Excessive and unenforceable were a couple of words I immediately used to describe it.  Upon further reading, as expected I found my assessment anything but unique.  Thankfully enough, a ban on all cell phone use in cars, even hands-free, seems unlikely ever to happen, leading me to wonder why the NTSB this week would issue the outlandish and overreaching recommendation it did.

Texting is one thing, talking another.  How a fatal accident caused by texting immediately prompts a call for no talking, leaves me shaking my head and rolling my eyes.  As for the idea of hands-free talking too being outlawed, a CNN article today stresses this unlikelihood while noting:  “There’s conflicting evidence on whether hands-free cell phone conversations would be as unsafe as those by hand-helds… that more “definitive research” is needed.”  I say to the NTSB:  Fine, go ahead and pursue that “definitive research,” but in the meantime don’t be prematurely taking further swipes at the personal behavior and decisions that I along with many others deem appropriate and safe.

All the renewed chatter this week regarding cell phone use in cars simply underscores the larger issue for debate, this being government control vs. personal responsibility.  In many cases the former becomes too much while the latter proves not enough, which of course will continue to fuel such a debate.  Still, I tend to remain the defender of thoughtful and informed personal decision-making, while opposing blanket laws that lengthen the list of things we can no longer legally do.

Is there no end to such new and arguably unnecessary restrictions placed upon us?  There certainly needs to be, for the sake of our supposedly free society and the future thereof.