the feds - at the behest of the Provost Marshal, I believe - have been ticketing drivers using handheld cell phones for quite some time, perhaps four years or more.
As a matter of fact, the PM was so rabid about it - and for many in the Amateur Radio community, RSA is their lifeblood - that many in the chain of command had to be coaxed, cajoled and cozied-up-to in order to make an exception for the use of ham radio. It apparently didn’t matter that the RSA police used radios while driving.
But, as some see it, laws exist to protect us from ourselves. And while to a certain extent that’s true, some use such justification to create as many laws as possible. Case in point: California’s “no texting” law… even though they already have a requirement for hands-free cell phone operation.
Such philosophy asserts that everyone should be protected as much as possible through the creation of many laws.
However, the way I see it, if someone does something stupid and thereby causes harm to another, the legal system ought to be the place for proper redress of grievances, for civil and criminal. At least that’s what our Constitution says.
But some California judges just don’t see it that way.
More on that in Part 2.
