About a month late, but my personal rant; people don't seem to realize that the 'passing' lane does not equate to the 'speeding' lane.
What qualifies as 'passing' anyways? We're always 'passing' someone. Even if you always go the speed limit, you'll ALWAYS pass someone on the highway. So, essentially, always stay left...I think that's a hell of a lot safer than constantly changing lanes.
Left lane for passing, but if the speed limit is 70, and the center lane is full of people going 60 that I'm passing every 15-20 seconds or so, I'm not going to keep changing lanes back and forth. That many lane changes is just asking for trouble. I'll move back over when I'm done passing everyone, not just individual people.
And the guy who thinks that 'passing' lane means that he gets to go 30 over and tail me and flash his brights at me because I'M not going 30 over or squeezing back over to the right in between passes can just **** off.
The speed limit is the speed limit. The 'passing' lane does not mean that you get to be an *******. It only means that you get to go around people going UNDER the speed limit.
Statistically, most accidents happen due to lane changes. You either clip the guy next to you, or fail to accelerate/brake appropriately for the lane you just changed into. Get in the lane you'll eventually need, then camp there. Change lanes if the guy in front of you drops below the speed limit, and that's it.