As a libertarian about many things, I used to oppose laws against using cell phones while driving even in states -- Rhode Island is the worst I have seen -- noteworthy for having very incompetent, lazy and inconsiderate drivers. No more. The relentless snows have dramatized just how bad many drivers in the Ocean State are. The people in SUV's are the worst -- perhaps because the owners tend to be affluent and spoiled. They barrel down streets many of which are now less than a lane wide, at 20 miles an hour over the speed limit, with walls of snow and ice squeezing from both sides while yakking about their trivial lives on their phones.
I'll be pleased when the price of gasoline goes to $5 a gallon and even some of these slobs might get rid of their fat cars. They'll still be self-absorbed, spoiled people but less able to make life miserable for others on the road, be they other drivers or hapless pedestrians looking for a sidewalk behind six-foot-high walls of dirty snow.
-- Robert Whitcomb
