Feds misdial with proposed cellphone ban for drivers

Eyes on the road. Hands on the wheel. No talking.

That's the best way to hit the highway.

But let's be honest. Despite knowing that we're supposed to focus our full attention on the road when we're behind the wheel, no one does.

Including lawmakers.

We eat, drink, talk to passengers, holler at children, daydream, fiddle with the radio, admire the scenery and occasionally yak on our cellphones.

News flash: Most of us can multitask safely.

Which is why the National Transportation Safety Board's new campaign for a nationwide, zero-tolerance, absolute, hand-held/hands-free ban on cellphone use by drivers is outlandish. And just one more example of how the federal government likes to treat Americans like they're idiots.

I've gone back and forth on the cellphone issue over the years. After a couple of recent road trips, I've decided that an alert, experienced driver is more than capable of holding a phone conversation while zipping along a straightaway in minimum traffic. Sure, some nitwits habitually use their phones while negotiating crowded city streets, making left turns and merging into traffic. Their reckless cellphone adventures often end in dented fenders and tickets.

Yet Tuesday, hysterical members of the NTSB asked all 50 states to join them in stamping out this "dangerous epidemic" of distracted driving through a national ban on non-emergency cellphone use.

Ironically, this breathless announcement came just five days after an important bulletin from U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. He had boasted that highway fatalities have fallen to the lowest levels since 1949, despite a sharp increase in the number of miles traveled by drivers.

In fact, LaHood noted that automobile deaths in 2010 were at the "lowest level ever recorded."

So which is it, Ray? Are our roads safer than ever, or are we in the throes of a driving epidemic that'll kill us all?

Luckily, the feds lack the power to enact such a sweeping, mindless ban. Unless they try to blackmail the states into knuckling under as they did in 1984 when federal highway dollars were tied to a uniform drinking age of 21. Another absurd move by the feds.

Ostensibly, Washington wants to reduce accidents caused by distracted drivers. But distractions take many forms.

A recent Harris Poll showed that a large percentage of American drivers admit to a staggering array of behaviors.

About 86 percent eat and drink while driving, 59 percent use their cellphones, 41 percent play with their GPS (exempt from the proposed ban, by the way) and 44 percent sometimes drive while seriously tired.

Some of those polled even admitted that they've fallen asleep behind the wheel.

Once states are bullied into blanket phone prohibitions, what will be outlawed next? Drive-thru McDonald's? Car radios? Bawling babies?

There are better ways to discourage unsafe driving, and those methods should be left to the states. Many, like Virginia, already ban texting for all drivers. Cellphones are forbidden for drivers younger than 18. In addition, Virginia school bus drivers are not allowed to use mobile phones.

If the General Assembly wants us to think before dialing, it can - and should - double the penalty for motorists who cause accidents while using their phones.

But those of us who use our phones only when we believe it's safe don't need the feds riding shotgun. 

Kerry Dougherty, (757) 446-2306, kerry.dougherty@cox.net, PilotOnline.com/dougherty