Drunk Drivers

I am disturbed both by the ideas forwarded by Gilbert Smith (Letters, July 14) and the subsequent letter (July 31) that applauded Smith’s idea of issuing special license plates for drunk drivers.

This gut-level, shoot-from-the-hip idea is replete with shortcomings and unanswered questions. For one, how do we know this “scarlet letter” will work? Tell me where it has been used successfully? Who will pay the cost? Who will get these plates? The first-time offender or the repeat offender? What if the person refuses to put the plates on?

The drunk driving issue has come to the forefront of our national attention, and given the alarming statistics there is an understandable tendency to counter with vengeance. But rather than enacting ineffective laws, this problem needs to be studied. We need to find what punishment will indeed work.

Why not rehabilitation rather than stigmatizing?

If we enact this and other such ideas into laws I believe we will find that amid the fervor we were too harsh, too rash, that we wasted our money, time and lives. Let’s keep our heads.

GERALD McMULLIN

San Diego