Just when you thought it wasn’t possible to find another
way to try to shove pushy advertising down your throat, the DMV
comes up with a new one.
California may be about to turn your car into a moving
billboard via something called Digital Electronic License Plates
that display revolving “messages” (read: annoying ads) for the
edification of the motorists stuck behind you.
Oh, and just so “the children” aren’t left out, the
e-plates “could be used to broadcast Amber Alerts or traffic
information” — when they’re not assaulting you with grating
peddlers of the Billy Mays variety, demanding that you
BUY! Now!
These devices of Satan are the brainchild of Democrat State
Senator Curren Price of Los Angeles. “Were just trying to find
creative ways of generating additional revenue,” he croons. “It’s
an exciting marriage of technology with need and an opportunity
to keep California at the forefront… “
Yeah. The forefront of state-sponsored
exploitation of helpless California motorists.
It’s real exciting.
Price has put forward a bill (SB 1453) that would authorize
the CA state DMV to “contract directly” with “interested
advertisers,” whose dreck would then be routed to your car’s
license plate, for all the world to see. SB 1453 has already
passed the CA State Senate — unanimously — and will
soon be considered by the Assembly’s Transportation Committee.
(See here.)
Governor Ahhhhhnoooold has not come out pro or con
yet, no doubt waiting to see whether the public will rise up in
fury or (as usual) supinely accept this latest outrage as it has
accepted so many others.
The motivation for this, of course, is das
geld.
California is staring down a near $20 billion deficit and
the usual methods of financing state boondoggles, such as
jacking-up business and other taxes, have become politically
untenable. So apparatchiks like Price are scrambling for ways —
any way — to gin up new sources of “revenue.”
Enter the e-plates, which would open up appx. 40 million
new sources of “revenue” (the estimated number of registered
motor vehicles in the state) to the hungry maw of
Sacramento.
Expect other cash-strapped states to follow California’s
lead.
Of course, none of this “revenue” — an estimated
multi-million dollar jackpot — would go into the pockets of the
motorists who will be forced by law to have their cars
turned into advertising vehicles (literally!) for the
pecuniary benefit of politically connected businesses.
It’s yet another piece of pavement on the fascist highway
we’re headed down. Big Government and Big Business morphing into
a single entity — with the police power of Big Government used
to extract profits for Big Business. Maybe we don’t have the
operatic elements of a strutting Il Duce (yet), but the
economics are essentially identical.
And of course, no one seems to be concerned about adding
yet another element of distraction to the driving environment.
Just like the state lottery, it’s okay if the government
does it (and makes a bundle off the transaction) but if you, as a
private individual, do the same thing, then it’s ticket time (or
worse). Let’s recall that California is one of the most
belligerently aggressive enforcers of cell phone bans — on the
grounds that talking-while-driving is unsafe.
But Digital Ads hawking products on license plates right in
the line of sight of the driver following behind you?
No problem!
The arteriosclerotic prole at the 7-Eleven counter spending
his last dollar to play his “numbers” — and the rear-ender
accident that just totaled your car because the driver behind you
was reading the Viagra ad running across your license plate… who
cares about the human costs or the damage done.
So long as Uncle Sam — and his new “partners” — can make
a buck.
