OK, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.

You’ve got a bill that bans texting while driving a motor vehicle on your desk, somewhere. You need to make it the law of the state.

The Texas Legislature has worked out some differences in the bill and it has approved it and sent it to you for your signature. You need to do this. You need to make texting while driving illegal throughout our vast state.

Furthermore, Gov. Abbott, you need to show the guts that your predecessor, Rick Perry, failed to show in 2011 when he vetoed a similar bill that landed on his desk. Gov. Perry said then that the bill was too “intrusive,” that it demonstrated some sort of government overreach into motorists’ lives.

Good grief, man! Is driving too fast an intrusion? How about banning open containers of alcoholic beverages in motor vehicles? We also require motorists to be insured; we demand they have valid driver’s licenses. Are those measures intrusive as well?

I know you really don’t need to hear this from me, but I will say it anyway. A statewide ban lends continuity to laws across the state. It pre-empts local ordinances that ban texting while driving. Indeed, not all communities in Texas have been as proactive as, say, Amarillo has been.

Indeed, the state can post signs at every entry point at state borders warning motorists that state law prohibits them from texting while driving. It’s a dangerous and foolish activity.

http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2017/05/22/texas-texting-while-driving-ban-governor/

I am particularly proud of our Texas Panhandle legislative delegation that has supported this ban. They belong to the same party as you do, governor.

Listen to them. Follow their lead. Sign the bill and make it law.

A lot of us out here want you to do the right thing.