Good Citizenship through Paranoia

I’m not a good person. I leave 12% tips on adequate service. I drink. I lust. I sloth. (slothe? Sloath? Sloth.) I don’t envy, but I’m jealous of those who can. I speed (more than the courtesy 10mph), I don’t use blinkers, and I make sure that if ever my wipers are on, my lights are off. And if I were alone, and had free time, in a room with a puppy and a knife… well… only one of us is walking out. And if you think I’m alone, well, maybe you don’t realize how evolution happened and why *they’re* *our* pets.

That being said, some things can scare me straight. The first time I meet a future mother-in-law (or as is more accurate, a soon-to-be-ex’s mother), I am on my bestest behavior with a cherry on top. I try to keep my swearing to a minimum in front of Friars, Fathers, and Nuns. And whenever I see the tell-tale markings of a lightbar on top of a caprice or a Crown Vic with governmental plates, I am the very model of Driver’s Ediquette.

The problem, of course, is that these markings are tell-tale. The silhouette of a bacon-mobile is easily recognizable, and radar detectors are a dime a dozen. This means that I am only in accordance with the laws and regulations of the road/municipality when I am being directly observed. All memory high school run-ins with the fine ladies and gentlemen of the New Providence Police Department to the contrary, cops have better things to do.

So, take this under advisement, procurement personnel of law-enforcement agencies across our fair land: branch out. Don’t restrict yourself to American sedans. Buy anything with 1.5-7 wheels, and use it to scare the shit out of us. I mean it: your job’s hard enough. Why not play with our minds?

Imagine if every Hyundai Boxy-wagon or Alfa Romeo roadster pulled to the side of a road were potentially a speed trap? No longer could you whiz by a Winnebago doing twice its speed: they might be SWAT team members on their way to see the Grand Canyon. Every impounded car or bicycle should be turned into another tool for enforcing ridiculously low limits on our ability to endanger myself and those near me.

It used to be that this was easily taken care of: every red-blooded American was decent and God-fearing. But the idea of an omniscient being who can see your every thought just isn’t as surprising in age of cell-phone cameras, surveillance photos, orbiting satellites, gossipy blogs, and attorney general Gonzales/PATRIOT act enforcer cyber-John-Ashcroft. So instead, instill fear in us with a reconstituted fleet of mopeds and Yugos with sirens hidden inside.

-D”I didn’t think I was even fighting the law, and the law won”an