When McCain lowers the national speed limit to 50 mph, will you break the speed limit?

50???? hes nutz! I go atleast 90 on the freeway.. always have always will!

If everyone actually slowed down to 50 or 55 it would save a huge amount of gas.

And the extra time required to get to work would not be much, unless you commute a hundred miles each way or more.

It would also make the highways a lot safer. Which oddly enough is never considered an important factor by all these fools who talk about how they need a big old car "To Be Safe, DURRR..."

And then they drive ten or twenty mph over the limit... without seat belts.... talking on a cell phone....

It would save billion and billions of barrels of oil. 1. studies done indicate that fuel economy for all vehicles rapidly decrease for every mph over 55 mph. http://autorepair.about.com/cs/generalinfo/a/aa022...

Not everyone will follow this limit, we know, however the majority will. A lot of drivers travel at 60-62 mph in a 55mph zone, and 70-72 in a 65 mph zone to limit risk of being pulled over. It lowers everyone's speed (most everyone's). Law abiding citizens will follow 55 mph. Remember this used to be the natl. average (1987).

His idea is absurd in my opinion. I think that the idea of a national speed limit is also absurd, I hate that we are continually loosing state control over issues like this. Unless they are going to use the additional revenue from speeding tickets towards oil purchases this will be completely ineffective. I don't plan on slowing down to 50 on the highways, I live in Texas and we need to have 70 mph speed limits because of the vast amount of highways we have that cover the large state. The cost of changing those signs would be outrageous. Fortunately for me it would not have a huge effect on my morning communte. I do however make a 200 mile trip a couple of times a month and with the 70 mph speed limit I usually set my cruise at 75ish making that trip take about 2.5 hours. If the speed limit were 50 and I obeyed it that would make the trip 4 hours or realistically with the cruise set at 58 mph 3.4 hours. I think it would only make me speed more, I can't imagine driving 50 down I-35, you are getting passed when you do 85 on that highway. Thanks for bringin up this topic, I was unaware of the proposed change. Below is a link on the topic showing that there is little evidence that this would be effective. My sum of thought is that more power should be given to the states and I don't want a president who is for taking more rights from the states.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0...

Funny you mention this... our socialist guv here in dusty old Arizona is trying to get hundreds of speed cameras set up on our freeways for... you know.... safety. Oops, but then some muckraking reporter noticed that she had a few dozen million in her budget from the "safety" cameras to keep her feel goody socialist programs going in the face of big budget deficits. I've decided that if she gets her way I will spend a day driving back and forth between Phoenix and Tucson at 45 MPH, and hopefully make things really, really safe. Because after all, that's what speed cameras are all about and slow = safe!!!!!!!

I break the speed limit now, so if he lowers it to 50 miles per hour, i will really be in trouble for speeding.

Logically it won't change the amount of gas that highway miles will use up, and yes i do thing replacing all the signs will cost just as much in taxes as the sky rocketed gas prices.

If he really wants to reduce thee consumer demand in gas, get rid of all the traffic lights and some how eliminate all rush hour traffic jams.

How bad is the amnesia in this country?

We used to have a national speed limit, remember the 55mph limit. It was not a national law; neither Congress nor the president has that authority, only the states do. In the 1970s, Congress limited federal highway funds to states that did not lower its speed limits to 55mph. Congress repealed the policy in 1995.

BTW. Several states have low speed limits. When I lived in Nebraska, many highways had a 50mph limit; none were higher than 55mph and the interstate speed limit was 65mph.

When Oil was hard to come by back in the 70's Nixon dropped the speed limit, Nationally to 55mph. It not only saved fuel but saved lives. 55 is still the speed limit in many states including most of the Northeast.

I wouldn't worry too much. First of all it will never happen. Remember the 55mph limit? That didn't go over well with the American people either. Actually this is McCain's master plan to slow down the terrorists. If he gets that law passed, some crazy will assassinate him.

I have realized that slowing down does conserve gas, but i dont think changing all the signs to 50 mph will change the minds of everyone who like to speed anyway, so your right, spending all that money on signs sounds pretty stupid.

Probably not. Because if gas is $5 a gallon I'd rather slow down a bit and save some money.

Gas prices are not going down, so we may as well bite the bullet and make some changes.

I applaud McCain for coming up with an idea to save gas.