Tuesday morning around 5:30, I was finishing my
daily seven mile run before grabbing breakfast and
heading to the capitol. It was dark and I was
running north on Helena’s Montana Avenue about a
half mile from my temporary home. For safety sake, I
wear a florescent yellow jersey, a highly reflective
body harness, headlamp, and red strobe light. On
roads lacking a sidewalk, I run on the shoulder
facing traffic should a probable collision require
my leap into the barrow pit. This four lane street
is mostly deserted at this early hour, and this
morning, with no other cars in sight, a sedan zipped
past me holding firm in the outside lane; their
passenger side mirror missing my right elbow by a
mere couple feet. Had the motorist drifted to the
left lane we would have passed each other at a safer
distance of eight to ten feet. Oh well; he made his
point and I kept running.
Fifteen seconds later, another set of headlights
approached and at a distance of 200 yards, they
shifted to the left lane, before safely passing and
drifting back to the outside lane. In the darkness,
I smiled, mouthed “thank you” and nodded my head in
gratitude; a gesture the minivan driver would never
see.
In my last quarter mile, a third vehicle approached;
again in the outside lane. This driver held his
pickup firmly in his lane and I considered taking an
evasive leap over the snow bank piled along the
road’s shoulder. Just like with the sedan driver, I
could have reached out and slapped the pickup’s
rearview mirror as it zoomed past, dislocating my
shoulder thereby proving I am stupid; a trait I
prefer kept a secret. Now, let me jump to another
subject. I will get back to the sedan and pickup
drivers when I make my point at the end of this
column.
Montana’s code book grows every session. Beginning
with our one page compact to join the union in 1889,
our Treasure State book of laws has ballooned past
16,000 pages, stands 16 inches tall, weighs over 50
pounds and citizens are expected to know and obey
every single regulation. Ignorance of the law is not
a defense in court; it’s a dang good excuse and I
use it frequently, but it is not a defense. Answer
me this: Would you buy a new blender if it came with
a 16,000 page operator’s manual and you were
expected to commit every page to memory before
blending your first margarita? Probably not, which
is why people lick the salt, slam down the shot of
tequila and suck on the lime rather than buy a new
blender. Progressives assume citizens will obey
every law and this is the special logic behind
solutions like gun-free zones. To the left, utopia
is but one regulation away and once the magical
combination of laws is enacted America will achieve
nirvana. Liberals are delusional.
Last week in the House Transportation Committee, we
heard HB257 an “act revising laws pertaining to
bicycles.” In addition to further defining bicycles
and regulating lights and brakes, HB 257 requires
motorists to maintain five feet of clearance when
passing bicycles. Even though driver’s manuals have
required this five foot clearance for six years, and
it is common sense, it was never part of Montana
Code. We heard emotional testimony from bicyclists
who have been critically injured being rear-ended by
autos and I empathize with their pain and suffering,
but I voted “No” and here is why. Yielding a five
foot safe zone to walkers, runners, or bikers is a
simple courtesy, but if you were preparing to zoom
past a bicycle at highway speeds separated by only
inches, I doubt the presence or absence of a law
will change your behavior. To close the loop and
prove my point, both the sedan and the pickup who
zipped past me in the darkness on Montana Avenue
were Lewis and Clark County Sheriff vehicles
operated by citizens educated in the rules of the
road and sworn to public safety. HB257 slipped out
of committee 8-3, but logic prevailed on the House
floor where we defeated it on a vote of 43-57. Just
like knapweed, it will grow back.
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