DC Follies: Expired Tags? Go To Jail
The woman in this video ended up in handcuffs and jail in the District of Columbia. Her crime? Her tags had expired. This was last year. And it was no isolated occurrence. To this day, people are routinely thrown into the nation’s capital’s slammer if they forgot to renew their license plate.
Fox News chronicled a list of cases where people went to jail for missing the DMV deadline. In one case, police arrested a mother on her way to pick up her child from school, with her younger child in the car. The arresting officer informed her that the to jail.
The practice attracted the attention of the AAA. “This is ridiculous,” AAA spokesman John Townsend said.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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You had me at "The woman in this video ended up in handcuffs..."
Well it's always fun to pick on The Capital of the Free World . . . ever since Richard Nixon started doing it in 1968. I've been a resident for 15 years and have worked here for 33. To be sure, the parking enforcement is aggressive and the fines are high . . . although I recall one time when I was in college (1969) and my buddy's TR-4 was towed in Manhattan for an expired parking meter. That cost us $100, which was a lot of money in 1969! People routinely yap on cellphones while driving here, yet almost never get popped. Yes, there are a few red light cameras, prominently displayed at intersections that do not have short yellows. I got popped by one about 8 years ago, because I was following behind a big truck at slow speed in a little sportscar and could not see that the light had turned. If you want something really obnoxious, look to the DC suburb of Chevy Chase village, where you can't touch a house for less than $1M. There's a major street running through their "village" (30 mph) limit that routinely flashes people going even 1 or 2 mph over the limit. According to AAA, nearly half of the Village's budget revenue comes from that speed camera . . . as if those poor starving taxpayers need the money!
Her 2nd problem was she's not too bad to look at. Far too many ugly people in jail. Third, she was driving an SUV that most cops can't afford. Everyday I spot cars driving around with '09/'10 stickers with one thing in common... crappy cars that no one will pay the impound/storage fees on. Guess what, cops ignore them as they're more of a liability than anything and so are their no account, no job, non tax paying drivers. No one wants or needs either of them in the system. States are in too much trouble to be feeding/housing/bathing the poor and ugly for petty 'crimes'.
Another example of statal officials preying on the populace. To Gove employees and officials we are the vast herd to be fleeced and controlled. No wonder there is such a populius baclash against gov, and no wonder those who work for government 1/3 of the population, fight so hard to defend it.