Nevada Drivers Are Dying Like Idiots

By some bureaucratic miracle, the Nevada Office of Traffic Safety has released its quarter-assed death tally for the year—just through March, mind you—and the numbers are in–98 souls splattered, crumpled, or otherwise turned into roadside pulp across the Silver State, a whole 0.03 percent increase from last year, which the state seems weirdly proud of, like a drunk who boasts about only crashing the car into one tree this time.

Of those 98 dearly departed, 29 were pedestrians—likely mowed down by people who treat red lights as polite suggestions—and 14 weren’t wearing seatbelts, proving once again that Darwin’s ghost still haunts the highways. Seatbelts, folks. They’re not complicated, and they’re right there.

State safety honchos, those clucking helmet-haired apparatchiks, blame “impairment and speeding.” No kidding.

Mixing a six-pack of Modelo with a lifted Dodge Ram going 110 down Tropicana might end badly. What a revelation.

Not surprisingly, Clark County claims the lion’s share of carnage with 68 fatalities—Las Vegas remains America’s most determined game of live-action Frogger. Washoe County added another 14 to the body count.

The rest are like confetti in towns nobody cares about unless they have a gas station or a brothel. So buckle up, slow down, and for the love of whatever god you pretend to believe in, don’t drive like your skull’s filled with aquarium gravel, or don’t whine when the reaper punches your ticket.