I just saw a semi being pulled from a ditch

No, it is both a protection AND a limitation. I can't run to town and deliver my backhaul, find that my reload will not be ready for 9 hours, go back to the house for 8 hours and roll back to grab the load when it is ready because by the time I fix the straps & tarps to make it road-worthy and get it home in order to roll out in the morning with it, I'll be beyond the 14 hour limit...even though I'd only actually worked for 6-7 hours. Wait those 2 extra hours to get a 10 hour break in so that I can "legally" go grab that load, and now I'll be 2 hours later running the next day, potentially having to bounce home because the place I'd reload at was closed...or take a full day off delaying the shipment by a full day in order to run "legal" and according to a schedule that maximizes my profits for the run.

I don't work too hard...hell, 40-50 hours per week is about all I'm willing to put in anymore. A little flexibility (such as was the case with the old 15 hour rule) would be nice on the days I DO work instead of a strict 14 hour clock, simply because I actually have a life OUTSIDE of the truck, and would like the flexibility to take care of things I want or need to take care of while I'm in the area anyway that a strict 14 hour clock might otherwise prevent...like having dinner with my wife on her lunch break, feeding the horses that are boarded across the river, or even helping bring in the hay from the fields on my way home...instead of going home and wasting time and gas driving back to where I just was and/or missing the opportunity to do what I want for fear of violating that 14 hour clock.

I never falsified my log to benefit the company. They don't pay me enough to do that. However, if it allows me to spend extra time with my wife, kid, or the horses, I had no issue with shaving time here or there to "make it work"...usually the "illegal" move to get the truck home from whatever I was doing is less than 30 miles.

I realize my situation might seem foreign to a lot of the mindless Elog drones who live to truck and truck to live, only seeing "home" 1 or 2 days per month. I sleep at home more than you sleep in your truck, and anything that gets in the way of that is a problem for me. Yes, the HOS prevent the company from forcing you to run 100 hours per week or 20 hours per day. NOBODY is advocating that those protections cease to exist. The regs already prohibit driving while ill or fatigued...which is the entire basis for the HOS. There really ought to be more flexibility in the HOS to allow the driver to "drive when awake & alert, and rest when tired" instead of this one-size-fits-all BS they have now. Not everyone is the same. Some people operate just fine on 4-6 hrs of sleep per night and couldn't sleep more if they tried, and sitting around for another 4-6 hours after they wake up means they are that much closer to fatigue setting in before they even start their day. Other people are utterly useless if they haven't had 8-10 hours of sleep, and for them the rules have NEVER prohibited them from taking that time. Even an idividual will have days where they are alert and more than capable to safely work an extended day, and other days that same individual would be unsafe after only a few hours. The HOS needs to have the flexibility to adapt to the individual needs of those governed by it while at the same time protecting the weak from being "pushed" to drive while fatigued. If you can't stand up for yourself when you're feeling fatigued without using the HOS as a crutch, then you are weak. If you don't understand that people are not robots capable of performing a specified way day after day with no variations, then you are delusional.