Many defense lawyers and drivers have complained that the blood-alcohol level used by states is too low and allows charges for relatively low amounts of alcohol consumption. Nevertheless, it appears that the National Transportation Safety Board will recommended that all states drop the blood-alcohol level at which motorists can be charged with driving drunk to .05, down from the current rate of .08. That will mean that an average woman will cross the threshold with only a single drink. For men, it will be a two drink maximum.
What is striking is the statement of NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman, who explained that “Our goal is to get to zero deaths because each alcohol-impaired death is preventable.” That would seem to favor a .00 BAL. While all agencies work to avoid all injuries and deaths, few consider it a functional goal since there are few attainable absolutes in regulations. All regulation tends to be a trade off between rivaling goals or practices. Drinking is legal and most people believe that they can drive safely with a single drink. There is no question that the alcohol diminishes driving ability even with a single drink but the new level could result in a massive expansion of drivers under court supervision or suspension.
In defense of NTSB, they claim that more than 100 countries have adopted the .05 alcohol content standard or lower. Yet, this is a change that will receive little debate outside of the NTSB. An issue of this importance used to be the subject of considerable debate in Congress (or more importantly, in state legislatures) but with the rise of the “Fourth Branch” of federal agencies, such decisions are increasingly decided by federal bureaucracies that are fairly insulated from the public. They are then imposed on the states through federal conditional spending.
Many states are likely to balk at the decision given the already vocal opposition over the current standard. However, the federal government is expected to threaten states with the loss of federal funding for highways if they do not do exactly what they are told. No state (particularly in this economy) can afford to forgo federal funds for roads. While the Supreme Court suggested in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius that the federal government could go too far in coercing states (in that case by threatening Medicaid), it has long allowed the use of federal conditions for highway funding. This encourages Congress to take in more taxes than it needs to return the money to the state with conditions or federal mandates.
States may also be ordered to implement alcohol ignition interlock devices. The cost of these devices is imposed on the drivers in the form of a $50 to $100 purchase price plus a $50 a month fee to operate.
With the increasing use of sobriety roadblocks where drivers are asked if they had anything to drink (and most answer truthfully), the result could be a much higher “yield” in arrests.
What do you think about the new regulation on BAL?
Source: USA Today
**
“There are what… 40,000 deaths per year on our highways? Many of which can be attributed to one or more alcohol-impaired drivers? I think that sounds like a fine standard. “One for the road” has to stop. We’re not driving horse carts anymore.”
**
Of those 40,000 deaths per yr how many can we say were Micky D related because there was a Micky D wrapper at the scene?
Any cell phones, walmart sacks, etc…
Couldn’t we say that those deaths could be related to any number of factors.
For example in a peer reviewed study a few years back showed that the average new born baby has over 285 toxic chemicals in their blood at birth.
(Same 285# for the nurses & mothers which also became part of the study.)
( Of course the doc/nurses shoot up the new born with the toxic Hep B Vax, right out of the womb. geezz.)
Anyway, try as you might you just can’t say it was just alcohol related.
He!!, I’ll go one better: How about nothing above a .00 blood alcohol level when carrying a firearm?
(chuckle, chuckle)
I don’t know if it is true, did not gooogle it, but according to the stories I heard this am the other countries with the reduced level found the number of fatalities also greatly reduced. If so then it is not a bad idea.
I was surprised for the Prof to write “Many states are likely to balk at the decision given the already vocal opposition over the current standard. However, the federal government is expected to threaten states with the loss of federal funding for highways if they do not do exactly what they are told”
‘expected”? “likely”? this is not what is happening or to my knowledge proposed. more like scare tactics, see what a bad idea this is because the government will then swoop in and start using draconian measures to enforce what may or may happen.
“There are what… 40,000 deaths per year on our highways? Many of which can be attributed to one or more alcohol-impaired drivers? I think that sounds like a fine standard. “One for the road” has to stop. We’re not driving horse carts anymore.”
How many of those are caused because a driver has a BAC > .05 but < .08? The stats I've seen show a very gradual rise in impairment from 0 to about .08, a slightly greater rise to about .15, and from there it really starts to spike up. Impairment is NOT a linear function of BAC. Someone with a BAC of .2 is many times more impaired than a person with a BAC of .1, not just double. To address my question, I suspect that the number would be extremely small, and the number deterred by enacting the new limit even smaller.
When the transport safety a holes develop a reliable test for igPays to use on the side of the road then we will buy into it. The margin of err is too high for .10 as it is now. Maybe outlaw alcohol by a constitutional amendment. Why cant we try something new? Outlaw computers in cars. Cant we put internet blockage over highways?
** Bron 1, May 15, 2013 at 10:35 am
mespo:
“More nanny government at its worst..”
keeping drunk drivers off the road is a bad thing?
**
Oh how sweet, you’re doing it for the “Children” again.
Hey brainwashed Zombie almost every F’in Nuke plant in the world is leaking cancer causing radiation & you are eating & breathing it!
If you can pull your head out of your backside for a minute in case you haven’t noticed the US/World has much larger problems then lowering the 2 beer limit we already have in place.
It’s a mathematical certainty that this Fascist system we are currently forced to live under is under going a complete collapse right now.
1st up: Remember that kindly looking grandpa type eating the ice cream cone, that American Hating Piece of Trash, Warren Buffet?
“Buffets Weapons of Financial Mass Destruction”
Approximately 1.5 “Quadrillion” dollars worth of unbacked OTC derivatives are the sheeet hitting the fan right now.
What did you think that 85 billion a month welfare check to Wallst Banks/Insurance companies was paying for?
Yes, that’s your job & your savings & pension fund going up in flames! LOL;)
2nd up, Military Stats
You can say what you wish, but our military does sometimes put out some great stats.
I’ve used them before, with success, for profit.
Anyway, without going back digging them out the US Military stats I’m pointing to show that at the current exponential growth rate of fascist tyranny beating down of the citizens/govt employees that we are fast approaching the level in which the citizens/govt employees refuse to submit to the abuse of the tyrant traitors.
So just sit back, stay off the roads the best you can, drinking or not & wait because it won’t belong before it’s all right at your front door.
Gary T:
I would like to see that study. I dont think this a socialist capitalist issue.
I have read of a study made by a Massachusetts university that stated most people drive better on one drink of alcohol (1oz).
What they should do, is offer a special dispensation on a person’s driver’s license that certifies them able to drive on x number of drinks.
Some people can drive on more alcohol, whereas others cannot.
This is simply another socialist edict being imposed . . . because SOME people cannot drive with alcohol in their system, it must mean that everyone must be prevented from doing so.
Drunk Driving laws/rules are just another one of those political football issues meant to distract the population from the more important issues, like treason that is being committed by some of our leaders.
For example, should you personal be more worried about drunk drivers or the AIDS/Cancer Viruses that the govt has allowed in the past in the vaccines?
Have you read the peer reviewed studies that show what happens to you when you eat Mansanto’s GMO food?
Have you seen pictures of the tumors it causes?
mespo:
“More nanny government at its worst..”
keeping drunk drivers off the road is a bad thing?
Just saw Prof Turley on CNN. An outstanding job as usual!
Are you up on all your govt approved vaccines Bruce?
Maybe you need a couple more shots? LOL;)
I’m all for cutting down drunk driving, but is there any evidence that drivers with alcohol levels between .05 and .08 are killing people? I know it’s just anecdotal evidence, but every time I read about a drunk driving fatality, the BAL involved is always well over .10.
Maybe we need a new law limiting the amount of Rat Poisons in the water supply, like Sodium Fluoride, that you can have in your system while driving.
Maybe we need a new law limiting the amount of hydrocarbon pollution poisons you can have in your system while driving.
Maybe we need a new law limiting the amount of Monsanto’s GMO poisons you can have in your system while driving.
In other words it’s a complete distortion of fact only look at alcohol level & ignore all of the other known neurotoxins in the environment.
Oh well, I guess drinkers can always just switch to meth or something. (Sarc Off)
If by now you don’t get the message about drinking and driving maybe you should be bankrupted by fines and attorney fees.
Was it looking at that beer that had you impaired or was it something else?
Maybe we need a new law limiting the amount of radiological poisons you can have in your system while driving.
** TEPCO seeks permission to dump groundwater from Fukushima plant into ocean
Japan Today | The contaminated water storage has been a problem since early in the accident. **
The percentage of alcohol is an arbitrary percentage. 0.08 was selected as as a compromise between someone possibly getting drunker ( continued alcohol absorption) or getting more sober at the time of the test. A more accurate method would be to also test one hour later, which is never done. How many ways do you want to spell money grab?
Just another day in the life of the average American living under crushing fascist govt tyranny….
http://www.prisonplanet.com/shock-video-california-police-break-into-home-taze-victims.html
http://www.prisonplanet.com/dad-who-died-during-arrest-begged-for-his-life-witness-videos-seized.html
More nanny government at its worst..
RWL should be reporting soon w/ his quite “unique” take on DUI.
Oops, sorry a damn typo: States contracts with the private prison industrial complex in which the State guarantees the Private for Profit Prison a 90% occupancy rate.