BLATHER REVIEW

Newsflash: The Unborn Aren't Old Enough To Drive

A pregnant Arizona woman tries to justify her use of the carpool lane.

Unborn children don't count when it comes to carpool lanes, according to a judge's ruling.

Even after being fined $367 for improper use of a High Occupancy Vehicle lane, Ahwatukee Foothills resident Candace Dickinson stood by her contention that Arizona traffic laws don't define what a person is, so the child inside her womb justified her use of the lane.

Ooooookay. The reason the carpool lane is there is to encourage people to er... carpool, right? Now, that would be to try to have as few cars on the road as possible and to ease congestion. I don't think the fetus was gonna to be taking the second car out for a spin any time soon.

When he asked Dickinson how many people were in the car, "she said two as she pointed to her obvious pregnancy," Norton said.

The case set off a firestorm of opinion but Phoenix Municipal Court Judge Dennis Freeman used a "common sense" definition in which an individual occupies a "separate and distinct" space in a vehicle.

"The law is meant to fill empty space in a vehicle," Freeman said.

Actually, the law was meant to empty full space on the highway. Even if Mrs Dickinson had seven kids in the car with her, that doesn't qualify as carpooling any more than eating pizza qualifies as windsurfing. Words mean things. Language is funny that way.

Good luck, kid.

Tip o'the tam to Drudge.

Posted by Tuning Spork at January 11, 2006 09:27 PM | TrackBack