Come on, Dan, really?

The police said she deliberately hit them. I forget: what's our rule for when we are skeptical of what the police say?

Fan the flames!

Or is is Fan of flames?

To be fair, by the time she got her clothes off and started running around, she was technically a pedestrian.

@2, probabl when they have any reason at all to lie?

(ie, after they murder a black person, after they steal drugs, if they're showing some kind of racism or homophobia, if they are showing excessive force. not when they arrest a drunk lady after she runs people over).

So she deliberately hits a cyclist. Oh...and by the way and incidentally, also crashed into two other cars and then tried to steal someone else's car. After taking off her clothes and running around the accident scene naked. And this is some sort of example of how car drivers are always trying kill cyclists or something. As opposed to an example of why jackasses who drink and drive are dangerous to Everyone.

Good thing no one got killed.

Could you make this a regular addition.
There are plenty of stories to go around...

@7: Yeah, like this one.

Could you make this a regular addition. There are plenty of stories to go around...

Nooooo!!!

Look. Anybody who wants to know about every report of a cat stuck in a tree can make a google alert for cat-stuck-in-tree. No stuck cat shall escape your notice.

But generating a robotic blog post in response to every single one is duller than shit. It's noise. If you really care about bike accidents, so some work and write something of substance about it. Same with all that other redundant crap.

That's Florida. Doesn't apply to any other human realm.

Holly Highfield... did anyone else laugh when they read her name?

Childish, Dan. Provoking, fanning.

These are not PIT BULLS.

You have an asshole side that really roars its head sometimes in petty ways

@2 - it states that witnesses also claim she struck the cyclists intentionally.

But really, we've all been there. It's not fair to single this woman out. You are driving along and all of sudden you feel a small legion of ticks crawling all over you, burrowing into your skin. You realize that the cyclist over there is controlling them, and really, what choice do you have. You hit the cyclist, but the ticks are relentless, so you have to tear off all of your clothes to get them off of you. I mean lets try to show a little sympathy.

Generally, the complaint is not that cyclists "roll through stop signs", but more that they blatantly ignore red lights, which drivers arguably *don't* do.

Christ Almighty! Did you read that article? I just now looked at it...

The children in Highfield's car told police that she was driving north when she turned to them and said: "Do you think this biker is going to get hit? Do you have faith? Are you afraid?" They said she then steered her SUV across San Pablo and struck 55-year-old Cathy Giury riding a bicycle.

Drunk, or maybe on drugs And a religious nutcase. And there were friggin' kids in the car with her!

So. Kids in the car. Drunk, or perhaps on drugs. Hits a cyclist. Hits some other cars and a fence. Tries to steal a van with people inside it. Gets more and more violent as the episode goes on. Kicks a policewoman. Charged with battery, carjacking, DUI while accompanied by a minor, DUI while causing damage to property...and all you could see was that she hit someone on a bike.

Gosh...car drivers are such a bunch of arrogant self centered it's all about me me me jerks aren't they?

The minute you take your clothes of and start running around naked you're automatically awesome, no matter what.

*off

You know, this has really changed my opinion. Clearly, this woman, and by extension all drivers, is dangerous and probably crazy.

From now on, I'm going to support the position that a person's mode of transportation determines whether their actions are acceptable or criminal. Bicyclists can gang rape nuns, and it will be the nuns' fault, if they're in a van or something, because of this psycho woman in Florida.

Wow, this new worldview sure makes life easier. That whole critical thinking and perspective thing was kind of exhausting.

Typical motorists, pissing in the backs of patrol cars like they do. Oughta be a law, I tell ya.

Tuesday, at the intersection of Fremont Ave. N and N 34th St., I had a cyclist totally read me my beads because I stepped into the path of his left turn as I used a cross walk with the light.

Fuckers.

All of them.

There should be an open season.

The police probably framed her.

Most likely after they found the paint from her car all over the cyclists' crushed bodies.

Remember, guns don't kill motorists.

Armed cyclists kill motorists.

yeah.
"they must've provoked that lady somehow."

idiot.

go back to portland where you can drink beer in front of toddlers.

@13

When Critical Mass rioted, the police didn't see it. They just heard what happened from various witnesses, and made a judgment that the driver was the victim. In this Florida incident, same thing, except the witnesses were mere children.

So maybe the cops got the story right when the interviewed everyone, and maybe not. But when Critical Mass beat a man's head in with a steel U-lock, suddenly the cops were all wrong, sight unseen. And they had none of the motives in @5.

Critical Ass.

7 -- yes, let's take an emotionally charged debate where peoples' safety is ultimately the central concern, and fan the flames daily with malkin-esque posts where provocation and outrage take precedent over substance and merit. MOTHERFUCKING BRILLIANT.

just limit your canned outrage franchise to pitbulls, please.

Yesterday I was driving on Capitol Hill when I came to a four-way stop with a stop light. The light was green, and to my left and right were lines of cars waiting for their chance to go. As I turned right, in my side mirror I saw a cyclist who'd run the red light abruptly swerve to miss me and almost hit a light pole.

Usually I'm the type to be overly cautious around bicycles; These people are freeing up valuable resources, and putting themselves in harms way for the good of the environment. I'd feel tremendous guilt if ever I put one in harms way... and yet, I felt no guilt whatsoever when this woman almost crashed. All I heard was a voice in the back of my mind:

"And that's why you always stop at stoplights."

Just this afternoon I was almost hit by a cyclist on Stevens Way at the UW near the HUB, as a pedestrian in a crosswalk. The biker missed me by inches, whizzing by on the right without any warning or notification. Then, to avoid the bus that was stopped immediately below us he cut right onto the sidewalk, through the people waiting to board, and then left again into the street directly in front of the bus. All without any signaling, stopping or even slowing down slightly.

Ah yes, these poor cyclists are all such martyrs.

@27: It's always a good idea to extend the actions of one individual to the group as a whole.

@10 has a point, Florida doesn't really count, I remember an (alleged) comedian with radio talk show that had a bit called "Germany of Florida" where he found bizarre news stories and the caller had to guess the location of the story.

However, here is one "Auto drivers are evil" story in Seattle, http://www.kirotv.com/news/17192870/detail.html well, no bicycles were involved, which is sort of ironic as a bicyclist could potentially have done more damage to the 7 year old than the car in this case actually did (though that was just luck, the car could easily have killed most of the 15 kids, while a bicycle probably couldn't take out more than a couple)

Completely off topic, number of stop signs or red lights I've run in in my car in the last couple of months; 0, number of bicyclists who have run a red light in front of me while I cautiously remained stopped at a light that had just turned green for me; 2.
Since the light had just turned green for me, in one of the cases the cyclists may have thought they were going through a yellow (but in the other, I could have been halfway into the intersection before he blew past, so he knew it was red, and with dark clothes and no lights I wouldn't have seen him, he is just lucky I was in no hurry at the time)
When riding at dusk with no lights or helmet[s] (both cases), caution might be wise, especially for the pilot of the tandem, you may not care about yourself or if you dent my truck, but think of your stoker.

@29

I like to think of the assholes you describe as "gimmes" and accelerate into them.

I know this girl and she used to have alot going for herself and throw it all away!! She is from my home town and I want tell were that is. but everyone here wants to know who in there wright minds would even let her have there kids with her.

@28: You missed 27's implicit comparison to Savage's original post. Savage seems to think that the actions of this one driver on Florida mean... um, something, so it's only fair to trot out equally meaningless anecdotal evidence in the comments.

If you're going to get into the business of critiquing reasoning, you should really work on grasping the context.