...to taking peoples licence away from them, or basing fines on a percentage of the yearly income, like they do in Finland, people would think twice then. Recently a man was fined about 200.000 Dollars for speeding, he was a CEO, he will definately think twice. How long before someone constructs a hack for this breath analyzer?

The Navajo reservation doesn't allow alcohol to be sold on it, and there are often long stretches of road with no lights or anything. So, when Indians get drunk and drive home, it is significantly harder than it is, say, for me when I have too much at the BW3 5 minutes away.

I'm kinda on the fence about this one. It is a good idea, but the target market (the drunk drivers most likely to have problems) are more likely to drive old cars without this modification.

They don't just take a percentage, but a fixed amount plus a percentage. So a fixed fee of $200 plus 5% of $0 is $200, not $0 ;)

Nice idea, though :) I'd love it if it were true ;)

I don't support this latest measure as I find the inclusion of such an invasive device completely inappropriate, but I think that something must be done to curb the plague of drunk driving in America.

New Mexico is especially vulnerable to this because of its long straight highways which lure even the most level-headed driver into thinking that one or two drinks couldn't hurt too much.

Too often, those two drinks are the difference between making it home safe and killing an entire family in a horrific accident.

I think that there should be measures put in place to curb drunk driving, and I think they should be mandatory, but I also believe that as long as they are invasive (as this requirement is) then they are useless. The measures must be invisible but accurate. A sensor that detected the level of alcohol in the air of the car would be appropriate, but anything that required user interaction is entirely inappropriate.

Ohio has an interesting way of discouraging drunk driving. Anybody caught driving drunk has to get yellow license plates, so everybody will know they have a DUI.

Why should people like me who don't drink have to deal with this thing? Either by having to use it or when selling the car?

I don't live in NM, but I can see where feel-good laws like this could spread very quickly!

GTRacer
- Probably *need* to get drunk

Wouldn't a balloon full of air serve as a "hack"?

I am going through something similar. I've just purchased a used car and in order to get any type of financing, they are installing a device on the car called "Pass Time". Basically this device gets installed between my key and the ignition and emits a friendly chime when I turn the key to on. After the friendly chime, I can start my car. This may sound innocuous enough, but in order to start my car, I have to punch in a six digit code every month in order to start my car. When I make the payment, I get the six digit code and I can use the car I pay for for 30 days. Oh but they are so sweet.....I get a 9 day grace period after the due date when the friendly chime beeps a little longer. After that, the car is dead as a door nail until I make a payment and get the six digit code. Nich huh? And it's not being installed because I have crappy credit.....no...it's being installed because I've only been in this area for 9 months as opposed to 2 years! It's an outrage and I feel less than human. I've NEVER been late on a car payment and I show 5 paid off car loans in my lifetime. You may say that we could have walked (which I almost did) or gone elsewhere, but we tried. This was pretty much the only way for my wife and I to get a loan for a frickin USED car.

Hell u can take the licenses away and they will still drive . License is just a piece of paper / plastic with a fine attached to it if u drive with out it.

The Idea is interesting however the "big" brother approach will not do, scoze the people that never drink and drive will revolt and sue the pants out of every one attempting to bring such a law into existence

As if people on cellphones weren't bad enough, now every few miles a tube is going to drop down in front of you, require you to take a hand off the controls to pull it to your mouth, and blow into it, otherwise the engine is going to cut out.

How about requiring that every car be sold with a hands-free cellphone adapter?

Support Human Justice for Human Beings [jerf.org].

This story is part of a larger pattern, where law enforcement thinks it can farm its job out to machines. DRM is another instance of the exact same bad idea.

But machines enforce a machine version of the law. We are human. We need fuzziness, and we need the expense of prosecution, as well. (See my linked essay for a justification of that second clause.) This is a feature of the law, not a bug!

What do you do when the machine gets a false positive? Or your life depending on going somewhere right now? Is the state going to take responsibility for the extra 30 it took to get someone to the hospital while they are having a heart attack, or on the verge of a potentially life-threatening birth??

Machines and law enforcement do not go together!

New Mexico has periodic (annual, IIRC) vehicle safety inspections. If your interlock were disabled, you wouldn't get your inspection sticker and couldn't legally drive your car.

And this is why you join the ranks of plenty of other US citizens in registering your car out of state. People in MN do it all the time because of the fucking bastards in MN that charge astronomical rates for license plates and taxes on those plates (ie I pay taxes on the price of my car that are $3000 more than what I actually paid because the State gets to determine how much I paid not the dealer).

In some states one can't take away one's livelyhood and that means they can't take thier vehicle.

In the US, I'd say that 80% of the West has no mass-transit and at least 30% of the East doesn't so without a vehicle there is no way to get to the job.

Again, it depends on the state. I was serving time for a non-drinking offense in '93 and a jailmate (there were two of us in the whole place) was serving 45 weekends so he could get his 90 days sentance taken care of. He'd gotten 90 days for drunk driving, but since he was an electrician they couldn't take away his job with the sentance.

Nah, most ppl that actually do drink and drive (have a habit) will have some switch installed hidden for the police. Teenagers with motorcycles and truck drivers have all kinds of technical restrictions built in/imposed and it's common knowledge that a large part of them has such a contraption.

The police normally don't bother to take the vehicle apart to find the hidden switch...

I would have to agree that more testing and more testing is the only successful way (like they do over here around new year (december/january: drinking under influence drops significantly, only to rise again in february :-/).

When I moved to New Mexico in 1994, I had to take a special course (as did all immigrants to the state), which was very anti-drunk driving. I remember being in the room with a bunch of very pissed-off people, as the angle was that the state's drunk driving problem was the fault of people moving into the state; if memory serves, the class wasn't required of residents that were getting their DL for the first time. It was just stupid.

I spent several years as a firefighter in the state, with a fire department that covered >25 miles of interstate. Lots of drunk drivers piled it in over that time on that stretch of road, but the problem was much worse once you got off the interstate. The drive-up liquor windows went away, yes- but I think the only effect that had was on my roommate at the time, who was bound to a wheelchair and found it much more convenient to pick up a couple of beers on the weekend via the drive-ups.

New Mexico has a long way to go in terms of bringing itself to the modern day. Enforcement is also a big issue; in the areas where the police AREN'T corrupt, they're usually so sparsely placed that they simply can't cover it. Catron County is something like 3x the size of Rhode Island, and has only two state police officers to cover the entire area at any given time. It's amazing.

Heh... somehow I doubt that even if you were ejected from the vehicle through the windshield or side window (even if it were down) at 65 mph, you're body would have enough force to actually cause significant damage to a bystander unless they were standing right next to the accident already (thereby putting them in greater danger of debris and the accident itself than your flopping missile of a body). I guess it's possible that you'd beat the odds and actually smack somebody, and I guess if you got hit hard enough to accelerate your mass to such a degree that it could cause major damage you COULD hurt someone.. but it's one of those "BUT WE HAVE TO TAKE EXTREME MEASURES BECAUSE I'M CONSIDERING UNREALISTICALLY EXTREME POSSIBILITIES!!!! lol!!"

Or, in conclusion, I think whoever used that argument against you is an idiot. I also wonder at the utility of requiring people to wear seatbelts since they're only endangering themselves (lamebrain arguments about being "ejected to safety" and "trapped" notwithstanding the fact that only idiots believe them). This makes a lot more sense because you're obviously putting other people in the way of a much greater danger by driving drunk, but the fact that the government feels it can walk up to me and say 'you have to pay for this becuase that dumbass was driving drunk' is something that more than just ruffles my feathers. Here's an idea: put the dumbass in rehab, take away the license PERMANENTLY, fine the living shit out of them the first time they do it, and lock them up for a good long stint in the state pen for increasing amounts of time for each repeat.

Any vehicle that comes into my household equipped with such a device will not stay that way for long (and will only be on long enough to pass inspection each year). I can imagine there will even be a pretty quick grey market set up around easy mods to eliminate them.

Yet another idea that looks real good on paper, gets some government figures some face time, and is just a really, really dumb idea that doesn't withstand even a cursory run through the logic chain.

"Whatever happened..." indeed.

From a link [ignition-interlock.com] link further down the page....

PRODUCT AND DESIGN FEATURES

Hum Tone: Requires the client to deliver a hum resonance while blowing the alcohol test prior to starting the vehicle. Deters techniques utilized to mimic human breath or to absorb alcohol.


This is good, if you are concerned about people faking it.


Random or Fixed Retest: Programmable. The client is alerted and given a grace period to retest after the vehicle is put into the run state. The test can be delivered while operating the vehicle or after pulling off the road. Breath test refusal or failure is recorded and sanctions are imposed, including honking of the car's horn. Deters drinking after completing a sober start and vehicle idling at bars.


Probably most useful for DUI offenders, not for everyone...but who knows how far this legislation will go?


Bypass Detect: If a vehicle is started and the breath test is not passed, the horn will begin honking until the vehicle is turned off or a breath test is successfully completed. All events are recorded. Deters hot-wiring and push-starting of vehicles.


There had better be a small amount of time that the vehicle can be driven before the test but after you start the car. Otherwise, that 30 seconds is going to be a major pain. Not only that, but what if you are fleeing from an attacker? I guess our own personal safety isn't as important as those on the road who might be killed if I end up behind the wheel drunk (which, statistically, the majority of people do not do.)


Events Log: A built-in memory chip records all events associated with the use or misuse of the device. Reports are generated through a personal computer in a summary and complete hard-copy format.


Cool.. Now when are these reports read? For DUI offenders, it's presumably fairly often. For everyone else...when? When you get your car inspected? These things had better have a pretty big memory.


Violations Reset: Programmable. If the predetermined number of violations occurs during a monitoring period, an early inspection is required within three (3) days. Failure to report will result in immobilization of the vehicle. Violations are quickly identified and reported to the jurisdiction.


Again, most useful with DUI offenders. But honestly, after one violation, I'd think that you'd want inspection.


Service Reminder Reset: Reminds the client of a scheduled monitoring check. Failure to have the device monitored within the prescribed time period results in the device interlocking.

Power Interrupt: A dated record, in the event 12 volt power has been disconnected or interrupted. The device maintains memory through an onboard back-up lithium battery. This condition (other than tampering) can occur when a vehicle's battery is disconnected due to repairs or is replaced. Clients are required to provide documentation of repairs.


Whoa whoa whoa.... So if my battery dies, I'm fucked? No documented repair. This absolutely is only good for DUI offenders, because frankly, it's an unreasonable burden on your average person. I change my own batteries. There are also times when I take the battery off for other reasons. I should just be able to, period. Demanding documentation as to why the battery was removed is simply unacceptable unless there is good cause to believe that I was trying to get around the system.



Vehicle Restart: In the event of a vehicle stall, the driver has a grace period during which the ignition can be turned off and re-engaged without having to submit an additional breath test.

This somewhat mitigates the 30 second timer, but it also leads me to believe that that timer is a hard limit, and that this device actually prevents the car from being started until the check has completed. That's scary, to me. 30 seconds is a long time. Get a stopwatch, go outside, sit in your car for 30 seconds. It's an unreasonable imposition for someone who has neither broken the law, nor has a history of alcohol problems.

Ah, a scarlet letter law that not only brands the offender, but his or her entire family. That sounds like a really good idea.

<sarcasm>After all, if they're related to a criminal they must be criminals themselves, so we better be safe and lock them all up.</sarcasm>

I tried to search for information on the percentage of false positives these devices give, and most of the resulting homepages had FAQs that claimed that false positives were not a problem. Howerver, I did find some interesting things beyond the mouthwash false positives, for example that cigarette smoke and acetone breath (for ex. in type 1 diabetics who either don't know they have the disease or do a poor job in controlling it, or people on Atkins) can cause false positives.

to taking peoples license away from them Do you know how many people my father arrests for driving with out a license, allot of the people that lose the license simply don't care, just like people driving with out insurance.

I heard a rumor in one of my Criminology classes that one state was talking about seizing a persons car is convicted of DUI, kind of like drug smuggling. I think that would make you think twice, and if you didn't and lost your car it would make people think twice about letting you using their car.

The best way to make new law, is to mandate it has to replace an old one or two. Enough is enough! Of course then we will end up with 10 commandments, no nine.. no eight.. no wait a sec.. Anarchy! But thats a good thing.

"/Dread"

it seems if they are going to do something like that, they need to get rid of the laws that can get you a DUI for just sitting in a parked car drunk.

That's a perfectly good law (unlike the stupid ignition interlock law described in the story). If you have the keys and are in the car, you've demonstrated your intention to drive. If you're planning on having too much to drink to drive, take a cab to the bar/party/etc. so there's no issue.

Sunset provisions, are a good idea, but I see no reason to exempt quote-unquote "basic issues" such as murder or theft. It's not like, when the law against murder is up for renewal, there are going to be a lot of people saying "hey, I don't think there's nearly enough murder going on these days". On the other hand, allowing an exemption clause would just open the gates for lawmakers to describe their pet projects as "basic issues".

"Oh, restricting black people from voting is a basic issue, there's no reason to review that at any point in the future."

We just don't know what laws we currently have that are going to be deemed acceptable in the future, so why presume that we do in certain situations?

Also, I wouldn't worry about adding work for congresspeople; either they'll hate the extra work and be discouraged from making needless legislation, or they'll like it because they can reasonably give themselves higher salaries and larger staffs, and we'll still get sunset provisions. It's win-win.

I live in Albuquerque New Mexico. Below is the letter/email I sent to all the state senitors. Thankfully the bill seems dead as there will be no time to vote on it during this session. I recent local TV poll showed people were 85% to 14% against the measure

To Albuquerque Senitors:

I'd like to begin by stating that I do understand we have a large DWI problem in New Mexico. I personally lost my father years ago to a drinking and boating accident. I know the pain families feel when people decide to recklessly endanger themselves and others.

However, I must speak up about the "Ignition Lock" legislation recently passed by the legislature and pending in the Senate. As much as I want our streets to be safer this measure goes way too far in my mind. You're basically asking people to prove they're not committing a crime just to go somewhere.

I'd also like to make sure some possible ramifications to this law have been thought out. People would likely start leaving there cars running when they make quick stops. This could lead to an increase in motor vehicle theft. We are also talking about technology here, which is not always 100% reliable. What if someone gets stranded in the back country because their Interlock malfunctions? Or, if it hinders someone's ability to get moving quickly in an emergency situation? Or even the possibility of spreading disease when several people share a car.

With the projected cost of $600 you are also punishing the underprivileged. For some people they do not have that much to spend on an entire car, let alone a state required accessory. You're raising the cost of entry of vehicle ownership over the $1200 mark. For some people that's too much.

The intentions of this law are good. But monetary and societal cost seems too high. Our civil liberties are vanishing too quickly in this country, and this is a large step in the wrong direction.

Having a parking lot at a bar is like being an accessory to the crime

You are assuming each and everyone of us are unable to drink alcohol in a moderate way. It is not about the taxes collected from the sales of alcohol, but about our freedom.

I do not need an idiot senator or a frustrated, clueless individual like yourself to make new laws that require people to respect laws that are already there. The argument is stupid.

Maybe we could ban the internet too, eh? Making this evil technology available to the public is being accessory to crime, because we know the internet is only used to download music illegaly.

If you have an alcohol problem and you can't behave in public places, get some help. I'm certainly not willing to give away my rights just because you're a moron.

I've been proposing this for years [slashdot.org]. For your first DUI/DWI, you get a fat fine and points on your license. For your second conviction, the police takes your license, and your car. For #3 and beyond, it's license, car, and go to jail. Most people will stop driving drunk pretty quickly.

It's a simple solution that's easy to implement, isn't intrusive on innocent people, and provides non-tax revenue for local government. Do any states do this? I contacted my local legislators but they weren't interested.

Engineering Design done by a legislature:

These rolling retests require the driver to take the test as the car is moving. If the driver fails a retest, the horn sounds and the lights flash until the car is turned off.

I mean ... I'm all for reducing drunk-driving, but they obviously haven't considered the full impact of this. Just a few human factors/reality issues:

• Carmakers sued because someone couldn't get someone else/self to help in time due to an emergency situation and the person died ... since the driver had to do a breathe test. I'm not saying it's likely ... but hey, Coffee cups now have warning labels about hot contents don't they?
• Teenagers: "Let's all go caravan in our cars (or parents' cars) and nobody do their rolling retest" ... and purposely drive around annoying everyone (but I'm sure some law will cover that too, right?)
• Breath tester thingamajig malfunctions and shuts car won't start/starts tooting and winking at random internvals
• General American Populus becomes more grumpy in the AM because they are delayed 30 more seconds by breathe test.

And then the funny/unrealistic (but still possible ones)

• System mistakes unbrushed teeth/bad breath for drunkenness and sends driver home for hygiene maintenance
• Police cars winking and honking while driving down the street.
• Police (or Keystone cop) car won't start for 30 seconds while criminal speeds away (who has bypassed his system anyway). They shouldn't be 'above the system, no?
• Beneficial one here ... system becomes new alternative to 'jump-starting your car'
• New Bumper Stickers: "Stop Breathing, Start Driving"

Yeah baybee, SUV bearing down on you, lets see how fast you can get the tube, and don't forget to hum that little tune they taught you.

Imagine you and your buddies are hanging around drinking some beers and watching the game on TV, when all of a sudden your friend starts having a massive heart attack. For one reason or another, the ambulence can't make it to your house (this has happened before!) and you realize you need to drive him to the hospital ASAP. Unfortunately, even though you are barely over the legal limit and your friend is about to die, you cannot start your car. This is only one situation I can think of off the top of my head where a breathalizer in your car would totally fail to serve its purpose. I also don't like the idea of having to wait an extra thirty seconds just to start my car, and I really don't understand how they could breathalize you WHILE YOU'RE DRIVING -- wouldn't that be a cell phone-like distraction?! Unless there was some sort of "hands-free" way to do it (a robotic arm? A tube down your throat?), I don't see how it's even plausible. I hope this bill gets stopped, for New Mexico's sake.

Sunset provisions have their goods and bads... It's good to force a review of a laws, witht he hopes of undoing a particularly bad one, such as the Patriot Act.

But it also creates uncertainty, in that every time the administration changes, or power in the senate or house shifts parties, all the work done by the previous congress could be reversed through a "review".

Don't many laws already have sunset provisions?

In addition to the shame angle, having yellow license plates is helpful in itself, because if other people see yellow plates on the road late at night, you know to give that car extra space. There've been lots of times I was driving behind someone who seemed to be DWI, but couldn't really be sure. Seeing the yellow tag would be one more piece of evidence I could quickly assess to get the big picture.

My uncle is a classic Mopar guy. So is my father.

With a '68 Road Runner, a '69 Dart, and a '72 Challenger in the collection, I'm sure they're happy they don't live in New Mexico.

There's no WAY they'd bastardize the hours and hours of meticulous restoration that they've put into these cars, with a big ugly breathing tube.

S

I think the better solution is to actually fuck up people who DUI. Like permanent license revocations. Repeat offenders spend 5 years in a damn sweat shop. You can always have a designated driver.

Or maybe we could just execute them? But, oh wait, we already know that the death penalty isn't a crime deterrent. What makes you think that threatening to take away their license would work?

Besides, there is a serious logical problem with allowing a person who has been drinking to decide when he is ready to drive again. And the formulas (e.g., one drink == 1 hour) often fail, due to metabolism, body weight, food consumption, level of tiredness, etc. This would end the problem of "I haven't had anything to drink in 2.8 hours, so I think I'm ready to drive again."

Of course, an alternative to this law would be to require that all alcohol-serving establishments have a Breathalyzer easily accessible to its patrons.

I think you misunderstand the point of that poster. That person _also_ thought that this is stupid, but he realizes that with the legal limit going so incredibly low all it takes is one drink, plus a poorly calibrated breath tester, to screw someone over. You think that they _won't_ have the car phone home and charge you with something just for even _trying_ to drive?

I would trust this lots more if I weren't aware of the calibration problems with low-end breath testers, and I doubt the expensive units will be affordable for this purpose.

Having to retest while the car is in motion seems like something that could cause accidents to me!

Imagine going down the freeway at 60+mph and having to fiddle around for the tester to keep the car running! Your options are

1) Take your eyes off the road and concentrate on the test

2) Don't test, and hav ethe car stall

Neither of these sound especially safe to me.

Look at it this way: It *everybody* had one of these on their cars then muggers/rapists/murderers/etc will know that anybody they see entering their car will be a sitting duck for 30 seconds.

Your breath comes out at apporximately[sic] body temperature ~.

Riiiiight. So that means that your car won't start if you just drank a cold soda or hot coffee. Or you have a fever. Or the air is humid or dry. Or it is winter and you are in Chicago when the wind is blowing off the lake.

Rather than rely on urban legend like how sucking on pennies or eating underwear [google.com] will make your breath heat up to "body temperature" and then you'll pass the test, you can get the actual scientific information behind how a breathalyser works [howstuffworks.com].

On the other hand, this [greatoutdoorsdepot.com] plus this [westmarine.com] will make any NM car drivable by even the drunkest felon.

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Q. How do you know you're posting on slashdot?

A. 503 Service Unavailable
The service is not available. Please try again later.

I'd be all for this if they subsidized the cost of the part through a tax breaks AND through insurance breaks. I pay more for insurance to offset the costs of people who drink and drive when I don't drink at all.

I have too many stupid friends who drive drunk and this would end the risk to their lives and to the other innocent people they knowingly endanger. (Yes, they are too stupid to ask me to be their designated driver too since I don't drink).

realizes that with the legal limit going so incredibly low all it takes is one drink, plus a poorly calibrated breath tester

Actually, for a 200 lb man you would need >4 drinks in a two hour period. A drink is defined as 1 1/2 oz 80% proof booze, or 12oz beer/wine. This assumes a normal person, with a healthty liver.Here is a little tester Breath Wheel [intox.com]
As for the poorly calibrated breathalyzer, the police must maintaine records of the machine being calibrated. If you are ever stopped, refuse the field test and ask to be taken to an ER for a blood test. Make sure they use soap and water and not an alchol wipe before they draw the blood. This will be the most accurate level.

This is going to be trivial to circumvent - so the bad guys will continue to drive drunk - and law abiding citizens will pay the cost.

1) How does the car know you are breathing into it's sample tube and not squirting air into it from some other source?

2) Note that breathalyzers only produce a valid reading 15 minutes AFTER you've taken your last drink. For some of that time, the alcohol remaining in your mouth will give a false positive if you have had a drink but are well below the legal limit. For the later part of that time, the alcohol has not yet passed from your stomach into your blood stream and thence into your lungs - so you'll get a false negative for people who are already legally drunk.

So the test that happens as you get into the car could produce either a false positive (making it impossible to drive your car for 15 minutes after you've just finished a single glass of wine with a large meal) - or a false negative (allowing people who will shortly become drunk as a skunk to get their car started before the full effects are noticable in their breath).

3) Since there is also the obvious "getting your friend to start the car" trick - the initial test is essentially worthless. The whole thing stands or falls on the 'random retest'. Are we to believe that the car beeps at you and demands that you blow into a tube whilst you are driving along...all day - every day? Isn't that gonna be kinda distracting? Am I going to have to prove I'm not drunk every day I drive to work - or 50 times during a long road trip?

How often does it do it? If it's going to do it once every (say) 10 hours of driving, then that won't be a deterrent to someone who is stupid enough to take the risk of driving drunk. If it does it once an hour - then *maybe* that's a deterrent - but it's also a major pain to have to do this two or three times a day on your daily commute.

This is a stupid law.

Here in Texas, the penalty for drunk driving is pathetic - hardly more than a speeding ticket. In UK, there is a HUGE fine (thousands of dollars) and they automatically take away your driving license for 18 months (more for a second offence) - and of course your insurance premiums are going to be astronomical for the rest of your life.

Now *that* is a deterrent.

I live out of town, but the nearest city to me, not many drinking establishments have parking lots. So it means parking on the street, or in a nearby pay lot.

As far as I can tell, the government (Ontario) almost encourages drinking and driving. They make no effort to allow people to find out their BAC before getting in the car. Instead of the cops sitting a mile down the road from the bar, how about they stand right outside the bar and check people on the way out. Better yet, make breathalizers even more accessable than that. Every bar should have one, or even personal ones. I think a lot of people end up driving because they think they are okay, but have no way of knowing for sure. Granted they shouldn't drive at all, but that will never happen.

The other problem is that the affermentioned city, and most other places I've been to, enforce that all cars must be off the streets at 3AM. What better way than to promote drinking and driving? The driver maybe doesn't want to move their car after they had one too many. But they have no choice, or pay the parking fine.

If government really wanted to stop drinking and driving they could almost eliminate it by making a few small changes. But I think they'd rather have the money come in, and risk a few deaths.

My neighbor had one of these years ago and he would just park the car next to his air compressor. When he needed to start the car all it took was a puff from the air hose to pass the test. Now how easy would it be to keep a little compressor in your car that plugs into the cig. lighter? Bottom line: people will always find a way around it. ---John Holmes...

Sunset provisions are a great thing. However, predictable timing on them is not so good as it gives the people in favor of the law advance warning that it might expire, so they can go around and find/manufacture reasons to keep it in effect.

Most especially, think of the effect of having a sunset law for various pieces of the bureaucracy. If Department of Redundancy Department knows that their funding/enabling legislation will expire in the next year, they would then take all their time to find reasons why they are indispensable and ever so valuable. Veritable bulwark of democracy. , they are (or so you'd believe if you listened to them).

I don't quite know how it should work, but I'd propose having a "Law Lottery". Every year 20 percent of the laws would be picked at random and reviewed (really random!). This means laws would probably be reviewed relatively quickly on average. If the legislature did not vote to retain the law within one month it would be tossed out. The law would need at least a 3/4 positive vote of the legislature (both houses in the case of bicamerality) to remain in place (but no executive approval). A law could continue on an "emergency" basis for one year with a 2/3 majority but would then expire completely. The short time frame is to make it tougher to plan/fund campaigns of special interests to support it.

If nothing else it would keep our idiot bastard legislators busy enough so they'd not have as much time to meddle in everything else.

Sadly, it would not work. Someone would rig the lottery. The well funded special interests would pay well to have instant notification of a review and would have lobbyists ready to jump in at a moments notice where the citizens would probably never get notified so would not have an opportunity to speak. (I know, what else is new.) Legislatures would pass hundreds of junk laws just to reduce the probability that real laws would be picked.

But still, its a fun idea.

Besides our legislature, police officers, and city council members, most of the people caught for drunk driving are driving cars that they've owned forever and wouldn't buy a new car, one with the device installed on it. I don't see how installing this device on new vehicles would solve the problem anytime soon.

There is already a law on the books that allows installing a device like this in the vehicles of drivers convicted of DWI. The judges need to be less lenient and start ordering these be installed in those vehicles. Meanwhile, we have people who've been arrested multiple times for DWI that haven't served more than a few days in jail.

If you are ever stopped, refuse the field test and ask to be taken to an ER for a blood test.

If you were in Pennsylvania when this happened, let me be the first to congratulate you on losing your license for 12 months.

When you receive a PA drivers license, you agree in advance to consent to a breath test if stopped and that you understand that failure to comply will result in 12 month suspension of the license regardless of its outcome.

- Tony

I agree, there are so many things wrong with this assinine proposal that I hardly know where to begin.

• Nobody wants to pay $1000 extra for a device to be installed in their car to do the cop's job. For $1000 per car on the road, you could hire alot of cops...
• Easily circumvented. Anyone with a pair of wire cutters and access to a Radio Shack can bypass this.
• Ppl would buy their cars out of state to get around this
• Flashing lights! At night??!!!?? Honking horn! At night?????!?
• Violates innocent until proven guilty principle, therefore degrading.
• Will cause accidents. If you think cell phones were bad imagine hyperventilating sober drivers passing out at the wheel.
• Easily circumvented. Even if you don't like wire cutters, you can fill up a balloon with air to blow for you. ( or another low tech solution devized by the same people who can make a bong out of *anything* )
• A 0.1 BAL limit is appropriate. Sorry, 0.08 is too strict. And age doesn't affect the drunkeness of someone with a given BAL. There is no justification for 'zero tolerance' laws that are used to convict minors of drunk driving who have BAL's of 0.02 or higher. Sure, age may play a role in how many drinks *will get a person to a certain BAL* but the BAL *is* the only easy objective measure of how intoxicated someone is. A minor caught with a BAL of 0.03 maybe should be penalized for drinking illegally, but not DUI, since they were not intoxicated while driving. There is MUCH difference morally between drinking a beer that the law says you can't have, and drinking a six pack that the law says you can't have and then going for a spin. Drinking 1 beer and driving home is no different morally than drinking 1 beer at home, or drinking a six pack at home and staying there. It's what one would call responsible drinking.
  

  Of course, a minor found driving while truely intoxicated ( at the adult limit in their state ) should be convicted of DUI as should anyone else, but applying the much harsher penalties meant to deter irresponsible drunk drivers from killing people to responsible minors who drink illegally and happen to be driving home with a safe BAL that is above zero is stupid and cruel.

there should be an initial period in which these de jure (meaning "because we can") laws only apply to the governor and legislators in the particular state. so, for instance, all the big suits in new mexico have to blow into their drunk-o-meters every 15 minutes while driving for a couple years, and then and only then can they remove a sunset clause in the law and apply it to the general public.

we will need a federal statute to make it happen. write your congresscritter now.

These rolling retests require the driver to take the test as the car is moving.

Great, so someone has a new distraction in their car to go along with cell phones, the CD player, kids...etc. Wait until a few people wrap themselves around a tree. Then I wonder if the state may be liable for passing retarded legislation.

Good one, lawmakers. Strike another blow for stupidity!

Holy cow, that is the most insightful, intelligent and JUST idea I have heard in a long time.

I hope you don't mind if I spread the word.

My dad got stopped for speeding (and subsequently DWI) in 1990 and as part of a Pennsylvania first-time offenders program he paid a fine, did time in AA meetings, and had one of these installed in his car. By doing so he avoided the mandatory 48 hours jail time and loss of license.

It cost around $2500 to install, and he had to keep it in the car for a year. You had to blow in a pattern, and the thing was fussy as hell. Like blow for 5 seconds, stop, blow for 2 seconds, stop, blow for 2 seconds and pray you did it close enough. Don't blow too hard, or too softly. It was easy to screw it up and have to redo it. It was right around then that I started to drive, so I got the old car and my mom started driving the car with the interlock on it. She had a hell of a time getting it to work under normal conditions. On more than one occasion she failed the 3 times and was stuck waiting 30 minutes for the lock to time out.

Maybe the technology on these has improved in the last 14 years, but I'd bet they're just as fussy as they ever were. Bad idea, too expensive, and why are we punishing 100% of the citizens for something .08% or less of them do? I'm all for whoever suggested the politicians all 'test' this idea for a year to see how it goes before enacting it as law.

Fortunately, the founding fathers of this country had the foresight to give everyone a constitutional right to move to another state whenever they feel like it for any reason. That way when one state does something stupid, they just lose taxpayers. Now if the federal government does something stupid, on the other hand, the people have to live with it until some terms expire. (And if the Supreme Court does something stupid, we're hosed.) Just be thankful the states still have some of the power to govern themselves so the fed won't do it!

Brilliant idea. While we're at it, can we have the management at bus and train companies, and in the public transportation departments of councils, forbidden to own cars? And the people who set the levels of welfare benefits forced to live on the amount they specify? I'm sure there are more examples. This category of thinking deserves a name.

Small laws like this one gradually but surely remove civil liberties one by one. At the government level, politicians would just assume that we were nothing but children that does not know what is best for us.

In general, the majority of Americans know what is best for them and generally making responsible decisions about their life.

People that consistantly cause problems are the minority compared to the rest of law abiding citizens.

Instead of tring to help people that have issues, they are punished by being sent to jail to live in a locked box like an animal or even worse being sent to a mental institution where they are put on so many drugs that it permanantly destroys their mind and body.

The thing to blame here is the education system. Right now all the special programs for troubled students are being shut down. Instead of putting those people in special programs and classes to try to reach them, more and more of them are being put in mainstream classes. Many people in this situation do not do well and end up dragging the entire class down. In this situation, these challenged people will get frustrated and act out. This may lead to other people's grades dropping because of the constant distraction.

Things like zero tolerance are stomping on civil liberties. Right now it's very easy to be treated like a criminal, actually it is getting much harder not to be. In the last few years schools have been fortifying their walls like a jail. If you skip a class, you can get sent away to a juvenile detention center. You can be expelled for having a butter knife or a pair of scissors in your car parked outside the school. You can also be expelled for having a bottle of asprin.

I can barely recognize my old highschool now, there are high fences surrounding the entire complex. Instead of allowing people to go outside to eat lunch, they are forced to eat in the cafeteria. How are these young people ever going to learn how to be responsible adults if they are locked in a cage 7 hours a day and are forced to go to classes that they shouldn't have to be in?

This all leads to people that are adult age but still having the minds of children. This means there will be a growing dependance on the government.

I guess it's just a coincidence that it is the government that controls how schools are funded and what curriculums they have and that if a school chooses not to follow a rule it has it's only source of funding taken away.

Coming back to the interlock, the masses are treated like children incapible of making their own decisions. If we allow the government, which is supposed to run under our consent to overstep it's bountries, then it will turn into a tyranny. This will no longer be a Republic, it will be a Fascist Dictatorship.

1) Not too many years ago I learned in a criminology class a few things about the patterns of drunk driving offenses. The professor had taken part in a get tough effort by some jurisdiction who was hard core about setting up traffic stops over a long period of time. The volume of drunk drivers did not decrease. Yet at the same time there were very few repeat offenders. The kept stopping different people over the course of the study.

2) At first glance the punishment described in the article seems only appropriate for people already convicted of DUIs. But given the professor's study, such an application would not reduce the number of drunk drivers on the roads. If everyone had to have it it would.

3) Personally the social cost is way too high in my book. This kind of mass intrusion into your private life is something we need to avoid at all costs. It is a slippery slope

One can not look at the total of human histroy and say it is not a natural activity for humans to kill each other...

I can't understand how your words are supposed to accomplish anything in that situation. What can the cop do about it? He/she only enforces the laws.

No, the cop in that situation broke the laws he was supposed to be enforcing.

A) Pulls me over without reason (loud muffler on a brand new car? Give me a break -- he never had the balls to actually write that ticket)
B) Asks if I have been engaging in illegal activity with no cause to suspect I have.

If a cop pulls someone over because they happen to be Black and are driving a nice car that's called racial profiling and there would be an outcry. Why isn't it profiling for them to sit outside the bar parking lot and randomly pull people over who are obeying every rule of the road -- or follow them for ten miles until they commit some sort of minor traffic infraction (failure to signal, 5 miles over the limit, etc) that we all do on a day to day basis? Cops aren't allowed to follow me around K-Mart waiting to see if I'm going to shoplift.

Talk to the lawyers/politicians/rich people/critical-mass-of-choice who can do something about this.

Nobody is going to a damn thing about it -- call me cynical. MADD has too much lobbying power. Sooner or later it'll get to the point where it's a felony to drive if you have ANY measurable BAC. If my state refuses to adopt it they will lobby the Federal government to withhold our highway funds.

Meanwhile the Nanny-state and big-brother get bigger and bigger and harder to stop. Nobody cares, because how can stopping DWI's be a bad thing?

I don't drink, I don't like alcohol, I don't like
being drunk (though I used to black out a few times
a month from drinking in the past) and I don't like
being around drunks.

A HUGE majority of the folks I know that drink,
WOULDN'T if marijuana wasn't against the law.
Just recently they've made posession of less
than an ounce a non-felony. It's a good start.
Now.... decriminalize it completely and you'll
see a major decline in the number of DUI's and
drunk driver related accidents.

Nothing worse than seeing an intelligent happy
stoner become a pissy, mean drunk because their
'Job' requires random drug tests and considers
marijuana a drug.

Look at the way we tried to circumvent basic rights in this country by declaring people "enemy combatants".

I really don't agree with a lot of what this government (and the last, and the last) have been doing, however I'm really tired of people making a big deal about this "enemy combatant" thing. The people that everyone was whining about not being granted "Prisoner of War" status do not fit the definition of POW in Article IV of the Geneva Convention. The convention states that they must either be a regular member of official armed forces, or fufill all the following conditions:

• (a) That of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates;
• (b) That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;
• (c) That of carrying arms openly;
• (d) That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.

The people that were being detained, terrorist or not, do not fit that definition. To grant them that legal status would be to dilute its meaning. POW is a very specific legal term and I do not see anything wrong with this administration refusing to use it.

Of course there are issues with how the people in Cuba were treated, no matter who they were.

Our constitution is very clear on what rights of our citizens may not be abridged, however I do not believe it grants those same rights to foreign criminals. Maybe it should however these "basic rights" aren't protected the same way as they are for US citizens.

Why do we need special exceptions for different types of criminals?

Most criminals don't try to kill 40000 people at once. Most criminals are interested in making money or getting personal revenge, not on causing destruction on a scale that could reach millions. Terrorists are not simple criminals, they are enemies of the state that operate in a psuedo-warlike fashion, and should be treated as such.

I do agree that governments in general tend to expand their powers when possible. Our constitution is designed to prevent things like this however it's often not properly applied. However it's also clear that our democratic system of government has been very successful at recovering from power-madness... Look at things like the Sedition Act that are no longer around... the Patriot Act wouldn't have flown without the terrorism, and eventually when things settle down in the world laws like that will be re-examined.

If the law isn't enforced or renewed, it dies - NO EXCEPTIONS. I agree that it'd be great to have manditory renewals on laws, however there are a multitude of problems with this:

• The amount of laws in this country is simply astounding. If Congress had to revist each and every one, we would have no time for passing new, more relevant laws.
• As the balance of power on Capital Hill changes, this will almost guarantee that the laws will fluctuate rapidly from election to election. Our government was set up to be slow and steady, not quick, radical, and flighty.
• Having many laws changing makes a lot of issues, and I don't just mean lawyers being stuck up late at night. It's already difficult to expect people to know the laws they are bound by, and changing them constantly will make this almost impossible. Not to mention the cost to businessees who have to change wordings in contracts or business practices all the time. Businesses happen to have this great habit of passing costs to the consumers. This sounds bad for everyone.
• Also I think that having laws being temporary by nature encourages them to be more radical, which gives us thigns like the Patriot Act.
• As of right now the public already has a way to strike down laws that are terrible: constitutional amendment. 3/4ths of state conventions on an amendment is what is required according to the constitution, and if a law is really so hideous as to offend the entire population they will be quickly struck down

Easily circumvented. Anyone with a pair of wire cutters and access to a Radio Shack can bypass this.

Yup. Its easy. I could bypass one in about 5 minutes. Problem? You can't hide it. The fastest way - just stripping wires and bypassing the box - is blatantly obvious, because even if you tape it back up, it won't have tamper seals on it (a requirement where I worked). And even when people get creative and just jump to the starter directly, the box logs it as an engine running fault. Too many of those and you're busted. And I know what you're thinking: "just disconnect the box". Doesn't work. You either end up with Power On/Off signals every time you disconnect and reconnect the box, or you get a very suspicious report with almost no 'blows' despite your milage having increased (yes, your milage is tracked, though not electronically).
Mechanically circumventing the box IS possible, but its very difficult and time consuming. Not something a drunk is easilly capable of doing ;). (And no, I won't tell anyone how.)

Will cause accidents. If you think cell phones were bad imagine hyperventilating sober drivers passing out at the wheel.

A potential hazard, yes. Luckilly you are given, IIRC, about 3 minutes to provide a sample. So you can easilly wait until you're stopped at a light or otherwise unoccupied. Of course, that relies on the users intelligence, which isn't a great thing to be counting on.

Easily circumvented. Even if you don't like wire cutters, you can fill up a balloon with air to blow for you. ( or another low tech solution devized by the same people who can make a bong out of *anything*

Like I posted earlier above, most newer devices (well the ones I worked with anyways) require you to hum for a few seconds as you provide a sample. This makes mechanical blowing devices a bit more challanging to devise (although, admittedly, still possible). But as the technology evolves, it gets harder and harder to fool it, to the point of being impractical (especially if you have nothing to hide, save your "privacy").

You can drink at 18 with a military ID.

On-base perhaps -- not in normal establishments. And that's not the point. How nice of them to allow me to drink after they draft me.

The point is that an 18-20 something kid is obligated to pay taxes and be tried as an adult if they commit a crime -- yet they can't legally drink. If you are male you are forced to register with selective service -- yet you can't drink.

At 18 years old you can vote, drive, smoke cigarettes, enter into legal agreements, join the service, buy/view pornographic materials or shows, borrow money on credit, consent to sex, adopt a child, consent to surgery, appoint someone as your power of attorney, change your name, renounce your American citizenship, move to another state or country, etc etc etc etc.

The state has no right to tell me I can do all of these things, obligate me to register for military service, treat me like an adult (i.e: charge me with a crime and send me through the adult legal system), yet tell me that I can't legally drink a toast if my sister announces that she is engaged.

Something is wrong with that picture.

I see your point about ripping the thing out with dykes being difficult to hide, but I wouldn't bother trying to hide it except from cursory inspection by the guy that gives you a sticker - once a year with a solder gun before getting a sticker and it's back where it's 'supposed to' be. And while people who have been ordered to install one of these things by a court may be required to submit reports to some parole-officer-figure, the general public won't be submitting anything to anyone.

As for mechanical blowers requiring one to hum, you could get around that with a charcoal breath filter that would still transmit the hum but not the alcohol on one's breath. Blowing isn't hard. Neither is humming. Someone will come up with a low tech jerry-rigged breathalyzer-defeating bong.
And I agree with you that those with nothing to hide except their privacy will largely find defeating this device impractical, but determined drunk drivers know who they are and will find a way around it.

I consider myself liberal, although I do find myself leaning toward the conservative side on a few issues. I also have Christian beliefs. One of them is not forcing my religion on those who do not wish it, as the fundamentalists seem to believe is the most important thing to do.

I don't believe that politicians have the right to push their religious beliefs on me in the form of laws. Lo and behold, the Constitution agrees. What particularly grates me is when they pass a law that makes life difficult for someone of a lower socioeconomic status while making life easier for a rich guy at the same time. A good example of that is tax cuts for corporations who send jobs overseas while the working Americans get screwed out of a job that is all they have done their entire lives. Anyway, this particular action seems to be in direct opposition to their stated religious beliefs, and that makes me crazy.

Now you may say that these working Americans should have planned ahead, but I ask you...did your parents plan ahead when they didn't learn to read very well?

I will agree that those working harder deserve "more." I don't agree that those who can't work harder for whatever reason deserve no right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I think everyone should at least have an equal chance in life. Not everyone has that equal chance right now, and it seems to be getting worse.

...the bill was dropped from the DUI package that the Senate passed so it's not going to be law anyway, not now at least. I'd suggest writing your reps and senators right now to make sure legislation like this gets shut down in the future.

Not that it matters much if it does pass, I'd just drive over to Texas to buy my cars. Also, there's no way I'm going to be living in this god forsaken state after I finish my graduate study, its stupid fucking laws like this that get passed here in New Mexico that are so unfriendly to business that I won't be finding a decent job here anyway.

This bill was a great example of really strange liberal thinking.

Several countries (Saudi-Arabia, Malaysia, Turkey, Thailand) have the death penalty for drunk driving. Most second offense, some first. If you want to cut down on a particular crime the solution is not to write additional laws, but to stiffen the law in place.

* In South Africa, the penalty is a ten-year prison sentence and the equivalent of $10,000 fine, or both.

* In Russia, the license is revoked for life.

* In Malaysia, the driver is jailed. If he is married, his wife is jailed, too.

(From http://fp.uni.edu/studyabroad/guide/alcoholdrugs.a sp)

You can be forced to give evidence against yourself in the US, just not testimony. Destroying such evidence is considered obstruction of justice. Of course giving evidence against one's self is really ( as opposed to legally ) tantamount to giving testimony, but that's only one level of BS that allows this to go on.

The other BS argument that allows this is that 'driving is a privalege, not a right'. If freedom of travel is a right ( which it is ), then in this society of roads and sprawl, so is having license ( freedom ) to travel by piloting an automobile. The whole 'driving is a privilege' nonsence idea strikes me of being formulated way back when the majority of people got around their tiny towns on horse and buggy. The precidents that baleywick has set over the years allows driving to continue to be considered a privilege by the courts nowadays rather than the right it is even though the world is much different.

I was once pretty much required to take a road side test.

A bunch of kids in a truck in front of me tossed a full beer can out the window when they illegally sped by and passed me on a main road. I saw an arm out the window and thought the passenger was flipping me off or something, and then saw a silver object arcing towards my car.

It was apparently a full, unopened beer can. I hit the brakes like mad. I thought whatever it was was going to hit my hood but it barely missed, bounced up after bursting, and splattered beer all over the windshield and hood, bounced up again, by this time a distance off, and skidded off the road.

I was a bit pissed someone just threw something at my car. Calmly call it in. Then had to literally chew the head off the operator because they were so passe. The other party was so stupid they pulled into where they lived a half mile up.

Cops show up finally. Note--I'm pulled over to the side of the road, parked. Officer takes all my info down and what happened. Now, there's beer suds and what not still on my hood. I think I'm going to leave soon and they're going to go talk to the other party and hopefully give them a warning or something (one of the guys, the passenger, was obviously drunk; hell, at least a littering charge) then I hear:

"Sir, I smell alcohol. Have you been drinking tonight? Please step out of the vehicle."

If I recall right, I looked up, probably with a scared, horrified look on my face, then I just paused, thought of what they were asking of me, and busted out a laugh. This, of course, pissed the cop off. Another officer had shown up about halfway through all this, enough to hear my account of the events, and he was looking at the other officer like she was nuts.

This was a Saturday night if I recall, around October 18th, 2003. Last time I had a drink? A beer February 2002. Needless to say, I passed the test and was let go. They said they would call me about the others they held, but never did. I found the whole experience rather insulting.

There are laws, federal and state, that mandate certain safety features and outlaw things that are considered unsafe In MA, those running lights that some car-modders are so fond of are illegal. In most states there is some form of safety inspection that must be passed before a car can be registered. And for the most part, this all makes sense. It's not really an unreasonable burden to pay something under $50 (I don't know of a state where the safety inspection costs more, but I haven't lived in all states, either) and wait in line/wait for them to check your car once every year or two in order to make the roads safer for everybody. None of us really wants a car with no brakes out on the road.

But this is ridiculous. First, because it's an unreasonable financial burden on *somebody*, whomever has to pay to put a huge number of devices in every car. Second, because if all of those devices are enabled (the legislation says that the devices have to be installed, but doesn't mention if they have to be enabled or not), it is a significant burden on every driver in the state, for reasons that have been well discussed here.

I hope it gets knocked down as unconstitutional.

I was going to make the same point -- imagine if you're on a busy freeway and suddenly the car behind yours starts honking and flashing its lights. Is it an emergency vehicle that needs to come through, an imminent case of road rage, or an interlock system with bad timing? And what if you're in heavy traffic, and your car goes nuts? I know people who would promptly panic and cause a multicar pileup if their car behaved like that.

The possibilities for worse-than-one-drunk-driver are endless. You're driving home from work at 3am, and your car decides to wake the neighbourhood (and violates a variety of nuisance noise laws while it's at it), and after this happens a few times, your neighbour goes berserk and shoots you. Or you're behind a fleet of gang-bangers on a lonely road, and they take your car's blast of noise as an ill-considered attempt to tell 'em to get out of your way. (I know someone who barely escaped with her life after annoying a Bay area tong by honking at them, so this is not exactly theoretical.)

Not to mention that it'll be rough on new-car sales in New Mexico. Yeah, they'll probably pass laws like California has to prevent people from buying cars out of state (to duck our high sales tax, or whatever), but that'll just cause an increase in grey-market used cars.

Yep, a really well-thought out law. The ambulance chasers will love it... and maybe they'll come of some use, by quickly making it prohibitively expensive to keep on the books.

Not to mention that it DOES presume guilt, which you'd think could make it ripe for constitutional challenge.

Montana (once a hotbed of drunk driving) made itself inhospitable to drunk drivers with a "get one DUI, lose your license for a year" law, and more-severe penalties for repeat offenders. It worked -- DUIs dropped radically. Meanwhile, life went on normally for sober drivers, which is as it should be.

And is it just me, or are more and more laws being passed everywhere (not just in the U.S.) that make you prove your innocence or right to do whatever, rather than affecting only the convictably guilty??

The freedom pendulum does seem to be swinging back the other way.