Ride to Vote, vote to ride

The image is stolen for the Ride To Work.org folks, but the sentiment is the same: If you ride, you need to vote to ride.

The AMA is touting  "Vote Like a Motorcyclist"  with T-shirts, pins and posters to go along with its new 2010 AMA Voter Guide.

"The elections on Nov. 2 are some of the most important in many years for the future of motorcycling," said Ed Moreland, AMA senior vice president for government relations. "It's critical for motorcyclists to get out and vote to help protect their right to ride."

He's got that right. Under pressure from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety to require ABS braking systems on all bikes sold in the U.S., the National Highway and Transportation and Safety Administration is advertising a proposed study to determine the attitudes of riders toward rider safety. Specifically, the study will study whether motorcycle training changes those attitudes.

The IIHS noted in dicta in its message to NHTSA last spring that it does not believe that training actually decreases crashes, one reason why the institute wants ABS.

NHTSA also has funded motorcycle-specific law enforcement programs, much like DUI checkpoints, that single out riders for insurance checks, safety checks, make sure papers are in order and other Nazi-movie-from-the-1940s requirements (Vee moost zee your papers!)

That's why the AMA is gearing up to get out the vote with the member's Voter Guide -- the first national voter guide of its kind for the motorcycling community. It features a fuel-gauge rating for every federal and gubernatorial candidate of the major political parties who returned an AMA questionnaire. The rating shows how closely the candidates' answers align with AMA positions.

Unfortunately, the guide is available only to AMA members.

However, you can advertise your voting preference with a "Vote Like A Motorcyclist" T-shirts for $21.95. Posters range in price from $11.20 to $22.45, depending on size, and pins are $2.20 at http://www.zazzle.com/americanmotorcyclist.