Overlawyered » NHTSA http://overlawyered.com Chronicling the high cost of our legal system Tue, 14 Feb 2012 11:28:52 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 March 21 roundup http://overlawyered.com/2011/03/march-21-roundup-3/ http://overlawyered.com/2011/03/march-21-roundup-3/#comments Mon, 21 Mar 2011 16:13:18 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=22112
  • “Cleveland Browns lawyer letter is apparently real” [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
  • “Headlines of the Apocalypse: ‘Lady Gaga eyes legal action over breast milk ice cream.’” [@vsalus re: Breitbart via @EdDriscoll]
  • Chesley discipline prospects in Kentucky fen-phen scandal: “King of Torts Dethroned” [Laura Simons, Abnormal Use]
  • Busy construction-defect lawyers vex Fresno builders [Bee, Business Journal]
  • “NHTSA Postpones Back-Up Camera Requirement Rule” [The Truth About Cars, earlier]
  • Lawyers in Italy call strike to protest law requiring mediation of commercial disputes [WSJ Law Blog]
  • NYT’s Mark Bittman has a magical touch with food (alas) [Patrick at Popehat]
  • Beasley Allen lawyers sluiced $850K to Alabama GOP judicial contender [Birmingham News via PoL]
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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2011/03/march-21-roundup-3/feed/ 0     Why Toyota stock rose after yesterday’s recall http://overlawyered.com/2011/02/why-toyota-stock-rose-after-yesterdays-recall/ http://overlawyered.com/2011/02/why-toyota-stock-rose-after-yesterdays-recall/#comments Fri, 25 Feb 2011 17:28:13 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=21700 I explain at Cato at Liberty.

    P.S. Also, welcome listeners from Richmond, Va.’s WRVA, which had me on to discuss these issues this morning. And a retrospective on the Toyota scare from The Truth About Cars’ Edward Niedermeyer.

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2011/02/why-toyota-stock-rose-after-yesterdays-recall/feed/ 0     “Toyota’s acceleration problem could be customer-based” http://overlawyered.com/2010/09/toyotas-acceleration-problem-could-be-customer-based/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/09/toyotas-acceleration-problem-could-be-customer-based/#comments Tue, 07 Sep 2010 19:56:07 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=19154 The Washington Post — unlike some other newspapers we might think of — doesn’t mind letting its editorial stance catch up with the facts on the ground as they appear to NHTSA staff. We’ve been on the story for quite a while.

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/09/toyotas-acceleration-problem-could-be-customer-based/feed/ 2     Charge: NHTSA sitting on pro-Toyota investigation results http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/charge-nhtsa-sitting-on-pro-toyota-investigation-results/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/charge-nhtsa-sitting-on-pro-toyota-investigation-results/#comments Sat, 31 Jul 2010 13:03:43 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=18691 A new report in the WSJ quotes a retiring NHTSA official as saying higher-ups are refusing to release the results of the agency’s staff investigation into charges of Toyota sudden acceleration, because those findings are not unfavorable enough toward the automaker. I’ve got more detail in a new post at Cato at Liberty, and Ted covers the story at PoL.

    Meanwhile, proponents of a sweeping expansion of federal auto safety law, one that would thrust Washington much more deeply into the operations of the automotive industry, are really in a hurry — a quick, urgent, must-do-now hurry — to pass it, even though many of its provisions have not had much airing in public debate. An editorial today in the New York Times — a newspaper that almost comically underplayed the revelations earlier this month about the NHTSA probe’s pro-Toyota results — flatly asserts that the Japanese automaker’s vehicles suffer “persistent problems of uncontrolled acceleration,” and demands that the sweeping new legislation “be passed into law without delay.” It’s almost as if they are afraid of what might happen if lawmakers pause to take a closer look.

    Among the many other things the new legislation would do is greatly enhance the legal leverage of automaker or dealership employees who adopt the mantle of “whistleblowers”. But if the new revelations from a responsible career employee of NHTSA are ignored, we will have another confirmation that some types of whistleblowing are more welcome in America’s governing class than others. (& welcome Coyote, Gabriel Malor, Death by 1000 Papercuts, Mark Hemingway/D.C. Examiner (”the indispensable Overlawyered blog”), Allen McDuffee/Think Tanked readers).

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/charge-nhtsa-sitting-on-pro-toyota-investigation-results/feed/ 8     NHTSA consumer complaint Hall of Fame http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/nhtsa-consumer-complaint-hall-of-fame/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/nhtsa-consumer-complaint-hall-of-fame/#comments Tue, 20 Jul 2010 20:04:02 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=18374 Courtesy Michael Fumento.

    P.S. More seriously, Fumento has a piece out in the new Forbes about how weaknesses in the NHTSA consumer database helped fuel the Toyota panic. He provides damning details about how press outlets like CBS News, the L.A. Times and U.S. News turned “a motley collection of anecdotes, many of them absurd” in which “anybody can enter anything” into assertions that Toyota acceleration has “caused” or “led to” 89 or more deaths. Read it here, with more at CEI.

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/07/nhtsa-consumer-complaint-hall-of-fame/feed/ 1     June 11 roundup http://overlawyered.com/2010/06/june-11-roundup-2/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/06/june-11-roundup-2/#comments Fri, 11 Jun 2010 11:11:47 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=17752
  • Automakers fight Bruce Braley/trial lawyer effort on Capitol Hill to overturn NHTSA preemption [Dow Jones, WSJ Law Blog, David Freddoso/Examiner, Carter Wood and more at PoL]
  • Twombly/Iqbal can curb sue-’em-all, sort-’em-out-later charges of civil conspiracy [Sachse/Drug & Device Law, earlier]
  • Claim: Obama, Kagan, Sotomayor typify “postradical” law school generation [David Fontana, Chronicle of Higher Ed via Wasserman/Prawfs (counter: "there are a lot of us liberal doctrinalists out here ...And students are learning that vision in law school"), Althouse ("Spare me! There are plenty of strongly liberal and lefty lawprofs and if you want theoretical ambition you can find it.")]
  • FTC report contemplates much wider federal intervention in media business [Jarvis/BuzzMachine, Tapscott/Examiner, Coyote, Steele/LEF, Stoll/Future of Capitalism, LA Times, ShopFloor, Jarvis/NY Post, Pethokoukis/Reuters, Suderman/Reason] Is scary McChesneyite “Free Press” making headway in administration? [Riggs, Daily Caller]
  • “Law and Society Boycott Resolution Gets Arizona Immigration Law Wrong” [Chin, Prawfs]
  • “Appeal of Crunch Berries Case Dismissed” [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
  • “Senior U.N. official” demanding end to U.S. use of drones against Al Qaeda in Afghanistan also happens to be NYU lawprof [NY Times, 16th/last paragraph of story]
  • Unintended consequences: 1932 cut in judges’ pensions changed Supreme Court history [Magliocca, ConcurOp]
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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/06/june-11-roundup-2/feed/ 1     U.S. News: Toyota death toll rises! http://overlawyered.com/2010/05/u-s-news-toyota-death-toll-rises/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/05/u-s-news-toyota-death-toll-rises/#comments Fri, 28 May 2010 12:38:22 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=17538 Except that even a cursory reading of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s news release should have kept the magazine from jumping to any such conclusion. Michael Fumento explains.

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/05/u-s-news-toyota-death-toll-rises/feed/ 0     NHTSA, Toyota and “speed control” http://overlawyered.com/2010/04/nhtsa-toyota-and-speed-control/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/04/nhtsa-toyota-and-speed-control/#comments Fri, 30 Apr 2010 14:55:19 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=17177 Michael Fumento warns that the federal government’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) “has no category for ’sudden acceleration,’ merely a ’speed control’ category.” The result is that many complaints of lack of acceleration can wind up getting counted and cited as if they supported the trial lawyers’ case.

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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/04/nhtsa-toyota-and-speed-control/feed/ 0     March 6 roundup http://overlawyered.com/2010/03/march-6-roundup-2/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/03/march-6-roundup-2/#comments Sat, 06 Mar 2010 14:52:36 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=16375
  • France: Scholar faces criminal libel charge over mildly negative book review [Steven Landsburg/The Big Questions; more, Citizen Media Law] U.K. atheist convicted of religious harassment for leaving cartoon leaflets in prayer room [Media Watch Watch and earlier via Secular Right]
  • Classic New Yorker writer of 1940s: “St. Clair McKelway on insurance, embezzlement, arson, and counterfeiting” [Freeland, North Mississippi Commentor]
  • Bulletin: In hiring new editors, New York Times will stop preferring those with scores of 89 over those who score 65. Oh wait;
  • “If I can drive a motorcycle, why can’t I drive a marginally more dangerous car concept? Because Detroit and its lobbyists have built it into the system, that’s why.” [reader at Andrew Sullivan]
  • “Jersey Shore Victim Wants DVDs Suppressed” [Above the Law]
  • Class action suit against Yelp.com alleges “extortion” [NY Times "Bits", TechCrunch]
  • “Some Employers Complain Law Barring Genetic Bias Hurts Wellness Efforts” [ABA Journal]
  • “The Criminalization of Almost Everything” [Harvey Silverglate and Tim Lynch, Cato Policy Report]
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    ]]>     http://overlawyered.com/2010/03/march-6-roundup-2/feed/ 6     February 18 roundup http://overlawyered.com/2010/02/february-18-roundup-2/ http://overlawyered.com/2010/02/february-18-roundup-2/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 05:08:29 +0000 Walter Olson http://overlawyered.com/?p=16144
  • Math curriculum wars in Seattle school district head for court [Seattle Times]
  • Stuart Taylor, Jr. reviews new Abigail Thernstrom book on the Voting Rights Act [New Republic]
  • Gail Wilensky: Dems could’ve gotten GOP votes for health care reform if they’d compromised on medical liability [The Hill]
  • Erin Brockovich swoops down on Florida cancer cluster [Fumento/CEI, more, also on Florida case]
  • Barry Goldwater was right: right-leaning bloggers favor lifting military gay ban by 62-37 margin in National Journal bloggers poll;
  • Jim Copland vs. Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter [Point of Law, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, more]
  • Why is there no iPod or iPhone equivalent for automobiles? Regulation might have something to do with it [Ryan Avent and more via Sullivan; McArdle and more (commenter: "Motorcycles would never, EVER be approved by NHTSA if they were invented today.")]
  • So reassuring: for now FTC says it’s “unlikely to actually investigate individual bloggers” [Lewis, NYLJ] More from late last year on commission’s semi-retreat on blogger freebies [Publisher's Weekly, GalleySmith, GalleyCat, Reason "Hit and Run", William S. Galkin] Icons to make disclosure easy [Louis Gray]
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