As a long-time reader and subscriber to Consumer Reports, I expect the utmost integrity from the magazine in terms of how they conduct their tests and communicate the results. That is what makes today’s news so surprising, and so interesting. They are facing their Tylenol moment. How will they handle it? Fisking their corporate statement,
CONSUMER REPORTS WITHDRAWS INFANT CAR SEAT REPORT
Move is made pending additional testing now underway
(is the fact that the testing is “now underway” supposed to make us feel better?)NEW YORK (Jan. 18) — Consumer Reports is withdrawing its recent report on infant car seats pending further tests of the performance of those seats in side-impact collisions.
A new report will be published with any necessary revisions as soon as possible after the new tests are complete.
We withdrew the report immediately upon discovering a substantive issue that may have affected the original test results. (If it was a substantive issue, it DID affect the results, why use weasel words like “may”?) The issue came to light based on new information received Tuesday night and Wednesday morning from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) concerning the speed at which our side-impact tests were conducted. (We didn’t check before publishing)
The original study, published in the February issue of Consumer Reports, was aimed at discovering how infant seats performed in tests at speeds that match those used in the governmentâ??s New Car Assessment Program (NCAP). This program tests most new vehicles in crashes at speeds of 35 mph for frontal impact and 38 mph for side impact. Child safety seats, in contrast, are currently tested only in front-impact crashes at speeds of 30 mph.
Our tests were intended (It’s not our fault, its the NHTSA’s) to simulate side crashes at the NCAP speed of 38 mph. The new information raises a question (confirms) about whether the tests accurately simulated that speed, however, so we are now reviewing our tests and the resulting article. (…we never should have published in the first place)
To those who may have seen the report earlier in print, on the Web, or in broadcasts, we urge you to remember that use of any child seat is safer than no child seat, but to suspend judgment on the merits of individual products until the new testing has been completed and the report re-published. (How about an apology for not confirming that the testing was done as requested. How about a “sorry” to your loyal subscribers who fund the magazine for publishing a major spread that had to be rescinded within weeks. How about a little humility?)
We appreciate that manufacturers and particularly NHTSA are engaging directly with us on this article, and we applaud NHTSA for giving serious consideration to development of side-impact child seat tests. Consumer Reports has long advocated adoption of such tests, since government data shows that side crashes account for a significant number of child fatalities.(…and we deeply regret the error.)We look forward to re-issuing guidance on child-seat safety as soon as possible.(..and we reaffirm our commitment to be the highest standards of impartial and trustworthy product testing.)
A little too much arrogance and not enough contrition in that statement. Back on October 11, 1982, the Washington Post had this to say about Johnson & Johnson’s handling of the Tylenol scare,
..what Johnson & Johnson executives have done is communicate the message that the company is candid, contrite, and compassionate, committed to solving the murders and protecting the public.
J&J’s crisis management is THE case study to this day. Consumer Reports response is not in the same league and that is disappointing.
Liberals are always talking about the importance of dissent, dipolomacy, discussion, debate, yadah, yadhah, yadah…
This penchant for “open debate” I guess does not apply to liberals such as Jimmy Carter who write books with numerous distortions of fact, outright lies, and non-footnoted sources (i.e. plagerized material) and refuses to debate Alan Dershowitz. And the “Dersh” as we fondly refer to him as here at Pundit Review is no right wing conservative.
And neither evidently does this propensity for open discourse apply to Al Gore, author of “An Inconvenient Truth” about how human induced carbon emmisions are causing “global warming.” Like Carter, Gore refuses to defend the claims he makes in his book with noted environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg, who like the “Dersh” is also not some sort of right-wing corporate shill. According to Mr. Lomborg who was supposed to debate Gore about the claims in Gore’s book:
The interview had been scheduled for months. Mr. Gore’s agent yesterday thought Gore-meets-Lomborg would be great. Yet an hour later, he came back to tell us that Bjorn Lomborg should be excluded from the interview because he’s been very critical of Mr. Gore’s message about global warming and has questioned Mr. Gore’s evenhandedness. According to the agent, Mr. Gore only wanted to have questions about his book and documentary, and only asked by a reporter. These conditions were immediately accepted by Jyllands-Posten. Yet an hour later we received an email from the agent saying that the interview was now cancelled. What happened?
Perhpas what is really inconvenient is that Al may have a little trouble rebutting the evidence Mr. Lomborg cites:
Clearly we need to ask hard questions. Is Mr. Gore’s world a worthwhile sacrifice? But it seems that critical questions are out of the question. It would have been great to ask him why he only talks about a sea-level rise of 20 feet. In his movie he shows scary sequences of 20-feet flooding Florida, San Francisco, New York, Holland, Calcutta, Beijing and Shanghai. But were realistic levels not dramatic enough? The U.N. climate panel expects only a foot of sea-level rise over this century. Moreover, sea levels actually climbed that much over the past 150 years. Does Mr. Gore find it balanced to exaggerate the best scientific knowledge available by a factor of 20?
Mr. Gore says that global warming will increase malaria and highlights Nairobi as his key case. According to him, Nairobi was founded right where it was too cold for malaria to occur. However, with global warming advancing, he tells us that malaria is now appearing in the city. Yet this is quite contrary to the World Health Organization’s finding. Today Nairobi is considered free of malaria, but in the 1920s and ’30s, when temperatures were lower than today, malaria epidemics occurred regularly. Mr. Gore’s is a convenient story, but isn’t it against the facts?
The fact that Al Gore has gone to great lengths not to debate the absurd claims from his book says it all. The guy is an eco-hysteric who has acted irresponsibly in my opinion by making apocolyptic claims of global environmental destruction to advance his far left agenda mainly consisting of imposing a global emissions tax and more onerous regulations on U.S. companies.
Lefties like Carter and Gore, I am sure, liked it much more when there was no alternative media to expose their distortions and lies. Too bad for you guys.
Like Massachusetts, New York and California continue to lose citizens tired of the high cost of living, high taxes, and regulations who choose to move to other more family friendly and business frindly states.
Via today’s Wall St. Journal:
New York, which finished second, has no such act-of-God excuse. It lost more than 225,000, or a rate of 11.69 per 1,000 from 2005 to 2006, and more than 1.2 million New Yorkers have moved out since 2000. California lost the most people (287,000) of any state from 2005 to 2006, but because it is the most populous state its out-migration rate was a merely dreadful 7.92. Without immigrants who have made up some of the difference, both states, and especially New York, would have declining overall populations and thus shrinking tax bases.
One of the major reasons that people in my old home state of California are leaving in record numbers are things like Governor Schwartzenegger’s universal coverage healthcare plan just introduced.
Last November, Gov. Schwarzenegger won landslide re-election in part by winning 91% of Republicans with an ironclad pledge not to raise taxes. He pounded Phil Angelides, his Democratic opponent, for wanting to raise taxes by $7 billion to pay for universal health care. But now the estimated cost of the Schwarzenegger plan to cover California’s uninsured, including two million illegal aliens, is $12 billion. State subsidies for people to buy insurance will extend to those earning up to $50,000 a year, more than California’s median income. “He’s creating a welfare state where more than half the people are in the wagon being pulled than outside the wagon pulling,” says one health-care analyst.
As bad as the policy implications are, the governor’s plan may be fatally flawed, politically. He insists it doesn’t raise taxes, despite billions in new charges on doctors, hospitals and employers. He prefers to call the new revenue “in-lieu fees” and “coverage dividends.” “He excoriated Phil Angelides, rightly, for proposing the same tax increases he has put on the table,” says GOP state Sen. Tom McClintock. “He is now pushing the second largest tax increase in California history. I won’t be able to trust anything he says.”
rest of story here.
If this plan goes forward (and the federal courts may strike it down as they have the “Wal Mart Law”) the unions and 2 million illegals getting tax payer funded healthcare will be happy. But it means that more of California’s most productive citizens will be moving out. And that does not bode well for California just like Governor Romney’s similar health care plan won’t for businesses and the taxpayers of the Commonwealth.
What is the common denominator in Mass, NY, and California? Wimpy liberal governors who call themselves Republicans who are all fundamentally liberals. I think there is a name for this type of individual. RINO.
Fresh off the Iraq Study Group report, James Baker has released another. This one the result of his work on a “blue ribbon commission” investigating oil giant BP.
Panel Sees BP Safety Shortfalls
A blue ribbon panelcriticized safety arrangements at BP giving the huge oil company its latest bruising.
The panel, led by former Secretary of State James Baker, identified material deficiencies in process safety performance at the London-based company’s U.S. refineries. The panel was set up after a March 2005 blast at a BP refinery in Texas City, Texas, killed 15 workers. BP has since accepted responsibility for the incident and set aside $1.6 billion for victim compensation.
“Significant process-safety culture issues exist at each refinery, not just the Texas City facility,” said the panel.
BP said it would adopt the panel’s recommendations, which include the appointment of an independent monitor reporting to the board for five years.
The news comes just days after the company’s longtime CEO, Lord Browne, agreed to accelerate his planned retirement. BP has also been hit by last August’s news of a big Alaska pipeline leak.
Hat Tip Little Green Footballs.
Must see
Why can’t our “mainstream media” report some of this stuff among the Bush/GOP hit pieces?
Former Green Beret, embedded citizen journalist and our friend Michael Yon joined us live from Mosul Iraq on Pundit Review Radio this weekend.
This is the second half of the interview,
What is Pundit Review Radio?
Pundit Review Radio is where the old media meets the new. Each week Kevin and Gregg give voice to the work of the most influential leaders in the new media/citizen journalist revolution. Hailed as â??Groundbreakingâ? by Talkers Magazine, this unique show brings the best of the blogs to your radio every Sunday evening from 7-10pm EST on AM680 WRKO, Bostonâ??s Talk Leader.
Like all of our interviews, this is also available for download at iTunes.
Welcome Instapundit readers. If you want to take a look around, we bring the best of the blogs to Boston’s Talk Station WRKO every Sunday evening from 7-10pm est. You will find the radio archives here, the blog is here and more about us here.
Former Green Beret, embedded citizen journalist and our friend Michael Yon joined us live from Mosul Iraq on Pundit Review Radio this weekend.
Michael had a surprisingly upbeat assessment of what's he's seen in the three weeks since he returned to Iraq as an embed. This was a much different view than what he shared with us last spring when he gave us a rather grim assessment. Michael discussed the improvement in the spirit and capabilities of the Iraqi security forces. He talked about the stark difference between the high spirits of the military men and women in Iraq with those who they are serving back at home. It is nothing short of amazing. He also laid to rest on of the most bothersome, dangerous myths of this war, that the people of Iraq "aren't doing enough". Finally, he told us about the type of man Gen. Petraeus is and we discussed the so-called surge plan.
Bottom line from a guy known for telling us the good, the bad and the ugly, Iraq is very winnable.
Correction: I have edited this to remove the box that infers quote from Michael. That was in my notes, right next to “Iraq can make it.” After re-listening to the interview, he only said the latter. I regret the error.
Michael relies solely on the contributions of his readers to funds his embed trips. The costs are staggering, and so are the risks. If you find his reporting to be a breath of fresh air, unfiltered and free of MSM and political bias, and you can afford to do so, please support his work by hitting the Support The Next Dispatch button on his website.
To listen to the second half of the interview with Michael, click here.
If you appreciate this kind of independent, trustworthy reporting from the world’s hot spots, you can support Michael via Pay Pal at his website or by sending a check to,
Michael Yon
PO Box 5553
Winter Haven, FL 33880
What is Pundit Review Radio?
Pundit Review Radio is where the old media meets the new. Each week Kevin and Gregg give voice to the work of the most influential leaders in the new media/citizen journalist revolution. Hailed as “Groundbreaking” by Talkers Magazine, this unique show brings the best of the blogs to your radio every Sunday evening from 7-10pm EST on AM680 WRKO, Boston’s Talk Leader.
Like all of our interviews, this is available for download at iTunes,Podcast Ready or WRKO.