Yup, it's a matter of changing the paradigm to *return* the nation to a once-American value of taking personal responsibility for our mistakes, accepting the consequences and/or making restitution.

Punishment and legalistic retaliatory actions are ineffective deterrents and do absolutely nothing to compensate victims of negligence. Consequences should solve a problem, not merely inflict pain on the perpetrator. A reasonable consequence for striking a pedestrian or cyclist would be, at a minimum, a refresher course in driver safety, regardless of who was at fault. In many cases a passive-aggressive attitude contributes to collisions even when no legally sufficient fault can be attributed -- something as simple as stubbornly refusing to lift pressure off the accelerator, pushing the incident beyond the gray zone where it could have been avoided or minimized and into the red zone of inevitable collision.

Over the decades, personal transportation in America has emphasized individual freedom over personal responsibility. We want our cake, the other guy's cake, and we don't want to pay for it. We don't even want to be reminded that we stole the other guy's cake, because it might hinder our enjoyment of stolen cake.

Until the paradigm returns to emphasizing personal responsibility commensurate with personal liberty, we need ghost bikes and traffic death memorials to remind us of how we've fallen short of our stated, but seldom fulfilled, ideals.