Seat belts should be a personal choice

Let me paint you a little picture: A nice sunny day in Bloomington, and there you are, driving down Third Street without a care in the world. \nWindows open, pumpin out the 'Coug,' you turn onto Indiana Avenue looking for some action. \nWait, what is that up ahead? Some cops in the road, hope there wasn't an accident. Huh, they are waving you over to the side of the road. \n"What's the problem officer?," you politely ask. \n"You're not wearing a seat belt," his stone cold reply. "Here's your $25 ticket."\nVoila, there goes your perfect afternoon. \n(By the way, for those not in the know, the 'Coug' is John Mellencamp, get with the program, you're a Hoosier!)\nThat's right, while the lovely local law enforcement officers aren't busy giving tickets away for public intoxication to 21-year-olds walking home (after all, don't want to encourage drunks walking home, that would be safe!), they are out there on the streets, trying to make it safe by buckling everyone up. \nNow, I have come to accept the fact that the police here have their priorities out of whack, it's a fact of life here at IU. But this seat belt thing is taking it a step too far. Is this really the most pressing need for these cops to be spending their time on? According to information reported in the IDS Tuesday, during the last "blitz" in August and September there were a total of 89 non-seat belt wearing violations cited. Eighty-nine! \nAnd the biggest kicker of them all is that at their seat belt checkpoints they run, it is still possible for a driver to put on their seat belt before they are given their ticket. Why even bother to set up a checkpoint if it's not fail-safe? \nYeah, it's true that wearing a seat belt does make it safer to travel around from town to town, state to state. Those facts are pretty sound and you can't make an argument against it. \nOf course, you can also make an argument that wearing a seat belt is a personal choice and the police have no business telling drivers what to do. It's like allowing a police officer to come in your house and write you up for not using a coaster for your beer on the wooden table. Pretty stupid idea, isn't it? \nI wear my seat belt every time I drive my car, so this law doesn't really apply to me. I have not gotten a ticket for this, and probably won't -- but that isn't the point. The point is that there is a line between personal liberties and public safety in the realm of laws. I think that this law of wearing a seat belt is crossing that line, and furthermore, the determined way that local law officials go about enforcing this is absurdly beyond the line. In fact, you could say it's so far beyond the line the police can't even see the line anymore.\nNext thing you know, our national government is going to take away our right to a jury trial and our protection against law officials searching our homes without a warrant. Oh wait, its already happened. I can only hope that one day soon someone will be there to check that the pattern on my boxers matches my shirt and that I'm wearing a belt with my pants. It would be unfortunate if I was hurt in a tragic trouser-dropping accident.