drbuzz0 said:

Americans like big cars for the obvious reasons: They’re comfortable, you can fit more in them, they’re safe – regardless of what anyone says, there’s no substitute for having a big vehicle for safety.

Depends immensely on the type of accident. Small cars have the advantage of being light, sometimes laughably so, leading to surprisingly impressive performances in the Euro NCAP crash tests. Of course, that doesn’t pay off when the other guy simply runs straight over the top of you in his big SUV.

I’ll try to do some sort of analysis of the numbers over the weekend if you like, but as a side note now, the worst score the Euro NCAP boys have ever seen was a Nissan Navarro pick-up. You can find a video of the test on their site, it’s worth a watch but prepare to be slightly sickened by what you see.

If you look closely, the reason for the shocking score becomes obvious: the driver flies forwards and is caught by his seatbelt, which then starts to pull him back. Sadly, his seat detaches from the chassis and simply bashes his skull in. The car as a whole survives very well, but it’s a deathtrap.

Disclaimer: Nissan quietly recalled and remedied the fault on the Navarro to avoid any embarrassing “death by seat” lawsuits. The new score is three stars, which sounds average but is still quite poor for a 2008 car. For other fun, watch the Rover 100 (my brother used to own one) and check out the impressive bunny hop from the Smart Fortwo.

PS: One thing that’s going to make proper comparisons difficult is market segment – SUVs (at least in Europe) are targeted at richer customers than small cars and hence can be packed with more safety features. If you’re adding £500 to a £40k car, no-one minds too much. Add £500 to an £8k car and it impacts your sales figures.

        Shafe said:

I’ve wondered about that one myself and come to realize that it’s straight from the Bible.

A lot of modern law does, or at least from the same legal culture as the book of Leviticus. There was considerable cross-pollination going on a few thousand years ago.

Out of curiosity, I decided to see what the oldest recorded legal code (which clearly did influence the ancient Hebrew code) had to say on the matter. The Code of Hammurabi, edict 21, states that breaking and entering is a capital offense:
If any one break a hole into a house (break in to steal), he shall be put to death before that hole and be buried.
Edict 22 goes on to make robbery in general a capital offense:
If any one is committing a robbery and is caught, then he shall be put to death.

It doesn’t clarify whether it is acceptable for the homeowner to actually carry out the sentence. The Code covers various sorts of manslaughter, but not that one.

        George Carty said:

I know our right-libertarian host won’t take kindly to this, but won’t universal health care in the United States also lead to a significant reduction in petroleum use?

This would free Ford and General Motors from the tyranny of legacy costs (most of which are healthcare related), allowing them to market normal-sized cars instead of gas-guzzling monstrosities.

US healthcare is massively overpriced because of government kowtowing to Big Pharma price gougers. The British NHS (which covers the whole population) is cheaper per capita than US Medicare and Medicaid (which do not), because the NHS (like other health services outside the US) drives a hard bargain on drugs, while US Medicare lets Big Pharma charge whatever the hell it likes!

Perhaps US supporters of universal health care could split the opposition by playing the nationalist card, demanding “Why should Americans pay through the nose for health care in order to subsidize foreigners?”

The biggest factor, as far as I can tell, is the tort issue, and the culture of defensive medicine it requires (doing every test under the sun for fear of being sued otherwise if somethign goes wrong). That, and the malpractice insurance, which in many places starts at 100K / year (assuming a 40 hr week, 50 week year, this requires a doctor to make at minimum $50/hr before even thinking about things like rent, a secretary, supplies, as well as little things like a roof over his head, repaying school loans, and eating a couple of times a day).

A good empirical look at this is Mississipi. When they did their tort reform a few years ago (capping damages at 250K beyond any actual monetary loss suffered), they saw people’s medical costs (as measured by health insurance premiums) go down something like 48%. This was due, not primarily to decreased payouts, but mostly to the reduced number of frivolous claims (it was no longer profitable for lawyers to do large numbers of extreme longshot / frivolous cases, since there would be no jackpot multimillion awards to get commissions on).

Drug cost issues pale in comparison.

a couple of articles written about it (a bit of quick googling, since I need to get to the pool before it closes):

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Heres-your-demonstration-project-Mr-President—-its-called-Mississippi-59990137.html

http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/14958

http://www.atra.org/wrap/files.cgi/7964_howworks.html

        Shafe said:

I’ve wondered about that one myself and come to realize that it’s straight from the Bible.

If I recall correctly, the rabbinic interpretation for harsher nighttime penalties for burglary is that, at night, the owner is expected to be there, so burglers are assumed to be planning violence.

        George Carty said:

I know our right-libertarian host won’t take kindly to this, but won’t universal health care in the United States also lead to a significant reduction in petroleum use?

Doubt it.

‘

That’s not quite how it works. The enormous costs of healthcare leveled on American car makers by the unions do make it very difficult to make a profit on compact cars, but that’s really not the thing that causes so many large vehicles to be made.

That article is very very biased. Saying Japanese cars are “better in every way” than every American car is bull****. I drive an American car and I happen to love it. American cars are not all crap.

The US has always liked fairly large cars. The era of the “land yacht” like the full sized Lincolns and Caddies is largely over, in part due to fuel efficiency restrictions. These are replaced with SUV’s. SUV’s sell well. Even in the era of more expensive gasoline, a significant number of vehicles on the road are SUV’s. Large pickup trucks also sell very well. Even foreign-built “monstrosities” sell well in the US. The large (and not impressively fuel efficient) Honda Pilot is one of the best selling SUV’s in the US and

The reason many Americans choose to drive large vehicles is simple: Because we can.

Our roadways are wide, broad and easily accommodate these vehicles. Believe me, I know how this works elsewhere, because I’ve traveled enough. In Europe you have much narrower roads, much smaller passes and interchanges.

Several years ago my family took a trip to Ireland and rented a van because we had so many of us with my Irish relatives included. You can drive a van in Ireland, but it’s a challenge. We were constantly pulling over to let opposing traffic pass by and, at times, inching through the roadway in towns and cities, to avoid scraping buildings. That simply would never be a problem in the US.

The US is just newer. Most urban areas were built more recently and many actually had some kind of a plan to their construction, not just growing over time as more moved in. Roads in the suburbs are generally purpose-built for cars, and there was no path or road there before.

Americans like big cars for the obvious reasons: They’re comfortable, you can fit more in them, they’re safe – regardless of what anyone says, there’s no substitute for having a big vehicle for safety.

Yes, there are compact cars in the US too, but there’s always a market for larger vehicles.

I drive a Chrysler Sebring. By US standards it’s a “mid sized car” but it’s significantly bigger than most of the private vehicles I’ve seen driving in London. In fact, it’s big enough that it might be a bit of a pain to drive it there. It’s five meters end to end and just under two meters wide. It weighs a ton and a half and has a 235 horsepower engine. Personally, I have no desire to drive anything smaller.

Uh… It’s not quite like that.

This would free Ford and General Motors from the tyranny of legacy costs (most of which are healthcare related), allowing them to market normal-sized cars instead of gas-guzzling monstrosities.

US healthcare is massively overpriced because of government kowtowing to Big Pharma price gougers. The British NHS (which covers the whole population) is cheaper per capita than US Medicare and Medicaid (which do not), because the NHS (like other health services outside the US) drives a hard bargain on drugs, while US Medicare lets Big Pharma charge whatever the hell it likes!

Perhaps US supporters of universal health care could split the opposition by playing the nationalist card, demanding “Why should Americans pay through the nose for health care in order to subsidize foreigners?”

        DV82XL said:

… and then, strangely enough, only at night.

I’ve wondered about that one myself and come to realize that it’s straight from the Bible.

Exodus 22:2-3
2 “If a thief is caught breaking in and is struck so that he dies, the defender is not guilty of bloodshed; 3 but if it happens [a] after sunrise, he is guilty of bloodshed.
“A thief must certainly make restitution, but if he has nothing, he must be sold to pay for his theft. -NIV

        drbuzz0 said:

Much as I find these actions at BP gas stations reprehensible I can’t see them as rising to the point of capital crimes.

Besides, I could not justify the kind of grief that it might cause to family members to lose someone because their only crime was being a very naive college student.

I agree, however as in most cases of this sort, it would never have come to that. The bottom line is that the only real benefit of deadly-force in upholding the law, is that it serves as deterrent. Actions like this do not occur in places where there is a very high probability that the authorities will react sharply. Prison, as unpleasant as a stay might be, or fines do not serve as sufficient deterrence in situations like this; the real possibility of death may.

This is, of course, part of a much larger debate on the issue of state prerogatives and power I know, but there is something wrong in a situation where draconian application of the law is reserved for those accused of copyright violations, but the authorities can only wring their hands when a handful of people can hold a major city hostage for several hours.

That said, I do see times when eco-”protest” groups reach the point where deadly force is totally justified. An example would be ramming ships in the Antarctic. That’s an unquestionable act of aggression and possibly piracy and a torpedo or anti-ship missile is completely justified to respond to that. Attempting to get a dingy up against the hull of a surfaced nuclear submarine after repeated warnings in a clearly restricted area is another example. I’d have no problem with them machine gunning any boat that attempted to do that. (the memory of the USS Cole is sobering and with much of the hull underwater and being most vulnerable when surfaced, allowing a boat to get up against a submarine puts the lives of the whole crew in Jeopardy. A few sticks of dynamite could potentially flood the sub before most could make it to the hatches)

Much as I find these actions at BP gas stations reprehensible I can’t see them as rising to the point of capital crimes. Besides, I could not justify the kind of grief that it might cause to family members to lose someone because their only crime was being a very naive college student.