Celebrate freedom with responsibility

Today is the day Americans celebrate their nation's freedom, with everything from barbecues to parades to fireworks.

The holiday also will include lots of drinking. And even with high gas prices, officials expect this to be one of the busiest travel weekends of the entire year as consumers celebrate the booming economy.

Mixing the two can be disastrous. As a result, the Governor's Office of Highway Safety is making it clear that celebrations of freedom that include the freedom to overindulge had better not put impaired drivers behind the wheel -- or cops are ready to put them behind bars.

The summer HEAT program --- Highway Enforcement of Aggressive Traffic -- is being supported by the Georgia Sheriff's Association, the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police and the Georgia State Patrol. Robert F. Dallas, director of the Governor's Office of Highway Safety, says all available patrols will be conducting a July 4 "zero tolerance" anti-DUI mobilization throughout the holiday weekend.

These agencies mean business -- and if you get caught driving drunk it could mean an immediate, if temporary, end to your freedom. Even that isn't as bad as the possibility of permanently ending someone else's life, or your own, with a traffic fatality.

Celebrate freedom on this most American of holiday weekends. But please do so responsibly.