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Texting Twit

no

What do you mean by budget? Drivers ed costs to the student?

No, students were not charged. When state and federal funds to schools were cut, some programs had to be cut at the schools. Drivers Ed., Physical Ed., and many other programs were either eliminated or the parents organized and footed the bills. My son's school cut the band; but parents organized and assumed the costs.
 
Insurance costs driven by ambulance chasing lawyers & sue crazy citizens were a factor in schools dropping the driver ed classes. The Federal/Dept of Ag.,Job Corps Program still has driver training. The cars were often cheap to come by but the insurance was not.
As to length of drivers manuals,the KY manual (used to be free,I think not today) is plenty long but I doubt its very widely read. I read it a long time ago when I needed a KY MC endorsement & had to pass the test( over again for that purpose) & trying for 100%-I missed one question as it was.
I had this juvy kid, "Freddy" who was the age to get a license & I got him a book to study,tutored him as he was a very poor reader & he was soon able to pass the written exam, the road test I left to him upon release. One of my workers criticized me for helping him get prepared-my reply was do you want me teaching him or the mess he came from? The same kids that cannot read, write nor count are the ones we want to be safe drivers & know the rules of the road.
 
Rider Texting.......

I mistakenly went on a group ride (six bikes, 7 people total) as my wife and I virtually always ride alone. On this group ride, the lead rider on Brand X was always pulling out his cell phone at each stop, taking a look, then leading on. I figured he was waiting on an important call or message...which ended up being the case. HOWEVER....when we get to the restaurant, he starts bragging / laughing about the other day he was riding 80 to 85 mph, on a two lane rural highway and TEXTING AT THE SAME TIME! I won't go into the brand of touring bike he was riding but, he never wears a helmet, puts on relatively quite a few miles per year and I am surprised he is still alive! Guess who I will never even come close to riding with again? WOW!
 
Saw one of those "twits" in Chicago yesterday pecking away while I was trying to just live through the rest of the city route.
 
You guys in the states still hearing about the Toronto texting/driving Mayor?

No I'm not serious.

Rob Ford sticks his foot in his mouth almost every day, he's chased reporters off adjacent property, called 911 on Marg Delahunty, and publicly announced he'd never heard of one of Canada's most famous authors during a dust-up about closing public libraries.

The guy is a total ass who got voted into office by accidently splitting the vote between the 2 real candidates.

I suspect people are following him around the way they did to Britney Spears et al.

Hopefully, he'll punch a cop when he gets a ticket for texting while driving and we can move on. Nothing is too surprising.

Told ya.
 
I called the KY State Police & was told by the dispatcher that if "they" didn't see it , it didn't happen. So much for being responsible citizens... Is that "how it works" elsewhere?

My first job was construction inspection of road and bridge construction in northern Kentucky. This was quite a few years ago. One morning, at about 9:30 a.m., a guy with Michigan plates stops and asks where the nearest liquor store is. He has an almost empty bottle of booze in his lap. I asked him where he was headed. Florida.

I promptly went back to the field office, called the State Police, informed them that a drunk driver was leaving my location, told them to look for a silver car with Michigan plates, and that he was headed south on I-75. I hope they caught the #@*!%.

Harry
 
I agree.

Yesterday the mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, was photographed reading a paper as traffic was travelling at 100-120 km/hr. When asked about it he replied that it didn't affect his driving. This is the same mayor who recently passed a street car with its doors open taking on and letting off passengers. He has been photographed talking on his cell while driving in the city. Some leadership!!!!

The Toronto Police have asked him to hire a driver.

At least he wasn't smoking crack.
 
Last night, coming home from a concert by a well-known guitarist, we're following this car (we're in our car) that's weaving from lane to lane. Get to stoplight...it's a young woman with her arms through the steering wheel, holding a smartphone (oxymoron alert), and texting. Light turns green...she drives this way...texting...no hands on the wheel. Weaves into right lane, back to center lane, weaves into left lane. We're behind her. I flash my lights to wake her the #@*&! up, and she momentarily gets stable and slows to the speed limit. When she realizes I'm not a cop....zoom!...off she goes, and resumes weaving.

God help us...our race is doomed. :brow

You can't fix stupid.

Darwin had it right - unfortunately, a laboriously slow process. :banghead
 
Last April, my son and I took a trip on our BMW's to PA, VA, DC, MD, NC & SC, then back up to NC, TN, KY and finished back in OH. 2,300 miles.

However, on the interstates, being on a motorcycle, I could see very easily what the car drivers were doing. I would guess that about 50%, maybe more, were doing phone texting/dialing/reading when passing us or us passing them. Didn't give me a lot of faith in my fellow drivers.

I watched everyone near me like a hawk!
 
Darwin had it right but most of these people have already reproduced and passed the stupid gene to the next generation. It's times like this when one wishes birth control could be retroactive.
 
All of this distracted driver stuff is just one one element of my recent decision to give up my two wheel adventures. I've been knocked off a bike just once, but have also survived nine heart operations...so sometimes feel like I'm on "borrowed" time. LOL. As I ride the roads around Pugetopolis I observe near constantly drivers texting, on cells, fiddling with "something" other than paying attention to their "driving". Fifty years of riding, but for me the risks are beginning to outweigh the rewards.....it's been LOT of fun, but think I'm done. :banghead
 
Not just to disagree but I hope that when I stop riding it's based on what "I cannot do correctly" (as in reaction times or decision making) rather than "what others are doing wrongly". There's never been a shortage of the latter-as, like Greenwald says-you cannot fix stupid!
 
Not just to disagree but I hope that when I stop riding it's based on what "I cannot do correctly" (as in reaction times or decision making) rather than "what others are doing wrongly". There's never been a shortage of the latter-as, like Greenwald says-you cannot fix stupid!

I appreciate the perspective, my decision is based on many factors, not just the texting twits. :D
 

Hey Mike, appreciate you reviving a thread over a year dormant. I suspect most readers of this thread (including myself in B.C. Canada) do not follow Toronto politics. And politics is one the verboten areas on this forum, so hope I am not stepping over the line when I quote an opinion article in our local paper. (Mod's, if I am out of line, please just delete this response - not the whole thread.) Quote from local paper:

"In case you've missed it - how has ANYBODY missed this? - Ford finally admitted that he smoked crack cocaine, less than a year after a Toronto newspaper and online media site said they had a video of the mayor doing crack which Ford denied.

The Toronto police chief said he saw the video and didn't dispute what the media outlets said.

Ford then admitted he smoked crack. In a drunken stupor. (Cue the media frenzy.)

Of course, Ford has been asked to resign and, of course Ford has said no, he'll stay on until the next election and let the voters decide.

I get the feeling they already have."

I certainly don't know what laws apply in forcing elected officials to resign, in fact have no idea what Toronto residents think of the job Mayor Ford has done for their city, but it seems to me his office should now be surrounded by iron bars. It isn't.

That is just one of the reasons many people on this forum do not respect LEOs. People in power can do damn near anything illegal they please. We all know that this is not limited to one man and one city. Fining or jailing the top guys for their infractions of the law would certainly turn public opinion around - but it ain't going to happen.
 
I don't think it's about politics at all.

I think it's about a person in a position of authority showing a terrible example by:
- Texting while driving
- Reading while driving.
- Being drunk in public.
- Smoking illegal drugs.
To name just 4.

I don't know much about drugs but I don't react much to public people admitting to smoking marijuana, crack-cocaine on the other hand, is in my perception, a very serious offence.

Tune in CBC radio1 at 4:00PM EST to hear cross country checkup today.
Rex is back and it should be a good one!
 
We had a program at my school this week about distracted driving, specifically texting.

Linky

They showed a VERY graphic video (not entirely sure how they staged the in-car view of the wreck). Stunned silence from the student body.

Next each student took turns operating a car in the simulator while classmates watched. The simulator sends a text to an iPad every 30 seconds that the students are to respond to. Simulation ends when they commit a major offense. About half died, ? killed another motorist and ? ran into a stationary object.

Overall quite powerful. Course it doesn't hurt that I made it quite plain that it's a good thing that I'm not allowed to shoot motorists for texting while driving. :deal
 
We had a program at my school this week about distracted driving, specifically texting.

Linky

They showed a VERY graphic video (not entirely sure how they staged the in-car view of the wreck). Stunned silence from the student body.

Next each student took turns operating a car in the simulator while classmates watched. The simulator sends a text to an iPad every 30 seconds that the students are to respond to. Simulation ends when they commit a major offense. About half died, ? killed another motorist and ? ran into a stationary object.

Overall quite powerful. Course it doesn't hurt that I made it quite plain that it's a good thing that I'm not allowed to shoot motorists for texting while driving. :deal

In my opinion, the problems with such programs is that they try to appeal to the danger imposed on OTHERS. Most texters (and many other offenders in other areas) only respond to SELF-preservation. These generally are people who haven't been brought up to respect OTHER's lives and usually also at times, don't even care about their own lives (mostly because they think that "it couldn't happen to them!").


These programs are OK, but the center of attention should be on our failure to teach the kids of each generation basic respect for others, and themselves, especially other's right to live.
 
In my opinion, the problems with such programs is that they try to appeal to the danger imposed on OTHERS. Most texters (and many other offenders in other areas) only respond to SELF-preservation. These generally are people who haven't been brought up to respect OTHER's lives and usually also at times, don't even care about their own lives (mostly because they think that "it couldn't happen to them!").


These programs are OK, but the center of attention should be on our failure to teach the kids of each generation basic respect for others, and themselves, especially other's right to live.

Agree completely. However...

Unless we revoke their parents breeding retroactively we have to do the best we can given the material we have to work with. Trying to instill such perspectives only works one person to one person when the mind is open to it. One down, 6,999,999,999 to go.
 
Agree completely. However...

Unless we revoke their parents breeding retroactively we have to do the best we can given the material we have to work with. Trying to instill such perspectives only works one person to one person when the mind is open to it. One down, 6,999,999,999 to go.

Schools and voting ??? I won't say any more due to site restrictions!
 
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