"passive" ? The two are not the same. One only encounters a red-light camera if one violates the law (and proper behavior), while the other presumes guilt until and unless one can prove innocence. but then social engineers love new technologies when it can be used to entrap people and make them prove they are not criminals.

As implemented in Houston, the red-light camera mechanism is not designed to make a positive ID of the driver. Guilt is presumed based on a photo of a license plate, and it can be a real pain in a city with this kind of sprawl to head downtown and get that sort of bureaucratic mess straightened out.

I'd be less annoyed with it if it: 1) were not purely a revenue stream for a city that's booming and has plenty of revenue and 2) a person weren't presumed guilty based on nothing more than a photo of a license plate.

If you think of it as illegally immigrating into the intersection, OJ will be fine with that. You're a Darwinist if you disagree, and possibly if you agree!

Just kidding, of course...

Kevin: Sure, but here in MD, people run through red (not even pink; Red!) lights constantly. If you're angry at someone, be angry at those drivers for making this sort of thing necessary.

More annoying is that DC has a zero-tolerance alcohol level; any reading is sufficient for an arrest, and the Metro closes too early, leaving you at the mercy of DC's taxis.

Yes, the Darwinist solution is to just let bad drivers kill themselves. But we're a Christian country, so we protect our neighbor even from himself.

The photo is of the guilty.

The traffic cameras don't bother me. Same result as if there's a cop watching (except cameras don't need donuts, and don't get lazy).

The mandatory breath analysis idea, though, is rotten. It crosses a line that will breed more disrespect than respect for the law. Besides, its just one more facet of OJ's pro-train / anti-car trope.

The only people who will notice the alcohol restraints are the ones who shouldn't be driving.

You are correct of course, but in many of these instances, skirting the law is far better than the processes by which the people are "nabbed."

For my part, I'd gladly pay an extra few hundred a year to drive faster, as long as it didn't get my license revoked. Further, funding gov. through speeders, gamblers, smokers and drinkers is far better than reaming the productive.

But I notice they are doing both.

Supporters of traffic cameras arguing about the "law" sound just like all the "wahoos" carping about "illegals."

The fact is that if every law in the US was enforced against every person breaking said laws, (and those arguing that there is nothing wrong with ubiquitous cameras are implicitly making the argument that we do so), the US would turn into N. Korea overnight.

I'm sickened by the "Nurse Ratchett" mentality that wants to turn every person in the US into a dingbat soccer mom, who, in turn, wants to turn all their children into pu----s.

Though it was a fairly puerile movie, "Demolition Man" did a pretty good job of pointing out just how tyrannical such futures are. [A cop is brought out of suspended animation in prison to pursue an old ultra-violent enemy who is loose in a nonviolent future society.]

So yeah, OJ. I just want to speed. And a future where everyone must conform to a 35 mph lifestyle is a dark one indeed.

Being one of the 14,000 caught I would like to comment instead from a more poetic or sci-fi perspective ... it was quite spooky several months ago after retrieving the mail to marvel at a photo of my 1966 brown jalopy wooshing through the intersection at Denny and Fairview ... Sure, I knew it had to be me behind the wheel, but as the driver wasn't visible I couldn't shake the uncanny feeling that might also be someone else. Where is Ray Bradbury when one needs him. Of course it probably was the ME me. And I am happy to report that as I approached this same intersection last week, the light turned yellow at the precise moment of truth and REMEMBERING WHAT HAPPENED LAST TIME I slammed on the brakes causing the driver behind me to swallow his tongue. Those cameras work like a doggone charm.

Of course you imagine it unjust that you be bound by our laws, that's why we have them in the first place.

A fine illustration though of the fact that there's no such thing as principled libertarianism.

Too funny Qiao!

Some laws are "unjust." Further, 100% enforcement of even just laws could be "unjust" under many circumstances.

If I had the time, or we were having a live town hall debate, it wouldn't take me 20 minutes to point out how easily your model (as argued above) leads to "unprincipled conservatism".

Some philosophies are more conducive to principles than others, and I agree with you re: libertarianism v. conservatism in that regard.

You are, however, arguing for a "Old Testament/Islamic" worldview of hard and fast rules, - with technology allowing for 100% compliance. We will soon see just how wonderful a world that brings us.

My view is that mankind is "unpricipled," and our governments are manmade institutions that are just as unprincipled.

The revenues generated alone, are cause to worry, given the unprincipled and substandard nature of most elected officials in the nation. We are better off with a few speeders getting through the nets.

But don't worry OJ, I know "resistance is useless." I will be assimilated.

Yes, objecting to the Testaments is the point of libertarianism. It's the elevation of self uber alles.