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Comment by LanceH | Hacker News Reader

Whenever someone is pushing a mandate on someone else, I wish they would be called out if they are already following that mandate. In this case it would be asked of those from MADD, "Have you installed these devices yourselves?" I'm sure they haven't and I'm sure they think they don't need them.

I was in the military when Congress banned smoking in much of the military and other federal buildings but exempted themselves.

Person saying taxes should be higher for everyone -- what's stopping them from paying more right now?

If it's a step I haven't already taken myself, I can't even conceive of mandating that everyone do it before I start, but that's just too alien a concept it seems.

In a similar bit of hypocrisy, I feel the same way about drinking underage and the number of people who are perfectly ok ramping up punishments for the same "crimes" they themselves committed -- it's just the timeline in a different direction now.

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> Person saying taxes should be higher for everyone -- what's stopping them from paying more right now?

Because me sending random cash to the federal government does absolutely nothing, and higher taxes can pay for actual programs. There's a huge difference between exempting yourself from a new mandate you enforce on everyone else, and simply waiting for a universal mandate before acting yourself.

Yea, it's perfectly intellectually consistent to say "I'll do it if you do it too"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordination_game

There is no basis for believing that the payoff for coordination is elevated. If anything the opposite: we see that more centralized decision-making introduces larger deadweight losses. See US-Afghanistan, as enabled by the tax base, as an example.

> There is no basis for believing that the payoff for coordination is elevated

Libraries, fire stations, universal K-12 education? Certainly imperfect, but def benefit from coordination. Health care too - a lack of universal coordination makes life difficult.

On the private sector side, many companies are great examples of coordination payoffs (I trade entrepreneurial risk/reward for consistent benefits).

But it is the height of hypocrisy to force other people to do things that neither they nor you would do in isolation. You’re not preventing a prisoner’s dilemma here because the proposed tax contribution is strictly monotonic with or without individual participation.

You can voluntarily pay extra income taxes. That money goes into the general fund and is used to pay for actual programs, such as servicing interest on the $28T national debt and invading other countries.

You can donate money to a cause you believe in and then deduct it from your taxes.

That seem like a wonderful way to have the NRA and Planned Parenthood swimming in cash, and no money at all for building lighthouses and sewers.

>Whenever someone is pushing a mandate on someone else, I wish they would be called out if they are already following that mandate.

Why though? If you found out that many members of MADD had installed these devices would it change your opinion on requiring it for everyone else? If you found that someone campaigning for higher tax rates actually did make generous contributions, would it change your opinion on raising the rates? Somehow I suspect not, in fact I would hope you wouldn't be so easily swayed! So then we've not pushed the argument forward at all, just taken a detour down an irrelevant cul-de-sac in the hopes of finding a gotcha.

Those facts would not change my opinion, and as you said they alone should not change anyone's opinion. But if someone is already living by the rules they'd like imposed on me, I'm definitely more likely to listen to what they have to say.

> If you found out that many members of MADD had installed these devices would it change your opinion on requiring it for everyone else?

At least I would respect the argument. Right now I see too many people proposing the use of force to achieve something they don't believe in enough to do themselves.

>At least I would respect the argument.

Which really just means 'no.' So like I said, just a big waste of time, the argument for or against these drunk-driving systems is about whether the good for society is worth the cost not about who's making the argument or whether you respect them.

> Have you installed these devices yourselves?

I don’t own a car, so no. But a bike is my primary means of traffic. Do I get no say in traffic safety that impacts me?

> Person saying taxes should be higher for everyone -- what's stopping them from paying more right now?

I also do this. California allows tax payers to pay taxes to a couple dozen special funds. I usually kick in extra for the rape kit tests and coastal preservation funds.

BTW, arguing bothsideism is one of the least effective ways to analyze policy. Focus on the specifics. Even though I support this mandate, one of the downsides is it costs $80/month to keep ignition locks calibrated. How does the federal government plan to make this equitable?

you do get a say because you also impact traffic safety - which is why that system should be installed on bikes as well

Perhaps, but drunk bike riders cause about as much mayhem as two drunk people fighting in a bar. Whereas drunk drivers are capable of easily killing someone without malice.

I write this as someone who has both been hit by a drunk bike rider and unintentionally hurt in a bar fight that wasn’t even involving me.

You've clearly never seen the damage a person can cause to the driver when hit by a car. If a person is in the road and intoxicated they can still cause injury or death.

Yes, but they generally don’t. And yes I’ve seen a bike rider t-boned and tossed in the air before. I’m well aware of the carnage from crashes.

a drunk bike rider can cause a sober car driver to swerve into the opposite lane or pedestrians

No, you don't get a say. Bicycles should stay on the sidewalks. :-)

That's not legal in many places. Probably best to be informed about the status quo prior to commenting.

I’d actually prefer to ride on the sidewalk. But then pedestrians complain about aggressive bikes passing them closely at 15 MPH.

Cycling while drunk is a DUI [1] so would you be willing to make all new bicycles have the same requirements?

[1] https://www.alcohol.org/dui/riding-bicycle/

The people who are most adamant about imposing rules on others are often those who are breaking them themselves, can't stop, and blame society for not having enough rules.

See all the morality crusaders who are also secretly sexting teenagers

keyword "often" -- this is a popular myth among people with rampant morality problems, in my opinion as an urban US dweller

If I do not drink and drive, why would I pay money to install a system to detect if I drink and drive? I would be throwing money out the window for zero gain.

However, I can with zero hypocrisy argue that everyone should have to do this before being allowed on the road, including myself. We can't tell who needs to have these installed, so we have to specify "everybody" for it to be effective. That would cover myself, which is annoying, but I would still gain a benefit from it would decrease my chances of someone else crashing into me while drunk.

And, I should not need to tell you this, but what is stopping me from paying higher taxes right now is that that is not a thing you can do. There is no voluntary tax payment.

A tax is a compulsory fee, so yes, you cannot voluntarily pay more taxes. You can, however, make a gift to the treasury.

https://fiscal.treasury.gov/public/gifts-to-government.html

> However, I can with zero hypocrisy argue that everyone should have to do this before being allowed on the road, including myself. We can't tell who needs to have these installed, so we have to specify "everybody" for it to be effective.

They have the opportunity to get one person closer to "everybody" but choose not to, so instead they choose to use the government to force people to do this.

You argue that the marginal benefit of you doing it on your own is too little for you to do it. Then you propose using force to add up a whole lot of "too littles" to make into something.

>If I do not drink and drive, why would I pay money to install a system to detect if I drink and drive? I would be throwing money out the window for zero gain.

And they propose to make millions of people waste this money when they don't believe in it enough to do it for themselves.

> You argue that the marginal benefit of you doing it on your own is too little for you to do it.

No, I argue that the benefit is zero, since I do not drive drunk, and the device will prevent exactly zero instances of drunk driving.

> And they propose to make millions of people waste this money when they don't believe in it enough to do it for themselves.

Please re-read my post. I explained the reasoning there already. The point is that:

a) We do not know who needs to have this installed.

b) That means the only way for it to be effective is to make everyone install it.

c) However, I know that I am not one of those who needs it installed, therefore, there is zero benefit to me installing it on my own.

All of this is perfectly non-hypocritical.

Hypocrisy is the GAME!!!!

“I’ll believe in Climate Change when people stop flying in private jets”

“People can always pay more taxes on their own.”

“People should give up fossil fuels if they believe in climate change “

Sounds like you’ve bought into how we play politics.

When we discuss inflation it’s:“Remember Jimmy Carter”

No one ever discusses the Fed, etc and the causes of inflation.

Oh well, at least try not to be part of the problem and understand that it’s mostly about manipulating people emotionally

From what I've seen of the US, Congress exempts themselves from quite a lot legislation. I think they exempted themselves from the recent vaccine mandates.

Well come on, why should our dear leaders be expected to subject themselves to the same rules that we must follow? They are better than us.

> I'm sure they haven't and I'm sure they think they don't need them.

Source please.

Even if what you are saying is true, are you claiming that installing these devices on the cars of people who routinely drive drunk would not save lives?

>> I'm sure they haven't and I'm sure they think they don't need them. > Source please.

Source - me. I'm sure. Please read carefully.

Also, it's not like they've presented large scale trials of this working.

> Even if what you are saying is true, are you claiming that installing these devices on the cars of people who routinely drive drunk would not save lives?

Am I claiming that? The discussion is about putting devices on all cars, not repeat offenders, so no.

> Please read carefully.

Classy.

> Am I claiming that? The discussion is about putting devices on all cars, not repeat offenders, so no.

And yet, "cars of repeat offenders" is a subset of "all cars".

I stopped myself from commenting so many times, but I just can't help myself. This is the dumbest fucking point of view. Do you think people who voluntarily install equipment to stop them from driving drunk are the people that need it? Your stupid ass ideology is harming your ability to view the world practically. Clearly people who drive drunk are the ones who need this installed, and they wouldn't do it voluntarily.

Now, I think cameras in our cars is something I hate and will fight against for other reasons, but your whole "do it yourself before mandating others" is a bad faith argument that makes no sense and is only used to distract from practical solutions in many areas.

> Clearly people who drive drunk are the ones who need this installed, and they wouldn't do it voluntarily.

And we already have systems for putting these systems in people's cars after they drive drunk. This new system is specifically targeting people who haven't been caught driving drunk. As such, MADD and Congress are absolutely in the targeted demographic for this bill. Frankly, given how often congresspeople get caught driving drunk, they should be probably be the first group to get them.

I would be utterly stunned if Congress isn't somehow exempt though. They'll leave a loophole for themselves, probably via not requiring the sensors to be retrofitted on imported cars or similar.

> Do you think people who voluntarily install equipment to stop them from driving drunk are the people that need it?

No, I absolutely don't think they need it. Nor do I need it. But the discussion is about putting it in cars for everyone. They think I need to have a more expensive car, but they don't want to make their own cars more expensive until they can mandate that I do as well.

> "do it yourself before mandating others" is a bad faith argument

It's not a bad faith argument, and I've tried to live my life like this. One major consideration when I left the military is that as I moved up in rank I was going to have to enforce rules that I wouldn't actually follow myself.

People are very quick to use the force of law on others.

> Your stupid ass ideology is harming your ability to view the world practically. I'll keep my ideology, thank you. Leadership isn't about driving the people before me.

Please don't break the site guidelines like this, regardless of how wrong someone is or you feel they are. You may not feel that you owe better to people you strongly disagree with, but you owe this community better if you're participating here.

Of course I understand what it's like when you've been reigning in frustration and then it boils over, but still—we all need to take responsibility not for venting that into the threads here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Edit: you've unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines like this multiple times recently. Can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and take the intended spirit of the site more to heart? It's not ok to lash out at others, call names, go on the attack, etc., just because they're wrong or you feel they are. That doesn't help anyone.

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