California Wants to Make You Get an EBike License

We used to go mushroom picking in Oregon as a family, three generations of us. I remember the first time I heard you now needed a license. It was appalling but I at least understood it in that context. Sometimes I think or imagine how things were 25, 50 or 100 years ago... We've built quite the world for ourselves, full petty red tape and bureaucrats with little to show for it.

Where I live, e-bikes have been using crosswalks instead of obeying right of way. I think most these people are new riders who are paranoid and seem to have no basic understanding of the true capabilities of their chosen mode of transport (namely acceleration), judging by their behavior around cars. This single behavior becoming normal in my area has led to a strange reaction from drivers, where they now habitually give up their right of way on busy thoroughfares ostensibly to allow both electric and acoustic bikes to cross the busy road, even if those bikes are waiting behind a stop sign while the driver has none. The problem is the drivers are completely unaware of the traffic they cause on these thoroughfares when they force all the cars behind them to stop, which has been forcing more speeding cars onto side streets, making things more dangerous for pedestrians and cyclists alike.

There's no perfect but it would be nice if people were educated on the basic rules of the road. They are there to encourage smooth traffic flow.

If you're on wheels, you do not get to use the crosswalk. So much for "law-abiding".

You cannot have cashless bail for criminals. Bail is something you get before trial, and definitionally are not a criminal.

Cash bail does not do anything except force low income defendants into either jail or debt.

What exactly do you think cash bail does that cashless bail does not do? I mean except for the obvious ones of ensuring poor defendants lose money, their jobs, their housing, their children get placed into foster care/CPS, etc.

If your concern is safety, then why do you seem to prefer a world where someone accused of a violent crime can just pay some money and get out on bail, vs one in which a person accused of a violent crime does not have that option?

If your concern is government control of citizens, why do you prefer a world where rich defendants don't have to go to jail, but poor ones do, regardless of guilt?

But also how are we getting "more and more laws" but also "less laws"?

At least for me ebikes are a bit of a menace on the sidewalks. I think they are great and they are very popular for food delivery people but they end up breaking every traffic law out there swerving onto sidewalks and through pedestrians crossing the street. I have seen a handful of accidents.

Luckily the smaller weight and better maneuverability means that all of the accidents I have seen have been minor but I'm sure there are some good injuries from time to time (especially more at-risk people like the elderly).

Having a license that can accumulate points and be revoked for unsafe driving may be a good way to help promote good behaviour. Personally I think ebikes are great, they provide far more throughput than cars downtown and consume far less energy. But currently they are used very unsafely leading to stress and injuries for other people trying to walk the streets.