Chung en Teak

I have a proposal that should be immediately passed by Congress and made the law of the land. It will require retrofitting of existing vehicles, installation of new equipment on all new vehicles sold in America, and the issuance of new drivers' licenses, but we can consider all that as part of the economic stimulus.

Here's how it works. Everybody gets to drive their age. What we do is embed the birth date of every driver on a strip in the driver's license. Then we install a keycard reader connected to the main chip on all vehicles. For some older models this may require a little re-wiring but I'm sure even a '57 Chevy could be made compliant. The chip will act as a governor to control the top speed of the vehicle based on the driver's age in years figured from their last birthday — always rounding down to the lower whole number. On your birthday, you get another mile per hour. Most of us will have a reason to look forward to birthdays again. Some women might refuse to drive over 39.

Now to consider the advantages. First, this will clearly save fuel. Either 16 to 25 year olds will ride their bikes, or go looking for Grandma. Maybe even Great-Grandma.

Accidents will be reduced as most accidents happen with younger drivers. Even a head-on isn't so bad at 16 mph. The best a couple of teenagers playing chicken can do will be a maximum 38 and a couple of bent bonnets. Anybody should be able to stay on hood-surfing under 20. Fewer accidents, lower insurance costs.

Families will be brought together. Your 68 year old grandfather takes on a whole new value when you're late for work.

In general our society worships youth and denigrates old age. This will change. Corporate executives will view the most elderly drivers as new status symbols. When you can do 105, you'll get respect.

It will give a whole new meaning to the NASCAR senior circuit.

Not only will this eliminate the Social Security crisis as the elderly find gainful employment chauffeuring the youngsters, youth will not mind nearly so much supporting life-extending and life-enhancing medical treatments for their drivers.

In addition to all these other benefits, it just seems to make sense that the people with the lesser amount of time should be allowed to get where they're going faster.