Speaker line-up via Rick Woldenberg; opening statements by Reps. Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.) and Fred Upton (R-Mich.); ABC News coverage; Republicans reportedly preparing legislation that would amend, but not repeal, the ill-conceived statute; a move to strip funding for the controversial product database.
A separate piece of legislation may address the law’s devastating effects on the sale of youth motorcycles, snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles:
“The original legislation Congress passed was meant to keep kids safe from lead content in toys,” said Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT), who comes from a state where smaller recreational vehicles are popular. “Ironically, the overreaching enforcement wound up putting kids at risk by forcing them to use larger more dangerous machines that are intended only for adults.”
Rehberg’s “Kids Just Want to Ride” Act, which he introduced last month, has 41 co-sponsors, including seven Democrats. A similar bill in the last Congress garnered 70 co-sponsors, including 24 Democrats.
2 Comments
It is unfortunate that Rep. Denny Rehberg misses the forest for the trees. Banning the smaller motorcycles would increase harm to those children who then choose to ride an inappropriate adult machine. In this regard, Rep. Rehberg is right. But he is terribly wrong in implying that CPSIA protects anybody from anything. The risks from substantial lead levels are vastly overstated, like equating the cancer risks from feeding pounds of chemicals to laboratory rats to the risk posed by the parts per billions exposure from normal foodstuff. The obsession with lead by James August and moronic pediatricians is madness.
The inability of people, even well educated people, to understand magnitude of risks is the problem with CPSIA, the closing of the Shoreham nuclear power plant, and the treasonous closing of Yucca Mountain.
Thanks for continuing to follow the CPSIA.
Do you know what the situation is with bicycles? I got the impression that the motorcycle industry canned their kids’ products due to CPSIA, but the the bicycle industry just decided to ignore it. I thought there were CPSIA-banned levels of lead in alloys used in things like inner tube valves, and possibly other components.