The National Motorists Association is happy, because …

Thanks to the efforts of many citizens and public officials, Wisconsin’s maximum speed limit will soon be raised to 70 mph. The new limit will apply to select stretches of interstate highways and freeways throughout the state.

The NMA has supported the increase ever since Manitowoc Assemblyman Paul Tittl took up the fight for higher speed limits two years ago. Rep. Tittl’s initial bill failed to clear the Senate Transportation Committee in 2013. But Rep. Tittl did not give up and proposed a simplified bill this year while redoubling his efforts to garner support. NMA representatives also testified in favor of higher speed limits at four public hearings over the last two legislative terms.

The speed limit increase in Wisconsin is long overdue. All of our neighboring states went to 70 mph years ago, and Wisconsin and Oregon are the only states west of New York with 65 mph maximum speed limits.

But that will change tomorrow when Gov. Walker signs the new speed limit into law.

This was emailed yesterday, which means “tomorrow” is today, although it’s more like as soon as the 70 mph signs go up along Interstates and elsewhere. I guarantee you that Gov. James Doyle or wannabee governors Tom Barrett or Mary Burke would have never signed a speed-limit increase into law.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t apply to all four-lane highways. U.S. 151 from the Wisconsin-Iowa state line to Fond du Lac won’t go to 70 because of the at-grade intersections, the result of farm machinery traveling the same highways as those trying to get, or deliver, from one place to another.

I also think 70 mph is too slow, though 70 is better than 65, and 65 is better than the stupid 55-mph speed limit on non-four-lane highways. (The 55-mph national speed limit should have gotten Richard Nixon impeached before Watergate.)

I support higher speed limits because speed limits usually are set too low under traffic engineers’ 85th-percentile rule, the speed at which 85 percent of traffic on a highway travels. They are also set too low as the result of certain politicians’ desire for more money, whether by hook (taxes) or crook (fees, fines, etc.). Speed limits are analogous to ticketing a driver for blood alcohol concentration higher than legal levels instead of ticketing a driver for drunk driving based on his wandering all over the road and being a danger to other drivers.

There is, you see, only one truly, provably nonrenewable resource: time.