CONSIDER: Cost of perfection

Coeur d’Alene Press writer Steve Cameron was recently unfairly berated by a reader who would have everyone believe that Steve was insensitive because he questioned the value of increasing the traffic control safeguards at the boat launch.

It is sad when a human life is cut short and all who value life agree with that concept. The question is: What price can be placed on human life? The quick answer is priceless, but that is not true. The courts throughout the land assign monetary value to lives every day of the year. Sixty million fetuses and babies have been aborted. Corporations factor in the number of possible deaths and injuries in their products usage in order to allow for legal costs and court rulings.

The cost of perfection can be astronomical. Cleaning up of a river could cost $100,000 to clean 90 percent of the pollution. It might then cost another $100,000 to clean 9 percent more. The last 1 percent could require an additional $100,000 to purify. In an ironic twist, it might not be possible to ever purify the last 1 percent.

I have visited the boat launch area in Hayden and I have found it not too hard to avoid ending up in the lake. The grieving family might like to see additional safeguards to prevent any more accidents. I think that is a fine idea. What would the safeguards be? A guard shack manned 24 hours a day, seven days a week? Concrete barriers that arise out of the ground almost instantly, like those at Fairchild Air Force Base? Who will pay for all this?

A very simple fix is to require out-of-state drivers to complete a weeklong course in traffic safety at Idaho boat launches.

How many safeguards do we need? At some point, the individual must assume some responsibility

ROBERT HUNT

Post Falls