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06/10/2005: "Europe – The Dittohead Paragon of Freedom"

It hit me on the autostrada (just north of Pescara, as I recall) that the European approach to auto liberty closely follows Dittohead anti-regulatory inclinations. My wife insisted on being the one to write it down because it’s difficult to drive and write on the autostrada. In fact, it’s difficult to drive and stay alive on the autostrada! You discover why you have two eyes – one is for watching the road ahead and the other is for watching the rear view mirrors for Mercedes, BMWs, and Porsches barreling down the road in your lane at twice your speed. I saw no indication that anything resembling a speed limit exists on those highways. I never saw any speed limit signs or, for that matter, Polizei. I recall from my years in Bavaria that if you get hit from behind in the left lane, it’s your fault! The bottom line in Europe is that every driver feels he (and it’s usually a he behind the wheel) has a right to go as fast as his wheels will turn, and the police are happy to go along with this. Instead of stopping speeders, their role is to clean up the messes on the roads that occur all too often. I saw plenty over the years, and am lucky I wasn’t involved with any of them! This is right in line with Dittohead values. So what if driving like a maniac causes fatalities among people not actually putting the pedal to the metal? Who said life was fair? And speed limits aren’t the only way that the European driving experience reflects proper right wing libertarian values. Just consider my manual-transmission rental. I’ve driven a manual for most of my driving career, but was totally shocked to discover that my Euro-car had no neutral safety switch. This is the device that prevents the car from being started if the car is in gear and the clutch is not depressed. It’s been standard on American cars since forever, and is quite useful in ensuring that people standing in front of a car being started don’t get squashed. Yet in Europe this simple safety feature isn’t required. Considering how the right wing feels about meddling government regulations, you can be sure they’d be holding Europe up as an example if they weren’t so busy bashing its wimpiness for non-support of American military adventures!