Tolerating People Who Will Kill Us

Recently our local newspaper reported a motorcycle collided with a pickup truck and that the two people on the motorcycle died as the result of the collision. The head-on collision was caused by the pickup truck turning into the lane of the oncoming traffic. The driver of the truck, as luck will have it, had minor or no injuries. The paper reported that the driver of the pickup has a long history of driving infractions. County Court records show the driver pleaded guilty within the past year to two counts of DUI for offenses that had occurred a little more than a month apart. Also reported was that he had pleaded guilty to charges of probation violation and was convicted of domestic assault. Additional charges include charges of assault and unlawful possession of a firearm. Talk about a danger to society.

Why does a civilized society tolerate individuals such as this, who choose to DUI, politically correct language for driving while drunk, stoned, high or buzzed?

Tennessee law requires those who drive motorcycles to wear helmets. Our representatives want to protect motorcyclists while at the same time permitting those who elect to drive drunk to continue to drive drunk thus being a danger to all of us. While I did not know either of these victims, parents have lost a son or a daughter, possibly siblings have lost a brother or sister, possibly a child has lost his or her parents and friends have lost friends.

If we are OK with seat belt laws, helmet laws, laws prohibiting various drugs, laws with penalties for using firearms during the commission of a crime, laws protecting non-smokers how about laws protecting the sober?

The public must get our politicians, local and statewide, to stop this insanity? I doubt if this will happen because the majority of the citizens of our county and our state are willing to take their chances because just maybe they or a relative or friend just might be that criminal one day. If that is not a correct assumption, why do we tolerate such heinous acts?

When are citizens going to stand up and demand that individuals, who show by their actions they are unwilling to live by the rules, be put away until they are willing to stop being a danger to the rest of us?