NHTSA Authority, NHTSA Nominee, AZ Attorney General Sues GM, A Safer Future?


NHTSA Authority, NHTSA Nominee, AZ Attorney General Sues GM, A Safer Future?

November, 2014

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

Busy times in the difficult struggle for good over evil.

NHTSA Authority

NY Times editorial notes “Three Bills to Curb Corporate Wrongdoing”:“When it was learned this year that General Motors had long failed to notify regulators and the public about fatal ignition-switch defects, theoutrage in Congress was bipartisan. Recent reports in The New York Times that the Japanese manufacturer Takata hid deadly airbag defects are also sure to inspire rebukes from members of both parties. Takata has rebutted the reports, but lawmakers have appropriately scheduled a hearing for Thursday and called for a criminal inquiry by the Justice Department.…new laws are needed to deter corporations from covering up safety defects and punish those individuals and companies that do. Three bills introduced by Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut and a former state attorney general, would cover many of the prominent issues.”  See http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/20/opinion/three-bills-to-curb-corporate-wrongdoing.html?emc=edit_tnt_20141119&nlid=37926955&tntemail0=y
NHTSA Nominee Mark R. Rosekind, Currently of NTSB
Reuters reports:

“According to the NTSB’s biography of Rosekind, he is “one of the world’s foremost human fatigue experts” and a founder of Alertness Solutions, a consulting firm that specializes in fatigue management.

Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, said he was surprised the nominee didn’t have a background in auto safety.

“Given the GM ignition switch and now Takata I would have expected someone with more of a hands-on experience in vehicle safety,” Ditlow said.

Senator John Thune, the top Republican on the committee that will consider the nomination, said he looked forward to hearing Rosekind’s “plans to address the rising number of motor vehicle safety recalls.”

See http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/19/usa-autos-nhtsa-idUSL2N0T931D20141119

AZ Attorney General Sues GM“The attorney general of Arizona said on Wednesday that the state had filed suit against General Motors, claiming that the automaker had defrauded the state’s consumers of an estimated $3 billion…. “In filing suit, Arizona has broken from a group of 48 state attorneys general that has been pursuing a multistate investigation into G.M. for its handling of the ignition-switch defect. The state had been on the executive committee of that multistate inquiry, led by South Carolina and Ohio.

“We’re proceeding with our own suit because it’s the best way to protect the citizens of Arizona,” Attorney General Thomas C. Horne, a Republican, said in an interview. “General Motors represented that it was taking care of the safety of its cars, and in fact there were serious defects that it did not disclose to the public for years.”  See

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/20/business/arizona-sues-gm-for-3-billion-over-recalls.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Who Will Win, What, Where, How, Why & When? Congressional Leaders Boehner and McConnell wrote about their Republican goals as reforming:

“• Excessive regulations and frivolous lawsuits that are driving up costs for families and preventing the economy from growing;

• An antiquated government bureaucracy ill-equipped to serve a citizenry facing 21st-century challenges, from disease control to caring for veterans;”  Seehttp://online.wsj.com/articles/john-boehner-and-mitch-mcconnell-now-we-can-get-congress-going-1415232759

For crash victims, past, present, and future, the answers may be found following the money.  About $4 billion was spent in the 2014 elections.
Let’s remember the lesson that “Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
The next two years appear to be a tipping point in the struggle for a Safer future.
Lou

 

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