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7
May 2009
Sorry, Jesus, but you gotta go
Posted by Scott Spielman
at 1:57 PM | Comments (1)
Here’s another sign that the government is whittling away at our freedoms under the guise of public safety.
The higher courts recently ruled that police officers could pull over motorists merely for having something hanging from their rear view mirrors.
The issue came up in 2006, when a Westland man was pulled over because he had a four-inch Tweety bird dangling from the mirror and police said it obstructed his view of the road. Police found cocaine, a loaded gun and an open bottle of liquor in the car and the man was eventually convicted on weapons and drug charges, but he filed an appeal, saying the reason for the traffic stop was unconstitutional in the first place.
In December, the Circuit Court of Appeals found the law unconstitutionally vague, questioning whether the law banned all object or just those that ‘obstructed vision.’ The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals answered that question (for now) in a ruling that said an object of any size can obstruct a driver’s view, therefore granting grounds to stop motorists for it.
I suppose it’s not that much of a leap to decide that dashboard ornaments fall under that same category. On mine, I have a little Jesus on a spring—I call him my ‘jumping Jesus,’ since He bounces around a lot.
Sorry Jesus, but you’ll have to go.
The ironic thing is that the single piece of equipment near my windshield that most obstructs my view is the rearview mirror, itself.
Oh. That reminds me. I have a sun-faded Spider-man figure hanging from it. Sorry, Webhead, but if I can’t make an exception for Jesus….
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