I drove some for a couple jobs I had and after experiencing enough idiots
cutting in front of me and hearing about truckers dying or ending up
seriously injured rather than running (literally) over a "4 wheeler" I
took
the attitude that if a driver was stupid enough to make it a him/her or me
situation it was going to be him/her.

Are you one of those truckers who will run up behind a "4 wheeler" and
sit there, tailgating, a foot or two off their bumper, knowing that
you don't have a prayer of stopping if traffic slows suddenly? Or one
of those who switches into the left passing lane going downhill,
knowing full well an uphill is just a few hundred feet ahead, and now
you'll just become a moving roadblock, running beside your brethren
trucker in the right lane, for the next 5 miles, unwilling to speed up
to get by and move back over? Or the trucker that pulls out into a
two lane road with traffic approching, knowing it will take you a mile
or two of struggling just to barely approach the speed limit, all the
while with traffic backing up behind you?

And then you wonder why people seemingly cut in front of you? It's
because of many trucker's bad driving behavior and general lack of
driving courtesy. Besides, if you guys were such great drivers, we
wouldn't have to shut down the interstate on a nearly weekly basis
because some dumb trucker has spilled his load on one of the off-
ramps... you know, the ones that are clearly marked with a sharp turn
sign and a low speed limit.

I believe that 18 wheelers should be limited to interstates only, and
have to off-load their cargo to smaller trucks within a mile or two of
the interstate. That would eliminate the severe damage they inflict
on the secondary roads, and the havoc they inflict on traffic. If
they spill their load, they personally pay for the cleanup. Cause an
accident, lose your commercial license *forever*.

I do appreciate them hauling our cargo. Just don't act like an
asshole and try to kill us while doing it!

--------
Never ran anyone off the road, didn't tailgate and would have loved not
having to get off the major highways and having to travel through city
streets......
I wasn't getting paid by the mile. Those drivers have to cram as many miles
as they can into the allowed 10 hours per day in order to make a living.
Some run 2 logs and run much longer and sometimes those will fall asleep.
For me at both jobs, driving was a secondary duty and I got my regular wage
while performing this.
It would be interesting to see how many tractor/ trailer accidents don't
involve other drivers or other outside influences. Not very many drivers
would ever just crash and spill thier load unless they just decide to end it
all one day. It's harder to lose a CDL than it is to lose a job if an
accident is the drivers fault. Employers screen drivers records, so unsafe
drivers eventually can't get jobs at all. For the number of trucks there are
on the road, there are VERY few accidents.
I had a good friend get killed by a tractor/ trailer driver. He was stopped
at a red light on his Harley and the trucker ran him over. This doesn't mean
all drivers are bad any more than one bad example from any group sets the
standard for the entire group.