Speed Limit 30-- Or, How I lost my license

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Mar 11, 2005

Sure, I saw the sign. If you go by the letter of the law, I suppose 70 mph was technically illegal. But the road was clear and dry, there was no traffic, and my Beamer handles the curves beautifully at high speeds.

So when the trooper pulled me over, I urged him not to commit the "sin of symbolic and ceremonial excess". I was showing "courage and resolve" by using a high-performance vehicle, I pointed out; this was not the time for "movement backward" in vehicular traffic.

As the trooper asked me to step out of the car, stand on one foot, and recite the alphabet backwards, I reminded him that he-- like anyone else in authority-- had a "duty to find the middle between the law and proper liberation from the law which might allow for cultural or local adaptations which are not in strident disagreement with the law."

The trooper, I'm sorry to say, was "in strident disagreement" with me. I think maybe he's anti-Catholic.