Believe it or not, I tried three times to respond to the well-reasoned comment made by Don to my previous post using this site’s comment function (You can try it below). And each time my words spontaneously disappeared. Maybe it was operator error (highly likely with this operator) or maybe the computer just did not like what I was saying, but here’s hoping Number 4 is a charm—and to be doubly sure, I am posting my reply to Don as this blog entry, which uses a whole different mechanism.

Anyway, what I have been trying to say is that I agree pretty much with everything Don said, which, if I am summarizing correctly, amounts to sheer wonderment at the fuss being made about trucks from Mexico daring to cross “our” border.

Turning to the Teamsters, let me just say right up front I happen to believe trade unions have just as much right to exist and to advance their agendas vigorously as do corporate entities. That being said, I don’t speak for this union or any union or corporate entity for that matter so I can only imagine why the IBT is beating the anti-Mexico drum to a pulp. My guess is garnering publicity has something to do with it.

I agree that the Sierra Club, an organization I happen to have respect for, is sure barking up the wrong tree this time. And I will even go out on a limb and suggest that if Mexican carriers are to be successful operating here over the long haul, they’ll want to run equipment—and employ drivers— that will enable them to truly be competitive with U.S. carriers on service and not price alone.

Turning to CRASH and their ilk, I’ve got to admit I’ve been impressed by how strongly and forthrightly FMCSA Administrator John Hill (pictured below) has vouched for the safeness of the pilot Mexican carrier program—even going so for as to practically endorse it personally: “Look I’ve been in law enforcement for 29 years – it’s all I’ve ever done – and I am personally committed to highway safety,” said Hill. “I would not be part of any program that wasn’t committed to highway safety.”

As for the overall economic impact of letting Mexican fleets truck here and our fleets truck there (and the same applies in my book to every trucker and conducteur de camion in Canada!), I say again let the chips fall—or fly–where they may. That is what free trade is all about.

And remember, it cuts both ways– or three ways in this case. You can be sure there are industries in Mexico and Canada that are not thrilled with having “their” borders fully opened to American competitors. What also comes to my mind is a quote made famous by John F. Kennedy: “A rising tide lifts all boats.”

We might also try asking ourselves if we are of the land of the free and the home of the brave, why pray tell are so many of us so afraid of a little competition?

Maybe just maybe the court decision throwing out most of the “new” Hours of Service (HOS) regs now in effect for truck drivers will lead to real reform of those dreadfully outdated rules.

And maybe we were on the right track with our April print-edition cover story titled “When to Drive, When to Sleep” in which I argued rather forcefully that placing simple limits on hours will never fix the very real safety problem truckers face– fatigue at the wheel.

Today’s HOS rules are incredibly divorced from the workaday world of truckers engaged in serving a 24/7 service economy. For one thing, the scary truth is that if drivers did not fudge their logs as much as they do even more of them– and more of the motorists sharing the road with them– would wind up in crashes. And let’s face it, forcing drivers to drive while fatigued or pressuring them to cheat the law doesn’t do much to make trucking an attractive career choice, either.

I said it then and I will say it again here: Does trucking care enough about the safety of its 3-million plus drivers and the millions of its ultimate customers its drivers share the road with to do the right thing and work for meaningful HOS reform?

Indeed, one way to look at this latest court decision is to view it as giving the Feds and trucking interests alike one more golden opportunity to step up to the plate and work together to usher in real regulatory reform that puts safety first and foremost.

Straight from the Now-I’ve-Heard-It-All Department comes this Associated Press (AP) report that ran in a local paper here in Connecticut under this must-read headline: Ice cream truck driver avoids jail .

It seems, reported AP, that “Susan Bottacari, 45, of Milford [CT], was pulled over in May 2006 after being seen driving erratically and nearly striking a security guard at the Southport Brewing Co. parking lot, police said.” Oh, and get this: “Bottacari had been driving an ice cream truck in Milford since 1993 and was in the process of renewing her license when she was arrested, officials said. She was already on a form of probation for a narcotics possession.”

But the real chilling aspect of this story is that a Connecticut Superior Court judge has ruled that if Bottacari simply enters an alcohol education program and attends classes for a year and “stays out of trouble”– whatever the hell that means– her drunken driving charge will be dismissed.

So far, the only punishment, if you can call it that, Bottacari has received is the loss of her license to sell ice cream and the suspension of her driver’s license for six months– and presumably she has that back by now.

Not surpringly, prosecutirs have objected to her cushy deal.

“It was serious. A person who’s driving an ice cream truck shouldn’t be driving drunk and, if they do, they shouldn’t get the (education program),” Assistant State’s Attorney Melanie Cradle said, according to AP.

Indeed. Consider this, reported by AP: “When police stopped Bottacari, they said she almost fell out of her truck. She refused an alcohol test. Authorities said they found an unopened vodka bottle in a cooler in the truck.”

It it is bad enough to drive drunk in any vehicle at any time.

But to be doing so in a vehicle whose main purpose– nay it’s true puprose– is to draw childen towards it is beyond unconscionable.

There is no shame in having an alcohol problem– for sure most experts agree alcoholics are born with a predisposition toward developing the horrible malady– and it is a fair bet in my view that most drug users don’t set out to become addicts either.

No, the real shame rests in having an alcohol or drug problem and not doing something about it.

We can only hope that Bottacari will rise to her challenge this time around.

And if she can’t, that she stay out from behind the wheel.

Especially that of an ice cream truck, for crying out loud.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge in this space the outpouring of support I and the other members of the FleetOwner editorial & art staff have received from persons near and far in response to the tragic passing of Terry Nguyen, our beloved friend and colleague, whom we lost two weeks ago.

Everyone on FleetOwner has mentioned receiving phone calls, emails, cards and letters expressing sincere condolences. These kind words have come to us not only from all quarters of the U.S.-Canadian trucking industry but literally from the four corners of the globe– truly a witness to the positive impact Terry had in his short time with us.

I know each of us on FleetOwner has been deeply touched by these gestures of sympathy and have been honored to convey them to Terry’s family and friends.

Thank you.

“No worries.” I can’t tell you how many times my young friend– 21 years my junior to be exact– said that to me over the past three-and- a- half years as we worked together. And I know if he saw me now, he’d say it to me again, calming me down and lifting me up at the same time, were he still here among us. But sadly, terribly, Terry Nguyen lost his life to the fury of an ocean at the still tender age of 27 less than a week ago, on the afternooon of June 1st. Now it’s up to me to breathe life again into that line for him and above all to tell you a little something about the wonderful guy who had served so terrifically as the FleetOwner web editor since early in 2004. I only hope I can do his memory justice.

When Terry joined our merry band at FleetOwner, I didn’t know what to expect. He was our second web editor ever and back then, in February ‘04, some of us ink-stained types (me, anyway) still weren’t all that comfortable with the online world we were being asked to embrace alongside our familiar print environment.

I was charged in part with showing Terry, who was just a few years and jobs out of college, the editorial ropes. I pretty much had to cover everything from what cost-per-mile is to what a private fleet is with sidetrips to such arcane stopovers as journalistic style and, of course, why male FleetOwner editors are almost always clean-shaven.

Terry took me all in his calm stride– the bad-mood mornings, the better afternoons, the insane way I can only write well under withering pressure or late at night. Very soon, and faster than anyone I have met before or since, Terry grasped what our readers are about and what kind of information they need as well as how to get it for them. And that he did like a terrier. A very well-mannered terrier but a terrier none the less. I can’t tell you how many Washington big shots and trucking kingpins he interviewed or at least got a meaningful comment out of, often getting what he needed from them to meet a deadline before many of us had had our second cup of coffee.

Yes, I may be a veteran journalist but I learned so much from watching him, getting a refresher course in journalistic gung ho that I now treasure. Indeed, before long I found he was as much mentoring me as I him.

In fact, I would not be writing this blog entry– even have this blog to write in– were it not for Terry’s low-key encouragment that I could make it happen with, yes, “No worries.” And low key is key. Terry was not one to yell, let alone raise his voice above a conversational level. Yet we all heard him, even the several members (me included) of the staff who are more than a little hard of hearing. Maybe that’s because he always spoke quietly yet confidently, sure of himself without ever being cocksure.

That, I think, is one of the main reasons– along with his gentlemanly kindness– that he was so well liked and will be remembered fondly long after many blowhards yet to be born have come and gone.

Here you see Terry in a shot cropped from a photo of he and a friend posing (I’m pretty sure) outside the White House on a vacation trip he made to D.C. Terry loved to travel and his travel always meant visiting friends and family. When he got back from a trip, I was always astonished not by what he saw, but how many people he managed to see! By the way, that’s his trademark cap he’s wearing– the one he wore (but only outdoors) nearly every day.

He was on such a trip when his life was cut far too short. Terry was in Florida for a few days of vacation with a couple of college buddies after the Memorial Day weekend. The details are sketchy but after lunch on Friday of that week the fateful decision to go swimming was made. Churning beneath the Atlantic surf off Delray Beach were rip currents, which can challenge even the most experienced swimmers. I don’t know who went in first or who knew what about the rips running that day, but my understanding from local news reports is that all three went in and all three came out only with the help of lifeguards. His two friend survived the ordeal, thank God, but Terry could not be revived.

This is the point in the story where Terry would join in and say, “No worries” then somehow add a few words to the effect that everything will turn out as it should. And it always seemed to. Till that day.

If you knew Terry, or even if you just liked hearing about him, please keep his family and friends in your thoughts and prayers as they struggle through tough days ahead.

As for my colleague and dearly missed friend, to paraphrase the old Irish blessing, I believe Terry is now safely resting in the palm of God’s hand. And there he indeed has no worries.