Accidents?

[Re-run]

Aww they are working at fixing that! Stem cells are amazing and no, they are not embryonic stem cells anymore. They found a way to grow cells and cause them to "reset" and become stem cells. So the ethical issues no longer apply.

So now they can try to legislate all the stupidity away! Not that it would ever work

[seestheday]

I tend to agree the most with free on this one.  Except for the swimming/marriage part.

I agree that people should have the right to do whatever they want to themselves.  It's when they start effecting others that laws or heck - mob rule - needs to come in.

Mandatory driving courses - wish these were even stricter, cars too - poor drivers arguably impact others more than themselves - e.g. cars hitting kids etc.
Smoking in office building - hate it, happy its outlawed - impacts the health of non smokers.
Helmet laws - wish we didn't have them - impacts the rider, impact to others is minimal - argument can be made that there is some impact from shared health care costs and inconvenience caused by road shutdown from fatality.


You guys can see where I'm going here

[Re-run]

I think the supposed impact on healthcare is a bogus claim made to further helmet laws.
I have not seen 1 actual report that backs this up.
If anything, it allows hospitals access to organs that otherwise would not be available, allowing them to do organ transplants they would not have been able to do.

I also support greater driver education. When you are riding or even driving, what is the biggest issue on the road? Shitty drivers of course. Better training and maybe even mandatory retesting once a certain age is reached would help rectify this issue. I would like to say driving is a right but then how would you enforce driver/rider training?

I am all for more personal freedoms but yet, would you want some homicidal crazy person to have access to weapons? Knowing that most likely those weapons would be turned against other people?
This is why regulations are needed on SOME things.

[sgtslag]

Gentlemen:

A word of caution on organ donor comments...  Tragedies happen, not always caused by stupidity.  Remember that nearly everyone who dies, has someone who loves them.  I get angry, too, but remember this is a public forum.  Thank you.

[Re-run]

I sure wasn't saying there is no tragedy, I was referring more to the money side of things. When it comes to helmet discussions, a lot of people FOR mandatory helmet laws cite the additional cost of their insurance. My comment was in effect, saying that any cost associated with keeping a person on life support would be more than offset by the monetary gains made on organ transfers.

I know about losing people. I lost my youngest brother, he was only 17. It is a long story but it comes down to I, my other brother, and a couple other people believe he was murdered.
I know all to well.

[shinyribs]

MarkPBG wrote

I'm from the side that believes if the Gov't takes some of my money in the form of taxes to provide something like roads, then I should have a RIGHT to access it. I don't think driving is a privilege. That argument might fly in countries whose infrastructure "grew up" before cars and there's good public transportation and pedestrian friendly cities. Here in the USA the country was built around the rail and the road, you just can't get most places without one of the two, so i think the movement that driving is a right is gaining momentum...though it's unlikely it will ever come to pass since the majority doesn't see it this way, but I think the point is valid.

I've read of several individuals who wanted to prove the point by attempting to walk cross country....most were ticketed and even arrested, sometimes several times. There's just no way to get anywhere, even on foot, without using the roadways.

Just curious,but ticketed for what?

And yes,every organ to be transplanted came from someone,so that is a very important thing to remember.

I think Prof. Sees summed it all up rather nicely.

[free2ride]

Re-run wrote

Better training and maybe even mandatory retesting once a certain age is reached would help rectify this issue. I would like to say driving is a right but then how would you enforce driver/rider training?

age 80 in Ontario. don't like the age thing becasuet here are some people far younger than 80 that should be pulled from the road, but it's the best we can hope for.

oh, and I think that you should have to license and have a road test if you have one of those 4-wheeled scooters -- they are the most menacing vehicle on city streets -- "hey, I'm on one of these things -- watch out for me becasue I'm not watching out for you -- I own the road!"

[MarkPBG]

They were ticketed for walking along a highway. Apparently, in almost all states, it's illegal to walk on the side of anything but side roads. Highways, Interstates, Freeways...you know, ALL the kinds of roads that actually connect the two sides of the country....are off limits to pedestrians....and you can't just walk off the roads, you'd be guilty of thousands, maybe tens of thousands of counts of trespassing going cross country if you didn't use the roads! So...how free are we...really?

[shinyribs]

Ok Mark. I figured that was the case. I can get the trespassing part just fine,the other is another one of those touchy gray areas. But still,pretty screwed up.

Concerning trespassing and freedom: I did a job for a man who lives on a 200 acre farm. The James River runs right thru the dead center of his farm. This is a fairly large river,but nothing that has any sort of 'traffic'. Basically,if you are traveling down this river you are out for leisure,not business. Anyway,there is a bend in the river on his property that creates a sort of a beach area. People tend to anchor their boats there and throw parties. Sometimes they get loud and keep at it til the wee hours. Since these people are on the water,and not his 'land',he cannot do anything about them being there. The County told him that he does not own the water,just the land under it and on both sides. The River is public property and Botetourt County has no curfews. They are not considered to be trespassing and they cannot be asked to leave. How screwed up is that?!

[seestheday]

Very interesting.  It is totally possible to cross Canada on foot or on a bicycle.  My Mom actually rode a bike across the country the year she turned 50.  She said that the Rockies were a blast but the prairies were super boring.

Also, as I've said before on this forum I used to be in a punk band.  During some of my mis-spent youth I was what could be called a libertarian, or what we used to call them back then: Anarchists.



Now I'm older and know better, but still have a lot of personal freedom biases.  It is always interesting to see older guys start to describe themselves as libertarian though .

Communists also advocate the same thing.  According to the communist manifesto the state is supposed to whither and fade away after the "dictatorship of the proletariat" was established and ruled for a short time - with the end result being a fully anarchist collective society.  Ya, like that will ever happen.

I remember when I first heard the term "libertarian" and asked some people what it was.  The best answer I got is still the one that makes the most sense to me:  Libertarians are right wing anarchists.  Anarchists are left wing libertarians.

[seestheday]

Found a better image:

[Truck]

even better than that Shiny, here in Va you also will have a $500 fine from the DMV and your licence suspended for not having insurance even though you have no vehicle.  Gotta love this state

[free2ride]

Can you figure this out? What exactly is being said here?

the latest article on the incident . . .

OTTAWA — A high-speed motorcycle crash on Eagleson Road that killed a man early Tuesday morning was neither an accident nor a criminal act, Ottawa police say.

The crash occurred at 4:40 a.m. at the intersection of Eagleson Road and Stonehaven Drive and forced police to block the busy intersection for several hours.

The crash was the result of a collision with “immovable objects,” said Insp. Murray Knowles of Ottawa police.

[sgtslag]

Sounds like suicide, but they don't want to come out and say it?

[seestheday]

Weird.  I'm not sure how a collision is not an accident.

[MarkPBG]

Insurance agencies and Law Enforcement have stopped using the term "accident" to describe incidents of "low-skill collisions". Only after they investigate the crash and possibly find a part failure or road condition that led to the crash will they again call it an "accident". I think they're using the different terms to more accurately reflect events in legal documents and court cases.

[shinyribs]

Sees' ,that is an awesome cartoon But really,we are all Anarchist. Every last one of us. We were created with free will and were intended to use it. Of course, like was said earlier,one mans right end where another's begins. Then the crazies among us started 'free-willing' over one another. So...then the Gov't steps in to create laws to keep us straight. Gov't me put in place to protest ourselves. Problem is,that gives the Gov't the ability to run over us real people,which they do,and it negates the whole idea: Gov't governs us to protect us from our crazies,but we have nobody to protect us from our crazy Gov't(s). The vicious cycle.So what are we to do? Vote them out? It's the best hope we got,sadly...of course,a Revolution worked pretty well for us American's last timebut, the vicious cycle started all over and it all went to poo once again ( or is heading that way quickly,it seems)

Depressing subject. I'm gonna go work on my bike and try to forget about it...


''immoveable object''....so,he ran into a Harl...?...nevermind

[clyde the ape]

Free,
 Out here in NJ we lost a guy during an escorted charity ride

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A few years ago a motorcycle cop was killed while leading a charity ride through Camden SC. I'm sure he had been very well trained, but all that safety training, and gear did not help much when the old woman in the Buick was in a hurry to turn into the IGA.
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