It is claimed that over the last three years, 100,000 people have died in the Syrian civil war. That is almost identical to the number of people who have died in the US in auto accidents during that same time period.
List of motor vehicle deaths in U.S. by year – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Over the past three years, approximately 1,000 people in the US have been killed by rifles. Obama and Bloomberg have devoted huge amounts of energy to getting rifles banned and confiscated, despite the fact that automobiles are 100 times more dangerous.
Intelligent Speed Authority (ISA) technology .
http://news.sky.com/story/1135815/eu-may-order-speed-limiters-fitted-to-uk-cars
Every problem has a mandatory government solution. Big Brother in your car.
I remember being amazed at the number of road casualties in the UK, when I discovered it in the 1970’s.
Of course the number has declined since then but it is still carnage.
It’s also interesting that the absolute number was far higher in the early 20th century, when there were far fewer cars (but probably no speed limit).
I find it incredible that people just accept it.
If a airliner crashes with a few hundred on board, it is major news, but far more are killed on the roads.
If a space shuttle burns up and kills the crew, there are calls for the entire space programme to be cancelled because it is too dangerous.
Aren’t Google working on a driverless car?
All we need is one without passengers and the problem is solved!
Ah, but the real carnage is inflicted by the US medical establishment. Between practitioner errors, prescription drug side-effects and prescription drug interactions, the annual US death toll is about 200,000. That’s a “Sandy Hook” each and every hour, 7 days a week.
You’ll never hear a peep about that one in the “media”.
It’s all a matter of perspective and “newsworthiness”. On a per capita basis, the Syrian death toll is ~13-14 times larger than the US auto death rate. The Syrian deaths are by warefare and not typical devices used by US citizens. We get all excited when a Piper Cub with just a pilot falls out of the sky, lots of news coverage and a federal investigation because it is visual and relatively unusual. Auto deaths are not all that rare.
Syria gives us pictures of destroyed houses, artillery and tank fires, aerial bombardment and people having at it with automatic small arms. We also get all the human destruction you get in war films. The thing that amazes me is that those folks really don’t mind wholesale killing.