During my miserable, nightmarish commute on the afternoon of November 28, as our latest storm hit, I didn't see a single plow or sand truck. Not one -- and as a result, the highway developed a thick sheet of ice that's still in place two days later. During that span, I've traveled the route four times, and a journey that typically takes me 25-30 minutes has stolen a minimum of 75 minutes from my life each time, and once over ninety. This might have been excusable had weather prognosticators blown their predictions, but shockingly enough, they didn't. Every major forecaster called the arrival of the storm accurately, yet state and local government types still weren't ready -- and we continue to pay for their mistake.
Obviously, I've had a lot of time lately to think about how to punish officials for this error, and this is my proposed solution. They should be forced to stay in their car for the total amount of time that their decisions cost each and every area commuter -- and the sentence should run consecutively, not concurrently. When they're finally released from automotive lockup -- in five years or so -- I bet they'll be much more attentive when it comes to watching the friggin' news. -- Michael Roberts