Ok, Bob...you think I talk too much? Then you will love what I have to say here. And no, as you so amusingly put it; I'm proudly NOT "from around these parts".

Let me tell you about your "drivers" here, pal. I've been nearly ran into more times in Havre than I have ANYWHERE else I've ever lived. I've had to get out of my car to stop the person behind me to see if they were drunk or even had a license. I see these wonder moms with 5 kids bouncing around SEATBELTLESS inside the car like dogs. I literally saw a child HANGING out of a window of a car the other day. I've had a kid fly past me on 5th doing at LEAST 60mph. Only to swerve into the Taco John's lot less than 100yds later. Honest to God. Don't talk to me about drivers and skills from other states. I've actually spent time in BOTH of the other states you mentioned. And felt safer, tyvm.

Safety checkpoints, you say? That's a joke. Not only is that a violation of your 4th Amendment civil right against unlawful search and seizure, but the LAST thing I've seen around here is "SAFETY". A SAFE stop would involve actually moving the stopped car AROUND THE CORNER instead of sitting in the middle of oncoming traffic on 5th on icy roads in the dark of a winter night. Perhaps if raging alcoholism and drug abuse were not quite so commonplace around here, there wouldn't be such a pronounced need for all those "safety stops". But hey, who am I to say? I "ain't from these here parts". I come from a place where "PROBABLE CAUSE" exists.

Even though there has been CONCLUSIVE evidence that shows that cell bans accomplish NOTHING, this stupid debate rages on. All anyone is going to do is hold their phone on speaker and below the window level so that it's not obvious it's being used. To simply outlaw everything we can't find other ways to influence is pointless. But Bob, you and the rest of Havre know better, huh? Good thing they haven't outlawed IGNORANCE yet...

Apparently none of these ban supporters have ever considered that there is NO less distraction as a result of the little bambinos bouncing around your car while you smack them with one hand and have a lit cigarette in the other. I have LITERALLY seen this happen...in Havre. Nor do they seem to be concerned with things like people's stereo noise, vigorously arguing with another person, someone placing their hands over the eyes of the driver(saw some HHS students doing that a few months ago), playing with an ipod, lighting cigarettes and smoking, having your DOG all up in your face LICKING YOU IN THE MOUTH while driving (ewwww...) - well, I think my point is made. Suffice it to say that phones are of no more or less distraction value than any of the afforementioned offenses. To waste time and taxpayer money worry SO much about ONE thing is just assinine.

I've tried very hard to encourage logical and rational THOUGHT about things through my posts. This seems to fall on mostly deaf ears. This and apparently it also solicits internet stalkers that like to make idle threats, having NO idea who they are talking to. So, riddle me THIS: So you made texting/talking on your cell illegal. SO WHAT? You think it will make any real difference? Or is it just one more pathetic way to increase COMMERCE between policy enforcement and the citizens and create one more repugnant line of division? I will let you chew on that one for a while.

Ask the youth of this town, your future leaders, how they feel about being called things like "teeny boppers on phones". Maybe parents should go back to being parents and not treat their kids like adults and OVER privelege them. This lack of parenting is what leads to the "extracurricular" activities that of late were going on in the Junior High. I wonder how many parents know what their kids were doing IN the school...

This is NOT a public safety issue. Were it so, the law would apply to EVERYONE, equally. Do police not have enough things going on in their cars distracting them? Am I some how beneath them that I cannot distinguish between a safe and unsafe time to use my phone? What have they that makes them superior to me? How do you know what things I've done in life? Perhaps my life has given me skills far surpassing that of a local policeman. (No offense, just making the point.) Nope, we need a LAW to tell you what you can and can't do. But...you're "free". Yup, we get a little freer every day, don't we?

Be lead around by a legal "ring" in your nose all you wish. I don't need or desire that much control over my life from people who are neither responsible enough nor worthy. My life is my own to do with as I please. It was given to me by God Almighty, and frankly that's all I need to know. What man is better than another so much so that they should have the privelege of having THAT much CONTROL over another?

I've been in Havre long enough to have watched jobs and properties as well as virtually everything else get passed back and forth. For discretion's sake, I won't mention what I see passed back and forth most - but it sure ain't real estate. When you make such archaic statements as "I bet you ain't from these parts, is you boy?" - the only image that conjurs to a sane person is that of a scene from "Deliverance". Is there a pig squealing in your back yard or is that just prejudice against someone you don't know who may have helped you at some point? Maybe even defended your right to your freedom of speech? So with that said I will only say that you are correct. I "ain't from these here parts".

You would be wise to at least ponder the viewpoints of people from other places, and see how perhaps their perspectives could assist your community in growth. Ever considered just how dead this town would be without the school, railroad, USCBP and a WalMart? Just like all the outlying towns...it would fall apart almost immediately. Your town is COMPOSED of "outsiders", Bob. Savvy? Good. Let's move on.

I come from a place called the Really Real World. Save your cheek for someone who hasn't seen places other than this and doesn't know better.

Ok RebelliousPeasant you talk way too much. You seem like you arent from these parts. Maybe where you come from, they dont do safety checkpoints, but here they do. And what you and everyone else does in their car does that affects me and my family is my business. If you want to go talk on your phone and drive off a cliff without your seatbelt that is fine. But when you or anyone else drives like they are from California or Arizona in this town... I have problems with that. It is bad enough that you drive around with your little bluetooth headset in talking to your buddy and texting your lover. There is a reason you dont hear about the cell phone bans anywhere else and that is because they have already had the laws in effect for sometime.
If you want to talk, talk, but pull over. Just sit in a parking lot and watch traffic sometime and see what this is all about. There are enough distractions nevermind texting or fighting with a boyfriend/girlfriend on the phone. Yes some people do ok, but it is the 10% that I'm worried about. Those are the ones who kill people. I dont want my family in their path. And yes driving is a privledge not a right.

That's right, let's just make EVERYTHING illegal.

Heck, let's just get rid of cars altogether and make everyone walk. That will take away the obesity epidemic and make everyone healthier!

Alcohol is a DRUG. When someone is in your car and you are talking to them, how is it ANY different??? So let's punish the MAJORITY of people who "cell" every day with NO bad results because a few morons can't control themselves.

To heck with it all...just ban EVERYTHING!!!

Honestly. Pull your heads out. Laws were meant to make REALLY bad things SEEM bad so that you wouldn't WANT to DO them. You start banning or illegalizing EVERYTHING, which I note IS being done these days, and soon...you will have taken ALL OF THE BITE out of SENSIBLE laws. Good God, when WILL you people WAKE UP and "get it"?????

You will have nothing but anarchy. People will have even less respect for the law than they do now. Which isn't much as it is. But hey, who am I? Just someone who has 40 years on this rock and watched this nation on it's downward spiral of foolishness.

HMMMMMM The bottom line is that Americans young and old are dying every day from cellers, who have the same statistics as drunks behind the wheel. Try to break it down to the least common denominator and what comes out is they are, in general, deadly. Now there will always be humans who can drive standing on their head and be rather safe, however how do you draw the line between the differences in each human??? It's a no brainer. We have to make (as a group) rules to increase safety on the road. Most everyone accepts the need to not drink and drive. Now with the same statistic we will eventually accept the need to stop celling. I personally don't like it but I have accepted it for the sake of others. It's not all just about "me" or "you" but it's about all of us and our kids and grandkids and their personal safety. Montana already has 5 times more deaths from drinking and driving / per capita / than Massachusetts sooooo if we add the deaths from celling whoooooo are we way out there.

If everyone is really as worked up for and against as they appear here what they should do is go to the special city council meeting that has been called for 6:30 pm on Wednesday. If you can’t make it then pick up the phone and give them a call or send them an e-mail.

Personal appeals to the council will be given more weight than anonymous comments posted her don’t you think?

Sorry there confused if I spoke against the idiot professor that you obviously think is intelligent. My whole point with the soup kitchen comment is to say that this guy can obviously afford to pay for lunch yet he literally takes the food out of the mouths of those that need it by gobbling up their lunch at the soup kitchen and not contributing to the collection afterwards. Now here he comes wanting more nanny-state laws. Give it up! His thoughts and actions are indefensible.

We have drunk driving laws yet people still do it. We have seat belt laws yet people still refuse to wear them. We not have a cell phone ban and people continue to talk, text and drive. Maybe efforts should be made to educate rather than regulate.

This stupid ban is just one more thing in the long list eroding our freedoms as Americans. If these types of nanny-state ordinances actually worked I may have a different opinion but they don’t. Make use of the laws that we already have on the books instead of just adding more that will also be ignored.

Good Lord: "DUE" to experience.

And my overall point is that I have NO sorrow for people who didn't give a beaver home about a "social issue" prior to being somehow affected by it. If you didn't care about it THEN, you have NO RIGHT to care about it NOW simply because the all important YOU have been somehow wronged.

The fact that it was not made good for all...bothers me. When THEY decide that it applies to everyone BUT them...that's called a LINE OF DIVISION wherein they remind you who and what you are: REVENUE GENERATING PROPERTY. Hence your Social SERIAL Number. The more you KNOW, the more dangerous you are to their agenda. Which has NOTHING to do with representing you so much as it does fattening their wallets with the ILLUSION that you somehow have any choice about what happens in your own life.

Nowadays they are even trying to tell you what kind of FOOD you can and can't have. That won't work for me, thanks. I grew up in a more free nation than what we have now. Unfortunately, it wasn't truly free then, either.

People, your "freedom" is an ILLUSION. Look at your tax bracket. Look at all the CONTROL 535 people in DC have over you. Baucus and Tester OPENLY betrayed Montana by BOTH voting in favor of the NDAA. Ask them WHY, if you dare. Nope, you won't. You will sit behind your window blinds being terrified of your neighbor who the TV tells you is a "terror risk" because he's a veteran who fought for you and now disagrees with what he sees those 535 doing in his good name.

Think what you want. Just wait for the NEXT phase of restriction of individual liberty. When they set up SAFETY CHECKPOINTS so that cops can check out everyvun's PAYPAHS to make SURE ZEY ARE EEN ORDAH! (Bad German accent typing).

What a gem our country is turning in to...one dissolved liberty at a time.

NOTE: ANYONE can get into MENSA. It's an open book test anymore that one can "practice" for using a test medium that no more measures IQ than I paint jumbo jets in mid-flight. Anywho....let's move on...

First off, as far as driving being a "privelege and not a right". Manure. It's a normal part of society as the most commonly accepted form of locomotion. The DRIVER LICENSE is what is wrong here. It's highly unconstitutional, and was never meant as a form of ID...anymore than your SSN was supposed to be. Roosevelt even told you that.

Bottom line here: There are far too many "advocates and supporters" of bills and laws that either limit or destroy our individual liberties. Seat belt save lives? And you point is? I've seen them harm just as many as they save...and it's MY LIFE. What I do in MY CAR is MY BUSINESS. If I CHOOSE to be ejected from my car during a crash, that should be MY BUSINESS. Things that I do that have NO effect on anyone else should NEVER fall under the authority of people who possess neither the integrity nor honor nor discipline to limit or otherwise affect them. PERIOD.

The nation that our fore fathers had envisioned saw a STRICTLY LIMITED government involvement, but do to experience - even THEY knew that power corrupts. What did Ben Franklin tell you? "You've been GIVEN a REPUBLIC....IF you can KEEP it." Savvy??

All these "higher education folk" will tell you about how we are a "democracy" when MOST of them couldn't give you the definition. We are a REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC. And the "representatives" are NOT "representing" us at all. But the media tells you they are...

Time ticks away to a day we will all never forget. And we will ask ourselves..."Where did our Nation go???"

Some of us will never forget.

I think the cellphone ban is good. Im the victim of a driver on a cell phone. I was a hard worker, 21, and had genius iq levels, was applying for mensa. Now cant work, memory both long and short is fading, in constant pain, and have a 75 iq which is two or three points above being legally retarded. Just because someone couldnt be bothered to pay attention to the road and stop arguing on the phone. S

Most humans are big talkers until their daughter, mother, wife, etc. is maimed or killed by a texter or celler. Every day there are hundreds of celler killers on our highways and cities. What does it take for normal (hopefully) human beings to realize and accept statistics that clearly show celling is the same as driving drunk???
The statistics also show that celling on a "hands off" cell system, in a vehicle is every bit as dangerous as celling "hands on."
The bottom line in "appearances" are simply that little kids on bicycles, small cars and anything on the road are considered "collateral" damage.
Missoula is one other town about to pass a celling law.
Many others are following suit, in Montana, and thousands other cities and towns in other states.
Some humans have become sooooo calloused they couldn't care less about a few more "preventable" deaths on our roads. They think it will be someone else rather than them or their own family.

Thanks Joe. You proved my point.

Hey confused. I wasn’t belittling people at the soup kitchen. Their opinion matters to me more than yours does actually.

The comment was made to Thackery because he goes to the soup kitchen nearly every day to mooch lunch. Not even a contributor to the free will basket either. Now doesn’t this strike you as odd that a man with a doctorate and a lifelong career working for the university with all their benefits and retirement would have to resort to this? Now he spends all his time hollering about how the government isn’t in control of enough areas of our lives

Nice reference to a poll at the soup kitchen Joe. I guess "those people" just don't count. I hope you and your family have the opportunity to become what you so belittle. You why those who wrap themsleves in the flag of hate will always fail.

Since when has driving become a right? It's a privilege that can be taken away for various reasons.

@longtimehavreite: what makes you think I'm not "from around here"? You have NO idea WHO I am. Just another useless yapper running their yap...typical from what I've seen.

And even if that were the case, what POSSIBLE difference could that make? I note that I at least provided a link to substantiate my statement. The OP only sat there running his yap.

As far as telling someone where to put something, I don't think the HDN will allow me to reciprocate the favor. But thanks for displaying your IQ nonetheless.

Im planning to return to Havre this summer and trust me I have been in cabs here in New York while the driver was watching DVD movie while driving--I also walk all over this city and I expect to walk every where in Havre. If you think that using a cell phone while driving is absolutely marvelous I suggest give up your car for a week and walk or ride a bike in Havre any date at any time. Then come back and tell us how kool it is for drivers to talk and text while they drive. Incidentally I suggest you have a number of reflectors on and keep in mind that there have been studies on Montana that suggest that at anyone time 50% of the drivers are using alcohol. I dont even want to think about driving to Loma while drivers in teh opposite lane are using a cell phone.

Good old Professor Bill’s ramblings are always a kick. You would never know he had made it past 8th grade judged by his writing but of course he is a mighty educated Doctor of something or another. Just goes to show that some college educated former teachers are just not as smart as one would think. No wonder education is on the decline if this is evidence of the caliber of teachers at the university level.

What statistical studies are you talking about Mr. Thackeray? Did you take a poll at the soup kitchen or did you find something with some credibility? I have seen polls that say these ordinances do nothing to stop cell phone use. People still do it just as frequently even though it is against the law. I agree seatbelts are also a life saver but don’t people still drive without wearing them?

Your letter is just foolish ranting.

And liberty cop. How is it even feasibly possible that a cell phone ordinance in Havre Montana will pad the pocketbooks of insurance agents? That is absurd. Do you hold a doctorate degree also?

Havre already has a distracted driver policy on the books, rather than implement a new law, we should continue to enforce those that we have. THe issues isn't cell phone use, the issue is unsafe driving. I know of individuals that are safe drivers and talk on the phone. But I also know and see people who eat while driving, change CDs and fiddle with the radio, people who put on make up and deal with children. I think is what needs to be enforced is unsafe driving or "not driving in a safe and prudent manner". I have seen police officer driving and talking on their cell phones, (NOT RADIOS) and why should they be exempt if we are going to have this policy what makes them any safer just because they are cops!!! It's interesting that only the city has the policy and not the county - how confusing and difficult!!!!

Bill Thackery dosen't even have a driver's license. He should not me able to comment.

Mr. Thackeray, you are right. I did use a "very silly made up example." Al Gore has taught us that we will never again have cold temperatures and snow because of man-made global warming.....

Hey, Rebellious, why don't you put a sock in it? There have been studies that PROVE that yapping on cellphones and texting are as dangerous as drunk driving! So before you post your newbie drivel, get to know who you're trying so poorly to bash! you don't even know who you're trying to insult with your worthless statement! Bill's family has been here a long time, he has a Doctorate and KNOWS how to research! You, on the other hand are just another newbie to this community! SHOW SOME RESPECT! You're not from here! Dr. Thackeray's EARNED it in more ways than you will ever know!

Nice point on the insurance rates, Dr. Thackeray, never looked at it that way before. I bet that's why Brekke is against the ban, pad his pocketbook a bit, right? Rich fat cat republicans are always looking for ways to make money.

No radios, no animals, no passengers in the car also right Bill?? They all create distractions. I hope this was a joke

@Thackeray,I don't like people talking on their cell phones either,but i hate the police using that excuse to pull you over.I have nothing to hide but why should i give up my rights to have an overzealous Rookie taking up my time.If a person gets into an accident,the cellphone time could be reviewed to see if it attributed to the accident and then fine him for careless driving. Heres a scenario,A cop sees you swerve a little but didn't see the pothole you were trying to avoid,so now he pulls you over and says he seen you on your cell,now he notices a couple pills on your passenger side floor,so now you remember you took your uncle to the drugstore the day before and unknown to you he dropped something.And there goes Bill Thackeray in hancuffs,but the good news is after paying 3500.00 on a good lawyer Bill gets found innocent of all charges.What a great court system.

WELL SAID!

You sir, (I am assuming), need to do some REAL research before opening your yap and making such absurd public statements.

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/12/13/studies-may-have-overestimated-cellphone-crash-risk/?test=latestnews

There is NO conclusive evidence WHATSOEVER to suggest that a cell phone ban has done ANYTHING to increase public safety. This is about CONTROL and POLITICS. The SAME signs that now appear here, also appear in Billings. Your individual liberties are being one by one dealt away by politicos whose ONLY motivation is fattening their wallets and making sure you shut your mouth and pay the higher cost of living every day.

The day you all WAKE UP and see what's REALLY going on...should scare you to death. Do some REAL homework and KNOW what you are talking about. Prior to opening your mouth and removing all doubt.