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Comment by wowzap | Hacker News Reader

I don't think this is a good example of government corruption. It's just a population stunned by lack of education trying a feel-good solution to a problem that works against their best interests. It's the same as most laws in our society - gun control, marijuana prohibition, the list goes on and on.

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How is this an example of a feel-good solution? This is in Suffolk County, Long Island - a county with a median income almost twice that of the nation as a whole. It's not a completely uneducated populace.

Yes I know - I grew up in Suffolk County. The people continue voting for politicians that allow these initiatives to occur. It's a feel good solution because at least some people believe the traffic light cameras solve the problem of car accidents at red lights. If they were educated everybody would know about the study that said that auto incidents increase and take it into account at the polls. But unfortunately they do not educate themselves on these issues and vote accordingly to fire the people responsible, instead they almost always just vote party-line no matter who is on the ballot and what they stand for.

> instead they almost always just vote party-line no matter who is on the ballot

This is a really hard single issue to run on. You’d probably have to have a law enforcement or prosecutorial background, to avoid looking soft on crime. And you’d have to tell wealthy voters how you’re going to replace the lost revenue. In a wealthy county like Suffolk, these are tough sells.

Somebody actually ran on this ticket a few years back and lost - their campaign signs said something along the lines of "RED LIGHT CAMERAS ARE UNCONSTITUTIONAL". The revenue question is more a matter of ideology. You could always tell them that before the sixteenth amendment the only revenue our government needed came from excise taxes and tariffs... it's not like there's no precedent for funding a country without red-light cameras, or income tax for that matter.

> The revenue question is more a matter of ideology

Practically, it’s a matter of raising taxes or cutting services. That’s what makes it a tough platform to run on.

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