It will come as no surprise to alert readers of the local dailies that the two could attend the same event – yesterday’s Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over – and emerge with radically different angles on the drugged driving initiative. For the Boston Globe, the story is prevention; for the Boston Herald, it’s enforcement. Who woulda thunk?
Start with the State Street Sobriety Squad, for whom Dan Adams filed this report.
Mass. rolls out new ad warning of danger of driving stoned
With the debut of recreational marijuana sales imminent, Massachusetts safety officials on Wednesday unveiled a new television ad warning consumers against driving under the drug’s influence.
The 30-second spot, dubbed “The Roads You Take,” is meant to discourage driving while stoned, drunk, or impaired by other drugs.
It features a diverse group of people walking toward the camera and solemnly intoning fragmentary phrases: “There are roads — the ones you take, the ones you don’t. There are laws. There are rules. And there’s you — you driving; you drunk driving; you driving high; you stoned and driving; you spinning, crashing; you arrested; you killing,” before concluding, “there are roads, and then there are just dead ends.”
Here’s the TV spot in the $280,000 ad buy.
Meanwhile, crosstown on Fargo Street Mary Markos filed this (police) report.
STATIES SWAB VS. STONERS
Authorities seek Breathalyzer equivalent for pot
State police — expecting a surge in drugged driving now that pot is legal, and looking for a way to prove a driver is high — are finalizing a test of swabs they administered
on about 170 people at roadside sobriety checks and a drug treatment center.
The Massachusetts State Police assessment is part of a nationwide effort by police to deal with the lack of chemical tests for drug intoxication comparable to Breathalyzers that are used to measure drunkenness. Legal experts say any chemical test is likely to face challenges in court.
They’re both good, informative pieces that reflect the beauty of a two-paper town: The safely local broadsheet vs. the tokey local tabloid.
Read ’em and beep.
Posted by Campaign Outsider 
It's Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town 