A Democratic governor would be well-advised to seek out a prominent Republican who cares about this issue - and there are many - to help lead such a commission. After all, highway carnage knows no party. Pair that person with a widely respected Democratic co-chair who knows his way around Annapolis and has a track record on highway safety.
Fill out the panel with law enforcement officers, judges, traffic safety experts, highway engineers, religious leaders and lawmakers from both parties. Add some relatives of crash victims to keep the motivation level up.
Then set the panel loose with a mandate to develop a program to reach the goal. Give them enough money so that members can go to places around the world and study measures that have worked. Support them with researchers from Maryland's universities. Have them study every aspect of the problem from engineering to education to enforcement to traffic law.
Don't tell the commission how to get there. Just ask them to check ideology at the door, keep an open mind and to focus on the goal.
Maybe they can come up with a program to halve traffic deaths without speed cameras, red-light cameras, cell phone restrictions or any of the measures some legislators consider intrusive.
My guess is they can't. Speed is a factor in at least a third of road fatalities, while distractions and red light-running account for many more. Law enforcement is stretched too thin to make much progress without 21st-century tools. But if there's a better path, if there's a libertarian way to save lives, bring it on.
Anyway, give these folks nine months to study and hold hearings and to write a comprehensive bill you can bring into the 2010 session as your flagship proposal. Threaten a veto if it's watered down. Show people you can fight for something big that isn't a tax.
Of course, if a governor were to propose such an ambitious goal, some might oppose it on the grounds it could pave the way for "Big Brother."
So give them a chance to vote against a bill setting a goal of cutting highway fatalities in half. Let them vote against even studying how to get there.
Politics is often a game of seize the flag. And on this issue, win or lose, a shrewd politician could lay claim to a banner that has long been waved by others:
Pro-life.
gettingthere@baltimoresun.com
