Sliding toward Prohibition ... again

The new NTSB recommendation that the limit for driving under the influence of alcohol be reduced down to .05 is a much bigger story than currently meets the eye. The initial standard of .15 was reached in 1938 after careful study involving the American Medical Association and the National Safety Council. Control and experimental groups were developed and one group was given alcohol periodically and the other group wasn't. Both groups were then tested periodically to determine whether or not a decline in motor skill ability occurred. For those who consumed alcohol, motor skill ability DID decline and the average threshold was determined to be .15. They had to settle on an average because everyone is different. Different body types, different weights, and different tolerances for alcohol made it impossible for the threshold to be spot on.

Several years later, the standard was dropped from .15 to .10 and then, eventually, to the current level of .08. These two drops didn't occur because of any scientific testing but because of the lobbying group, Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, more commonly known as MADD. This group was comprised of people who had lost loved ones in crashes involving a driver under the influence. As the membership of MADD increased, so did their influence. In addition to getting the threshold for DUI dropped significantly, they were also successful in getting alcohol-related crashes re-defined as anyone in the car possessing or drinking alcohol rather than just the driver. This was due to their successful lobbying efforts in state legislatures across the country.

And now, once again, MADD has had a significant influence in getting NTSB to recommend reducing the threshold to .05, one third of what scientific testing proved it to be. This goes hand in hand with lobbying efforts designed to significantly reduce the use of cigarettes, large sugary colas, high cholesterol foods, high caloric foods, fried foods, fatty foods and practically anything else that might not lead to what has been described by some as a healthy lifestyle.

All of this is being done to protect you from a fate you cannot escape and that is eventual death. But will it make you have a longer and healthier life while you're alive? The answer is deceptively simple. For some it will, for others it won't because there is no blueprint for living long or dying young. It happens in significant numbers on both sides of the equation.

Would reducing the alcohol content required to be DUI to .05 reduce highway deaths? Almost certainly it would but we could also eliminate ALL highway deaths if we got rid of cars, eliminate all airplane deaths by doing away with airplanes, eliminate most accidental deaths by prohibiting anyone to take any chances at all. But that's not what life is about and that's not what being an individual in a free society is about either.

.05 blood alcohol content is a little more than two drinks for most people. So theoretically, if you and your spouse go out for dinner and you have two pre-dinner drinks followed by a nightcap, you're going to be defined as legally drunk on the way home. More specifically, a 160 pound person who has three alcoholic drinks in an hour will test around .07. This is under the limit today but would be over the limit if .05 is passed. Those involved in law enforcement realize this stretches the limits of common sense. They also know that there are all kinds of impaired drivers because they've seen them all. There are drivers who obey every traffic law on the way home because all the want to do is GET home, while others throw good judgment to the wind and drive like maniacs, threatening themselves and everyone else they encounter. Now good judgment would suggest that these drivers be dealt with differently but again, thanks to the MADD lobbying effort, they're not. Their handling by law enforcement and the courts is based not on their individual differences but on that magic number that supposedly quantifies whether a person is impaired or not. It makes no sense, other than to prove that lobbying groups have more power than individuals.

Let's say that the lower limit for driving under the influence IS passed by state legislatures across the country, including Nebraska. That means that fewer people are going to drink in restaurants and bars and more are going to drink at home. We already know that people who drink at home consume more alcohol per session than people who drink in public. So a very likely outcome of the new limit is that there will be fewer traffic fatalities and more cases of domestic abuse, child abuse and sexual abuse. Because as our first go-around with Prohibition proved, you can make it illegal for people to drink but you can't stop them from drinking. All you can influence is where they drink and for wives and children across the country, abusers drinking at home will become their worst nightmare.

As hard as some want to try to protect everybody from everything, people can't be protected from themselves.