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As PM reported yesterday, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) this week voted unanimously to recommend a nationwide ban on the use of cellphones while driving, citing a multivehicle wreck that left two people dead last year in which the drivers at fault were allegedly distracted.

It's true that drivers not focused on the task at hand are a risk to everyone on the road. But the real problem isn't our gadgets. It's us. Why do we treat driving so frivolously that we allow ourselves to be easily distracted?

Perhaps it's because Americans have come to regard a driver's license as a right—not a privilege. In this country, it's ridiculously easy to get a license. Just think back to your driver's test. I took mine in a parking lot, and the gruff man doing the grading never got a chance to see how I'd merge onto a highway or where my eyes focused when approaching an intersection. The hardest part, as it is for many license-seeking teenagers, was parallel parking. That skill comes in handy now and then, but how important is it to being safe on the road?

America's lax standards about driving tests and entitlement about driving are just symptoms of our lackadaisical attitude toward driving. And that attitude conveys exactly the wrong message: Driving is a cakewalk, so why not send a few texts while we're behind the wheel?

One way to change attitudes is to mandate more rigorous training and increase the skill level required to get a license. For one thing, if it's harder to get a license, then naturally it would be more valued. And most important, car accidents are the leading cause of teen mortality. If we're not teaching kids to take cars seriously, then they're not going to get the message that cars can be extremely dangerous.

It can be done—look at what's happening in other countries. In Finland, for example, new drivers take 20 hours of classroom instruction on vehicle dynamics and then another 30 hours of behind-the-wheel training. Some would argue that the cost of that training is prohibitive (about $2500). But just think of how much we spend on the safety features—such as airbags, antilock brakes, stability-control systems—that are now required in every car.

I'm not suggesting that those features be removed. I am saying that we rely on cars to do too much for us. This morning I heard a caller on a talk show say that the solution to distracted driving is new safety systems that warn of accidents and even automatically stop the car if necessary. Engineers are already working on those kinds of systems, and no doubt they'll be useful. But they're Band-Aids. Shouldn't the responsibility for avoiding trouble ultimately rest with the driver?

Forbidding drivers from using portable electronics won't get at the root problem here. Better training wouldn't end distracted driving, but it would do far more to increase safety than a cellphone ban.

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