TexasCHLforum.com

Dadtodabone wrote:

The Annoyed Man wrote:Hey, if it's Saturday night, there's a reasonable suspicion that you're drunk.

I am just kidding of course..... but just barely. I don't know where this figure came from, or even if it was true or not, but back in my ER days, I remember being told by "someone who would know" that on any given Friday or Saturday night, something like 80% of drivers on the road after 8pm have measurable amounts of alcohol in their systems...... or maybe it was that 80% of drivers after 10pm are over the legal limit ......something like that

According to a studies done by the NHTSA and IIHS:
Percentage of Drivers with Measurable Levels,
1973, 36%
1986, 26%
1996, 17%
Percentage of Drivers with BAC of 0.10 or greater(impaired in all 50 states),
1973, 5.1%
1986, 3.2%
1996, 2.8%

http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopne ... rvey-finds

Well, that would be more or less in line with what I was talking about. I worked in that ER from 1979 to 1986.

Right2Carry wrote:I am reminded of DUI checkpoints where LEO stop cars based on that someone "may" be breaking the law. Where was the reasonable suspicion then?

Hey, if it's Saturday night, there's a reasonable suspicion that you're drunk.

I am just kidding of course..... but just barely. I don't know where this figure came from, or even if it was true or not, but back in my ER days, I remember being told by "someone who would know" that on any given Friday or Saturday night, something like 80% of drivers on the road after 8pm have measurable amounts of alcohol in their systems...... or maybe it was that 80% of drivers after 10pm are over the legal limit ......something like that. It's been 30 years since I worked in the ER, so I've forgotten details like that. But what I DO know is that on any average Friday or Saturday night, a very large percentage of our ER patients were half-lit on arrival, regardless of whether they were there for treatment of injuries, or treatment of illness. What's "a very large percentage" mean? Maybe 1 out of every 3 or 4 patients had esters of alcohol on their breath, and at least some slight impairment. And that doesn't count the ones who were high on something besides alcohol.

I get it that just because the guy behind me in the sobriety checkpoint line is drunk, that doesn't mean I'm drunk; and just because his behavior is suspicious, that doesn't mean that my behavior is suspicious. I also get it that law enforcement often pushes the boundaries of what is Constitutionally permissible. But you have to remember something..... for a lot of these kinds of things, they seem to be unconstitutional to anyone who has read the Constitution, but that is not the standard that law enforcement operates on. Law enforcement operates on the standard of what the courts say is constitutional or not, and for whatever reasons, the courts will sometimes uphold law enforcement's attempts to be proactive in preventing crime. The 4th Amendment right to be secure in my person, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures isn't as simple as that statement reads. It should be, but it isn't; and it isn't that simple because the courts have given police permission to interpret that very liberally in their favor in certain types of instances. I'm not saying this is right. I'm just saying it is what it is, and police are zealous because they want to catch bad guys and stop crime......not because they are by nature a bunch of nazi thugs. They are not. They just want to be effective, and if the court says that they can roust you just because it's Tuesday and you walk with a limp, then they will do that if they think it will reduce crime.

I'm also saying that, especially with regard to drunk driving, it is understandable. By that, I mean that it isn't hard to understand what drives law enforcement to setup sobriety checkpoints. It is fine to have a conversation about our rights and to be angry because we've been treated with suspicion merely by virtue of having had the bad luck to drive into a sobriety checkpoint; but I would also challenge people who object to this to go spend a couple of weeks working the night shift in a large Emergency Room, and to be personally involved in managing the carnage that results from drunk driving. It is absolutely horrible, and you have to dead from the neck up with a heart of stone to see that carnage and not feel like somebody should do something about it, so that it doesn't keep happening. And as much as it impacts the first responders who deliver the victims of that carnage to the ER, and the nurses, doctors, technicians who try to put those victims back together, it impacts the families and friends of those victims even worse. The ER has the patient for a few hours at most. The families and friends deal with the aftermath for days or weeks or months.....assuming that the victim lived.

So what happens is that people start demanding that somebody do something. Their lives have been impacted, and they want to make the problem go away. They talk to city councils and police chiefs. They vote for "law and order" political candidates. Etc., etc., etc. And the voices of the majority, who feel safer knowing that police are rousting sober drivers while looking for the ones who are drunk, are much, much louder than the voices of the minority who say "my rights are absolute, and your fears about drunk drivers do not give you the moral or constitutional authority to violate my 4th Amendment rights."

And by the way, this happens to be exactly why we always face such an uphill battle to restore the full expression of our right to keep and bear arms. There may be upwards of 300 million privately owned firearms in the possession of upwards of 90 million homes......or whatever the numbers are......but "gun owner" does not always equal "2nd Amendment absolutist". And because some gun-control advocates are also gun-owners, it is often the case that the voice of the gun control crowd is louder than the voice of the 2nd Amendment absolutists.

I hate that things are the way they are, but I understand why it is that way.

I don't think it is going to be that big of an issue.... except perhaps in Austin or Houston. As long as we've had CHL, I think that most LEOs are well acclimated to the idea of armed citizens.