An act of civil obedience

This is an interesting, and dangerous, exercise in demonstrating the absurdity of 55mph speed zones (video). This example takes place in Atlanta, but I routinely drove 75-85 on Chicago's highways which are also posted 55.

I always assumed the point in keeping speed limits absurdly low was to give cops an excuse to pull anyone over they wanted to, plus giving cops a good revenue source whenever funds were running low. I'm probably wrong on the details here, but more than around 10 over the speed limit is "reckless driving" which raises the fine to several hundred dollars, plus who know what other hassles.

To the Chicago cops' credit, they didn't seem to give a shit about speeders unless you were weaving lanes and generally being an ass. That doesn't mean the speed limit should be artificially low though.