[waterlesscloud]

In the interest of saving visitors to the US some trouble, be assured that the police here take it quite seriously.

Whatever you see on TV or even however you see people behave, if the police pull you over, you will definitely suffer serious consequences. There will not be any tolerance.

People do it, yes, because they think they'll get away with it. But if they don't there's hefty fines and/or jail time awaiting them.

That's aside from the risk of crashing, which should be enough for anyone.

[underwater]

I've lived in Australia, UK and now California. Drink driving is much more accepted here. In Australia I regularly encountered random breath tests (police stopping and breath testing dozens of drivers at a time) and have been pulled over by a police car purely so I could be breathalised (I was completely sober).

I feel it's much more commonplace and acceptable in the US to drive alone to a bar, drink, and then drive home. Cities are much smaller in Australia and the UK so catching a taxi, public transport or walking is feasible.

[tptacek]

We have a pesky 4th Amendment in our Constitution that broadly (but not completely) prevents the police from pulling over cars without cause.

So, it is true that if you're a "steady" drunk driver, you're perhaps more likely to get away with driving drunk here than in Oz.

If you get pulled over though, you're likely to be arrested. Getting arrested in the US (as opposed to getting cited) is very unpleasant.

[waterlesscloud]

Cause is pretty easy to come by, though. Speeding is the most likely, but there's also the old standby of "weaving".

I worked in a bar for a few years, which oddly enough involved driving home at the well-known bar closing time for the city. And that late at night I pretty much ignored speed limits. I got pulled over quite a lot, and every time as soon as they realized I wasn't drinking, they let me go with no penalty. They were quite obviously trolling for DUIs.

[tptacek]

Good for them, I say. At any rate, obviously, if you're speeding (which I, too, do all the time) it's tough to complain about being pulled over.

[Natsu]

I often drive home from work very late at night and I've been pulled over and followed for doing absolutely nothing wrong. I think one said my license plate was dirty. They let me go and told me to have a nice night when it was clear that I wasn't doing anything wrong, though.

[tptacek]

The point is, the police are (usually) required to have cause to stop motor vehicle drivers, and if they arrest you for DUI after stopping you for no reason, you have grounds to challenge the arrest.

Obviously, "grounds to challenge" is no guarantee that you'll be acquitted or have charges dismissed, and obviously the police can and do manufacture reasons to pull drivers over, but the requirement to have cause creates a disincentive to do that routinely.

Which, my point was, was one reason one might experience stricter detection of DUI's in another country.