God Is My State Trooper
“The Bush administration unveiled a new workplace safety policy today
that calls for no mandatory steps by industry and instead relies on voluntary
actions by companies to reduce injuries from repetitive motions on the
job.”
New York Times, April 6
•
The Bush administration unveiled a new highway safety policy today that calls
for no mandatory steps by police and instead relies on voluntary actions by
drivers to reduce injuries on the road.
“Government has no business being America’s back seat driver,”
said A.N. Rand, deputy White House director for sound bites.
Instead, speed limits on interstate highways are to be phased out over a
ten-day period, Ms. Rand said, in hopes that states will see fit to follow
suit.
“Each individual state will of course be free to retain speed limits if
it chooses,” she added, “although those which refuse to knuckle under
will of course lose Federal highway funding. Uncle Sam should not be an
enabler of highway fatalities.”
This was a reference to last week’s report by the National Commission on
Freedom of the Road, which found that speed limits are at best an ineffective
way to combat traffic deaths.
“Every single one of last year’s 42,000 highway fatalities occurred
on roads with speed limits,” said Raymond Ignoto, commission chairman and
president of the American Association of Body Shops.
“The only continent with zero highway fatalities last year was
Antarctica,” Mr. Ignoto added. “Which also just happens to be the only
continent without any speed limits. Coincidence? I don’t think so.”
•
At his press briefing today, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer announced
the formation of a Highway Security Office reporting directly to the
president.
“The president regards this as a faith-based initiative,” Mr.
Fleischer. “He has faith in the American driver, as he does in all
Americans of whatever race, color, or creed. Or country of
national origin, with some obvious exceptions.”
Mr. Bush’s choice as the first Reverend General of Highway Security will
be Billy Bob McAllister, currently chaplain for the Texas Highway Patrol.
“You’ve heard of police aircraft,” Reverend General Billy Bob said.
“Well, we’ve got us a brand new trooper up there. From now on the Lord
God is going to be our Eye in the Sky.”
The new reverend general hastened to explain, however, that this did not mean
an end to state troopers, or even to the tickets they have been known to hand
out.
“Our boys will still come down on you hard,” he said. “Anybody
that their blood alcohol percentage and their body weight combined adds up to
maybe 400, something like that, we haven’t come up with an exact figure
yet, why that individual can expect to face a brutal tongue-lashing from our
law enforcement personnel and possibly even a warning ticket. Sealed by court
order, of course. Our job is to enforce the law, not embarrass people who
make an innocent little mistake.”
•
Emphasis is also to be placed, the new highway safety czar said, on random
roadside inspections of small vehicles as well as body cavity searches of
their drivers.
The Freedom of the Road Commission’s report singled out such vehicles as
a major cause of highway fatalities when they are crushed by larger, more
patriotic vehicles.
This combination of new approaches to traffic safety, White House sources
explained, is expected to allow more efficient allocation of scarce police
resources to serious quality-of-life-threatening offenses.
Among these will be failure to wear or fly the flag 24/7, any references to
butterfly ballots or other expressions of lèse majesté,
assisting in the suicide of a terminally ill person, driving while single,
and operation of a motor vehicle lacking a valid bumper sticker that says,
“God Wrote It In The Bible, I Believe It, And That’s All There Is To
It!”
•
April, 2002
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Copyright © 2004 by Jerome Doolittle
remnant@badattitudes.com
