On Tue, 21 Mar 2006 17:05:05 +0100, you wrote:
My last question is: Who the hell is Paul Smith? The article begins "Safe Speed is a UK web-based road safety organisation run by Paul Smith." and only has this to say about him: "Smith ran the project as a hobby from his home in Scotland for some time but in 2003, following a period of illness in which his self-employed computer engineering business ran down, he took it up full time at some significant personal cost. Although Smith has always used the word "we" when discussing Safe Speed on the website, it is very much his idea and his organisation. Smith is also a member of the motorists' pressure group Association of British Drivers (ABD)."
And all the above as well. Yes, it's all a problem. A problem which is hard to address, since the site is *about* making unprovable claims, and is cited by libertarian motorists as an "authority" to back their views - it is the sole "authority" doing so, of course, which makes it widely cited..
Are we to be led to believe that this whole article is about some angry British motorist running a website from home?
Correct. But he is a talented self-publicist and has succeeded in getting his absurd "one in three" claim on the BBC News website, among other coverage.
Someone has taken to slapping {fact} and {weasel} all over the criticisms, which is understandable enough since the rebuttals all come from primary sources. Any decent suggestion on how to prune it down to an appropriate length and keep it that way would be appreciated. Guy (JzG)