Eight Feet Deep

 Per­haps because we move kind of slow down here in Texas is the rea­son why trends which have taken place else­where don’t always get to the Lone Star State posthaste. Take, for instance, bans on using cell phones while driving.

 A new law will take effect on Sept. 1 in Texas — on a local-option basis — which bans the use of cell phones in school zones. By local-option, I mean that the gov­ern­ing juris­dic­tion of where the school is located has to first approve it. If it is in a city, the city must approve it and county com­mis­sion­ers must give their approval if it is in an unin­cor­po­rated area.

 I sup­pose the Texas Leg­is­la­ture and Gov. Good Hair Perry, in their infi­nite wis­dom, decided they didn’t want to get get stuck as being the ones who out­lawed using a cell alto­gether while dri­ving. That is, no mat­ter how many peo­ple get killed because of peo­ple yakking on their phones and not watch­ing what they are doing.

 One thought has piqued my curios­ity. Since Moth­ers Against Drunk Dri­ving is largely respon­si­ble for one no longer even feel­ing they can drink one beer and drive with­out wor­ry­ing about a DUI charge, I won­der their thoughts on cell use and driving?

 Admit­tedly, I have not had a chance to do exten­sive research but in a quick search of the MADD Web page all I could find was a res­o­lu­tion sup­port­ing the use of cell phones in vehi­cles for report­ing drunk dri­vers. I won­der where they really stand?

 Although the fed­eral high­way safety agency tried to sit on stud­ies show­ing even hands-free use of cell phones is deadly, other stud­ies show those talk­ing on the phone are four times as likely to crash and are as likely to wreck as dri­vers with a blood-alcohol con­tent of .08.

 I admit that I some­times use my phone while dri­ving. It is a habit that I am try­ing to break just as see­ing — when I was as a fire­fighter — numer­ous folks dead who didn’t wear seat­belts got me in the habit of wear­ing one. Sad to admit, I once used to drink and drive. Hell, just about every Texan who both drank and who dri­ved cher­ished the long stretch when the state had no open con­tainer law or at least one that had no teeth. Times have changed now. You can get tick­eted for an open con­tainer and can be arrested for DUI for almost hav­ing alco­hol on your breath. Don’t get me started on those who can serve and die for their coun­try unable to get a drink because they aren’t 21!

 And so it goes. My lib­er­tar­ian friends don’t like the idea of gov­ern­ment play­ing nanny, and I don’t like it a whole lot either. But safety aside, a lot of prac­ti­cal util­ity comes from laws like man­dat­ing seat belts, DUI and ban­ning cell phones. This includes money spent on insur­ance pre­mi­ums, taxes we pay to sup­port hos­pi­tals, worker pro­duc­tiv­ity (hav­ing your worker show up instead of he or she being in jail, the hos­pi­tal or the morgue), to list a few.

 So, I imag­ine one day com­pletely giv­ing up talk­ing on a cell and dri­ving. Unlike many peo­ple I see every day, I don’t stay on the phone from the time I get in my auto until I dis­em­bark, and then some.

 I can live with­out dri­ving and cell chat­ting; per­haps even live because I am not dri­ving and talk­ing on the phone.