I'm sure people do make a conscious decision to drive like arseholes, you don't tailgate, cut people up, by accident, you do it because there's a perception that you are in your own personal space, inside your car, and essentially you can do as you wish.
This perception is reinforced by sentencing outcomes. In this case the van driver chose to exist in his personal space, inside his van, while not paying attention to the road, rather than to pay attention to his responsibilities to the outside world, and this was reflected by the judge saying 'never mind, it was only an accident'.
In my experience perhaps even a majority of drivers drive selfishly, their cars dehumanize the world around them, they are protected by air bags, NCAP testing, cosseted by air conditioning and music, and they pay only the scantest regard to the law on things like speeding, traffic lights, right of way and so on.
Penal policy should send out a message that drivers are NOT special, and they must pay the consequences for their actions, but instead we are told 'it was only an accident', as if there was anything inevitable about driving over the edge of a carriageway on a straight road and killing someone.
Driving is the only thing most people do that creates an existential threat to others, but we are still so blasé about it.
Personally I would fit black boxes to every car and record and collect the data and ban people automatically. It beggars belief that in our modern, risk-free world, people are still permitted to drive the way they do, at double the speed limit on residential roads, and as if they were competing at the Monaco Grand Prix, not dropping the kids off at school then going out to pick up some groceries.
I don't see that there is any 'right' to drive. Driving is by far the most dangerous thing people do, and laws should be properly monitored and enforced using modern technology, and ignore any bleating about civil rights. I'm all in favour of people asserting their right to free speech, to walk down the street, but no kind of right should involve propelling a 3-tonne lump of metal that will kill anything it hits while largely preserving those inside it.