Donald Trump doesn't want to Drive 55 – but Hillary does.

Well, she wants us to drive 55.

The Dear Leader's armored limo, of course, is not subject to any speed limits. They are for the Little People (that's us) only.

And if Hillary becomes Dear Leader, we may be driving 55 again.

Here she goes: "The 55-mile speed limit really does lower gas usage. And wherever it can be required, and the people will accept it, we ought to do it." She uttered this ten years ago almost to the day – May 24th, 2006 – at the National Press Club in Washington, DC (see here.)

You have glimpsed the Heart of Darkness.

But – to paraphrase Tonto's quip to the Lone Ranger – What do you mean we, white man? Er… woman. Sort of.

She really means her telling us how fast we'll be allowed to drive.

Which is not very.

To "save gas."

Except, of course, that we'll be fined for "speeding" and our perfectly reasonable driving characterized  as "unsafe" rather than merely fuel-inefficient. Our driving records will be marred with demerit points and these will be used to justify sticking it to us again (so much for double jeopardy) via jacked-up car insurance premiums.

This is how it was for some 20 years, from 1974 to 1995 – when the maximum legal speed in the United States was 55 MPH.

Those who lived through this evil epoch will recall the misery – and the idiocy. Imagine what it was like to drive 20 MPH below the current routine average lawful speed on most highways. Twenty miles per hour below the speed that had been lawful prior to the passage of this fuel economy fatwa (that was enforced as a "safety" issue).

Not only was it miserable (per Sammy Hagar, what used to take two hours now takes all day) and stupid and – yes – wasteful (of time at least and also of gas, bear with me for a moment) it was also corrupting beyond calculation. While there always has been a certain degree of "revenue collection" inherent in speed enforcement, the Double Nickel was about little else.

Motorists were dunned for operating at speeds that had been lawful previously – on highways specifically designed for higher speeds decades prior (back in the '50s). Cops charged with enforcing the new fatwa knew perfectly well it was absurd – but this did not prevent them from enforcing it. We knew it was a farce, but that did not help our mood much when we got pulled over for "speeding" and had to play patty-cake with the cop.

If cops are (rightly) despised today as little more than roving tax collectors, the passage of the National Maximum Speed Limit (as Drive 55 was officially known) was arguably the source waters of that contempt. Millions of dollars in outright legal rape was countenanced.

And even though the NMSL was finally repealed in the mid-'90s (the one solid done by Republicans in my lifetime) no refunds were issued… and the canker persists.