You're listening to There Auto Be A Law, the
Center for Auto Safety podcast with Executive
Director Michael Brooks, Chief Engineer Fred
Perkins, and hosted by me, Anthony Cimino. For
over 50 years, the Center for Auto Safety has
worked to make cars safer. Hey, listeners. Today
is Wednesday, April 15th, 2026. Pay your taxes.
Yeah, I guess. So doing this podcast, you get
to listen to your own voice and you're like,
oh, God. But no, it doesn't sound as good as
this podcast. RFK Jr. has a podcast. That brings
us about, doesn't it? Yeah, so I have an amazing
voice. But that's not what this show is about.
This show is about safety and auto and wonderful
things like that. I'd like to start off this
week with an opinion piece from the New York
Times. And no, this is not a nonsense opinion
piece, at least in my opinion. My opinion about
an opinion piece. No, this is one talking about
where did all the affordable cars go? Basically,
it talks about how the auto industry has shifted
from having in the late 70s, early 80s, these
account boxes, which sounds kind of derogatory,
but they were good cars. That got good fuel mileage
and were affordable for people. And they've switched
it over to, hey, you know what? We can sell less
cars, higher profit margins, and make them more
dangerous. And that's essentially been their
business model. And it talks about how there's
fewer and fewer cars available at the $20 ,000
price point. There's fuel available under $30
,000. The average vehicle is over $50 ,000 now,
which is insane. It's worth checking out this
article. The one thing that jumped out at me
that blew me away was it talks about the Honda
Civic that first hit the market in 1973, and
it had up to 54 miles per gallon. It got 54 miles
per gallon in 1973. That's what – how are we
going backwards? I mean, I get our current cafe
standards are ridiculous now, but it's – What
is it supposed to be right now? Is it even 30
miles a gallon? Average across the fleet, yes.
But, you know, that doesn't mean every vehicle,
obviously. Sure, it does. But like the I mean,
come on, the average from a vehicle from 1973,
if that vehicle is getting 54 miles per gallon,
it is 2026. Sure, we don't have a flying cars,
but there's no reason. I mean, before before
Cafe was completely dismantled. We were looking
at a average by 2031 of about 50 .4 miles per
gallon. Yeah, that's that's not happening anymore,
though. Well, at least, you know, under the Trump
administration, whether we see a return to cafe
and the emissions restrictions that we saw prior
to this administration remains in question. Yeah,
it's mind blowing to me that we used to have
good things and these are cars that. A Honda
Civic from 1973, you could probably easily throw
150 ,000 miles on it before it would die. Now,
I mean, I guess a lot of cars now, as long as
you're not buying American -made vehicles, you
can easily get over six figures in terms of mileage,
and they'll be fine. But good luck affording
them. Well, I'm not sure about one of the things
you said, which is that cars now are more dangerous.
I at the time I owned a Ford Pinto. You know,
that's my reference. Yeah. Also, you were the
one driving it. I was. Well, they've switched
to, you know, larger SUVs is that's the thing.
And people some we know with the rollover issues
that they were designed more dangerous, not intentionally.
I guess we'd say they're less safe because there
are increased gaps in compatibility. And vehicle
sizes and weights on the road. Right. So might
be might be another way of saying that. That's
another way that and also people think I'm in
this giant car. I'm protected. Let's text and
drive. I don't know if that I don't know if the
logic is exactly like that. But, you know, I
you certainly see people who want to buy larger
vehicles to protect their family members. You
know, that's something I've heard. you know,
ad nauseum from friends and neighbors over the
years that, you know, they don't want their child
driving around in a tiny fuel economy based vehicle.
That's an awesome car. The kind of car I would
drive because they're worried, you know, that
their kid's going to get in a crash and they're
not going to be as protected. And, you know,
that's something that has, you know, that's not,
they're not crazy. I mean, that's something I
think even the Insurance Institute looked at
that and came to the conclusion that, you know,
yes, if you were in a larger car, you were, you
know, obviously going to be affected less if,
you know, you crash into a Honda Civic and you're
in a, you know, GM Hummer. Physics, you know.
rule in this world. And, you know, there's really
no getting around that. In a smaller vehicle,
and, you know, most crashes, you know, the great,
not wouldn't say majority, but a very large percentage
of crashes are one vehicle crashes. So it's not
a matter of compatibility in a lot of situations.
But when there are situations where two vehicles
are colliding, the big one is going to inflict.
generally inflict much greater damage on the
smaller vehicle. What do you mean by one car
crash? Like it's someone driving into a light?
Like a run off the road. Yeah, yeah, that kind
of thing. That's the majority of crashes? It's
not the majority of crashes, but it makes a significant
proportion. I want to say 30 to 40 percent. But,
you know, readers or listeners, correct me if
I'm wrong on that. People could be reading the
transcripts that are listening to this. And if
you're reading the transcript, isn't artificial
intelligence amazing? Yeah, 52 % in 2023 were
single vehicle crashes from IHS. There we go.
That's amazing. Yeah. Anyway, check out this
article. It's pretty, I think it's pretty neat.
Pretty well done. I would look at, you know,
and the guy, you know, there's solutions proposed
here, right? There's one sentence here where
the guy proposes basically a system that could
work. And his solution is ultimately. We need
to allow Chinese vehicles into America and allow
them to compete with Detroit. We've been subsidizing
Detroit, bailing Detroit out for too long. And
there's been numerous policies over the last
few decades that have benefited Detroit automakers
at the expense of foreign automakers. And, you
know, he says, you know, allow Chinese automakers
to enter the U .S. market provided a few things,
right? Here's the conditions. They got to make
their cars in the United States. obviously that
could be done. Japanese, German, other manufacturers
are doing that. don't allow their costs to be
subsidized by the Chinese government. So you
remove kind of that government subsidization
that Detroit is so scared about because they
don't think that they can compete with China
in that regard. And then three, which is really
important to us and to everyone and to people
who don't even care about vehicle safety, but
are more concerned about China becoming a world
superpower, make Chinese automakers satisfy security
concerns with regard to digital communications?
And that would cover, you know, privacy, cybersecurity
and other issues that I think a lot of us have
concerns about when it comes to China. I would
totally check out one of these Chinese made vehicles.
They're pretty cool looking. Yeah. And Canada
is doing this now, right? You know, they they've
kind of lost a little faith in the United States
as a partner. And, you know, and. They had a
100 % tariff on Chinese vehicles, and they're
reducing that to 6 .1%. So Canadians are going
to be driving all these cool little BYD vehicles
that Jim Farley at Ford was going on and on about.
He has a little love affair with the Chinese
cars a couple of years ago. Farley's also, you
know, in an article notes, you know, that Ford
has signaled that it's in preliminary talks with
Chinese automakers and looking at joint ventures
to actually get some. Fuel economy is one thing,
but get vehicles out onto the roads in America
that we can afford and that are priced at and
under $20 ,000 versus $50 ,000 for vehicles with
a lot of convenience features that some of us
don't care about and don't want. Michael, could
I go to Canada, buy one of these Chinese vehicles,
bring it to the U .S., get Virginia plates, and
then go 150 miles per hour in D .C.? You would
have to – you can't go 150 miles per hour in
D .C. I'm conditioning. I didn't say I was legal.
But you would have to – I think you'd have to
apply for some type of exemption to bring a foreign
vehicle in the United States and register it.
Kind of like what Jim Farley did when he brought
his Chinese car into America, right? What did
he do? He recalled 100 ,000 Ford vehicles. He
brought, I think it was a BYD vehicle into the
United States. And to do so, you know, since
the BYD is manufactured for the Chinese market
and Chinese safety standards, you have to apply
for an exemption from the Federal Motor Vehicle
Safety Standards in order to import it into the
United States. Well, Anthony, you're a well -known
podcaster. You're wealthy enough to ignore the
law, right? That's what all your peers are doing
up there. Palm Beach. Yeah, I just need the last
four digits of your social security number again.
It didn't come through again. One, two, three,
four. Perfect. That sounds good. So listeners,
if you want to import a Chinese vehicle, go to
autosafety .org and click on donate. Then after
you donate, yeah, I don't know, figure out how
to import a Chinese vehicle. We're not going
to help. And ultimately, we don't want, I mean,
I'll throw this article, and I don't know that
any of us really want them imported. In that
sense, we want them built in America so that,
you know, it's supporting American jobs, right?
Moving on to American jobs, let's talk trucking.
60 Minutes, we got a link to this video, the
entire video, or you can read the transcript,
too. We'll put a link to that. They do this whole
piece on trucking fleets that are basically ghost
fleets. This was scary as can be. You can go
ahead. And if you're in, was it Slovenia? Is
that where they were? Serbia? It's all over the
place where they're coming from. India as well.
So you can start a trucking company, get into
a bunch of problems and then just quickly reapply
and get a different Department of Transportation
number. Just change your ID and get out there.
And what these trucking companies do. So trucking
is regulated. Like you only can drive a certain
number of hours. And we've discussed this because.
Obviously, safety. We don't want people driving
more than I believe it's 11 hours. They're required
to have a mandatory break. And so these companies,
part of the things they do is they evade that
law. So they're forcing drivers to drive even
longer, which makes it more dangerous. They're
skirting as many laws as possible and just keep
changing. They're kind of the center of this.
And I think Rob Carpenter, who is I want to say
he's some type of consultant in the trucking
industry. I believe he's a former gaslight winner
as well for his views on underride guards. But
he did a pretty good job explaining this to 60
Minutes of how, you know, a carrier can register
with the federal government, rack up, you know,
tons of violations and then just, you know. do
a chameleon, do a shape shift and register under
a new name and erase all those safety violations
and keep going, which is obviously a horrible
way to allow, you know, trucking companies to
operate, any company to operate, frankly. And
it's something that, you know, has gone on in
all sorts of industries involving safety for
a while. I mean, I think the first. The first
time I heard of such a thing was I think it was
cab drivers in certain cities, you know, creating
lots of shell companies to get out from under
financial obligations to lawsuits they had been
engaged in, that kind of thing. So this is kind
of like it shouldn't be surprising that we're
seeing this kind of behavior when it's allowed,
because it's something that a lot of corporations
do to avoid liability all the time. kill the
corporation, bankrupt it, and then restart it
somewhere else without being followed by all
of the bad things you did. And it's something
that could be, I think, easily corrected by the
Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration by
doing their due diligence on who owns and operates
these trucking companies. Yeah, I found it fascinating
that you can set up a trucking company in Serbia,
never even enter the United States, and run a
trucking company in the United States. It's bizarre.
Is there other industries where you can do this?
Probably. The internet? Well, the internet doesn't
drive down my street, okay? At least last I checked.
Not yet. Hey, doesn't this kind of put the lie
to... One of the arguments for self -driving
heavy trucks that truck drivers are hard to find.
Seems like this scammy company has no trouble
finding truck drivers who are well -qualified
to drive. Yeah, they backed down from it. I think
it was recently when we were looking at another
issue in the trucking area. It may have been
around autonomous trucks where the industry is
now claiming that it's not that they're having...
a hard they're not there's not this employment
crisis in the trucking industry that they would
have you believe um and that that's been bad
information that you know the trucking industry
was was once supportive of that idea but now
not so much with this i i okay so i understand
these companies are playing the shell game but
there's a limited number of drivers and if the
driver you know is working more than 11 hours
sure the company's at fault but so is the driver
for going beyond this But then the driver getting
into crashes and accidents and whatnot, I imagine
they're losing their ability to drive a truck
or no. I think it's going to completely depend
on the state. But yeah, I mean, you're being
tracked as a driver as well. I'm not sure how
the I do know that there are some federal regulations
around that as well. But I think and based on
what we've seen with some of the crashes, I was
at Massachusetts a few years back where they
weren't tracking drivers at all. And they had
a driver who was on meth and all sorts of other
things who had kind of a history that, you know,
they weren't they weren't. They weren't even
– even after violations, they weren't kicking
bad drivers off the road. So that's probably
something that the state and federal government
could both be doing a much better job on. So
me as a typical driver, I'm driving down the
road. I see a big rig. What do I do? Do I Google
the company and be like, hey, is this a real
company while I'm driving? No, I mean – What
do we do as consumers? I, what can you do? I
mean, it's kind of like when you, when you, every
time you pass a Tesla, are you going to, you
know, worry that they're driving on full self
drive and that, you know, they could, you know,
make a mistake. That's the robot can make a mistake.
It's going to kill you. My experience with truckers
is that, that, you know, and I think the stats
kind of bear this out is that, that, you know,
They're safer operators of vehicles than most
Americans. I don't think that they're you know,
it's not like there's some kind of super safety
crisis in the trucking industry where they're
driving as bad as your average human in a car
on the road. But when they do make mistakes,
the consequences can be so destructive that,
you know, we've got to hold them to a higher
standard. And so I don't know that it's necessarily,
you know. Some of these problems that they're
talking about in this article may be driver problems,
but they could also be serious problems with
maintenance. If you're operating a trucking company
from a foreign country, I've got to think that
you're probably not dialing down on the maintenance
and safety inspections and all the other things
behind the scenes that don't involve the driver.
So bad safety records are not just a driver thing.
They're in how you maintain, how you load your
cargo. how you maintain your vehicles, how, you
know, what kind of, what kind of stuff are you
hauling and the problems that individual things
can create. There's just so many things to that.
Well, Michael, when I do drive past a Tesla and
I look over and I see the driver with that tiny
little mustache, I, I take note and keep going,
get out of the way. I mean, you know, and we've
talked about it and Fred has advocated for, you
know, when a vehicle is operating on their autonomy,
you know, putting a light on or something. You
know, I think we've talked about maybe a blue
light. I think Mercedes had a... Teal. Turquoise
light. Yeah, turquoise light. Yeah, that notified
other drivers as to the vehicle status so that,
you know, people could be prepared for things
like, you know, short stops and other weird stuff
we see with partial autonomy and full autonomy.
Well, speaking of bad driving and Teslas, I'm
jumping right into my gas light. So the Europeans,
we look to the Europeans as, hey, they've got
sophisticated things. They look healthier than
us. They've got health care. Look at them talking
those foreign languages fluently. It's impressive.
Well, up until recently, they did not allow Tesla
full self -driving because they're again, they're
like, we fell for this once before. Let's not
do this again. But unfortunately, the Dutch.
Have said, OK, we're going to allow this, but
you got to drivers have to pass a quiz first.
So Tesla put in something called full self -driving
supervised activation tutorial where they make
people sit in their Tesla and go through a little
quiz. And the quiz consists of how many questions,
Fred? Two. He holds up two fingers. He could
be insulting me. I'm not sure what the British
slang is. And so question one is select. Victory.
Yeah. Oh, that was a good movie. Michael Caine
and Sylvester Stallone and Pele. Anyway, question
one, select the image where FSD supervised is
active. Question two, are you responsible for
safe vehicle operation while FSD supervises active?
They're making, first of all, we don't see how
many options there are. So this is a multiple
guess. This is a multiple guess exam. You're
not given any information on how many times you
get to fail this and keep going wrong, wrong,
wrong, and keep doing it over and over again.
But this is beyond absurd because we know as
soon as people accept something and they think
it's real, they're going to forget they took
a quiz. They're going to forget all of this and
go, oh, my car is driving itself. Ha ha, windmills,
bam, smash into them. This is just liability
protection for Tesla. Not even great protection.
So they can, you know, roam the Dutch countryside
and soon other countries of the EU. We're dumb
enough to fall for this, but they're not not
you, the French. No, you will not let the little
Nazi man in his cars and will you know. That's
pretty good. What's what's it's not much of a
quiz and it's not really a tutorial. It's not,
you know, you know, it's not taking you through
all the scenario. In fact, here's what I think
it should do is take take take the drivers through
a lot of the scenarios where they've seen. full
self -drive or autopilot fail. And, you know,
give people a direct tutorial on failure modes
might be a better way of doing this. But also
the real, I think one of the real failings of
this system is that if another person gets in
to drive your Tesla and they can, you know, they
have even less experience with the vehicle than
you, they can turn on full self -driving and
there is no tutorial for them because you've
already taken it for them. So there are problems
here. I don't know what the Dutch are completely
thinking here, but you know what? They're the
first country in Europe to do this, and I guess
it's going to be, we're going to see on a country
-by -country basis who, you know, over time,
who allows this to happen. And as time goes on,
it's more, you know, these, you know, level 2++
+, whatever you want to call them, vehicles that
are semi -autonomous. And I guess we're going
to see over time. what the appetite is for these
vehicles in these other countries. But as the
industry develops and produces more and more
of these, there could be more pressure on the
authorities to accept these systems and to allow
them to deploy. We're all doomed. And I want
to send out a special note to the Dutch that
this is awful because my granddaughter is studying
in... the netherlands right now so please be
careful of my precious little granddaughter okay
i mean she's got to come back to america when
that's over right so that's yeah that's his own
set of problems oh boy the america haters on
this show all right that's my it's terrible that's
my gas light but i'm i'm not sure if it's a tesla
i don't think it's tesla i think it's the dutch
i'm going to give it to the dutch government
that's right take that big orange fred you have
a musk related Gaslight as well this week, I
believe. I do. And this one's kind of diffuse.
But the title of the article is Musk falsely
claims Tesla FSD is 10 times safer than humans
and complains about lawsuits. Well, OK, that's
not a surprise, is it? You know, how can you
tell when Musk is lying? Because his lips are
moving. So we don't really have a problem with
the statement. So where are you? came at this
from the gaslight is that the author, Fred Lambert,
editor -in -chief of Electrek, and we'll have
this reference on our website, uses as the basis
for credible safety claims, Waymo. And he says
that, you know, because the Tesla didn't do all
the good things that Waymo did. then it's really
a bad comparison. But I want to bring people
back to my perennial problem with Waymo's claims.
Quoting from the article, Tesla does not release
disengagement data, crash by severity data, miles
driven by road type, or the denominator uses
to calculate his own crash rate. Well, number
one, neither does Waymo. Waymo, by contrast,
publishes peer -reviewed safety comparisons.
with matched human driver baselines on the same
roads, and has been transparent enough that insurers
like Swiss Re have run their own analyses on
its fleet. So what about those peer -reviewed
safety comparisons? Well, number one, all of
the peers were Waymo employees or Waymo clients.
That's not exactly an independent review. The
comparison of safety is based on the routes,
vehicles, and software from before 2022. They
look at trailing indicators only, did not identify
or show relevance of any leading indicators.
And the difference is a trailing indicator tells
you what happened. A leading indicator tells
you what is likely to happen. And there's no
references in the Waymo studies to any leading
indicators. And the conclusions that study reached,
they're not transferable to or supportive of
current vehicles. or software, or other human
-in -a -loop operation architecture, staffing,
or connectivity, because it uses completely different
vehicles and software, and in fact, software
philosophy, than the current fleet of vehicles.
It used to be that they had rules -based self
-driving. It used to be that they had Jaguar
I -PACE vehicles. All of these vehicles are brand
new, top of the line. And the comparison that
they used were against the transportation system
writ large, which includes vehicles in the average
age of 12 years, meaning half of them are older
than 12 years. A lot of other conditions based
on it. So the basic comparison there that Waymo
used is just bullshit. The second point they
make is insurers like Swiss Re have run their
own analyses. Well, number one, Waymo paid for
that analysis. The analysis ignored all the collisions
and other events reported to NHTSA for the standard
general order. They compared crash data against
only those that had insurance claims. So if Waymo
paid off somebody rather than put it through
insurance, it wouldn't be relevant, would not
fall into the base. It did not include any determination
of fault. Fault is a legal dictum. an engineering
consideration. So putting in a determination
of at fault really skews the data in ways that
are not understood very well. Again, data is
based on only operations from 2022 or earlier
in restricted speed zones and with a different
software stack. The current Waymo operations
are still not really autonomous. It's really...
human -in -the -loop operation with end -to -end
AI. This is something completely new in the world,
and nobody really knows how this is going to
work out. It's only been in place for a year
or so, and by Waymo saying that what we did in
the past, before 2022, is applicable to the safety
of the current vehicles that are now operating
with end -to -end AI with human -in -the -loop.
baffles me how they can say that this is relevant
to the current safety estimates they're making.
Again, they compared all the vehicles, 12 years
or so, with an average age of 12 years, with
brand new premium Waymo vehicles, which include
built -in safety devices not evident in the older
vehicles they're comparing to, notably automatic
braking and collision avoidance. None of which
are in the really old cars that are in the database.
So my problem with this is not that it says Musk
is a liar and that the safety claims are incredible.
It's just that Mr. Lambert assumes that the nonsense
being put out by Waymo, propagated by Alphabet
in its Google search engine, is somehow a gold
standard. or what safety analysis in the av industry
should be like so that's it that's it end of
rant that that's a good take is you know fred
lambert's generally pretty good but that was
you know he slipped that in there in that article
but you didn't let him get away with it but i'd
like to point out that our uh esteemed senator
from the state of texas ted cancun cruz um he
you know you know he's just a simple boy educated
at princeton law degree from harvard He recently
in a Senate hearing said, hey, Waymos don't drive
drunk. They don't drive distracted. They don't
text. So what I'm trying to say, listeners, is
you can have the best education in the world,
but eventually you'll just be reading press releases
from Waymo because that's how good Waymo's PR
is. There we go. Michael, got a gaslight? No.
What? I've got an anti -gaslight. What? Oh, I
don't know how to score this. We're so focused
on all the all the bad in the world. Right, guys.
I wanted to focus on something good. And this
one is, you know, one of our one of our I'm sure
Jonathan Morrison at this point has gotten a
gaslight from us, you know, a few months into
his job over at NHTSA. But he got a gaslight
before he even started at NHTSA. That probably
did. But in this case, NHTSA is doing something
really great. And I saw Jonathan's name pop up
in this article. What they're doing is putting
a lot of money in grants. NHTSA is awarding $50
million in grants for ambulance services across
the country. to start or expand pre -hospital
blood programs. Now, what is this? This is what,
you know, allows an ambulance to bring blood
to a crash scene where there are people rapidly
losing blood and potentially, you know, dying
on the scene. And to start blood transfusions
way before they get to the hospital, it's something
that was... developed primarily and i think combat
zones to treat soldiers who are injured you know
way out in the middle of nowhere where medical
care is a long way away somewhat analogous to
your situation a lot of crashes where you know
you could be half an hour or more even from a
hospital losing blood fast and needing a transfusion
um you know and you know Giving you an idea of
NHTSA's kind of budget priorities here. NHTSA's
$50 million is a lot of money over at NHTSA.
You know, that's, I think the NCAP budget now
is around $6 .5 million. So NHTSA's awarding,
you know, eight times that amount to ambulance
services across the country to get this program
in place. And I think we might see dramatic impacts
from this and some of the more deadly crashes.
I think we could see a reduction in... from this
type of program. And for that, I'm giving out
our first anti -gas light. Wow. That's a good
one. I like this one a lot. The article, which
we linked to, talks about how previously ambulances,
EMTs would have saline on the vehicle and they
could pump that in, but sometimes that's just
not enough. It's not going to make it. But now
they're talking about, hey, we can put blood
infusion right here, type O blood, which everyone's
a dental receipt giver. Receiver? I don't know.
And that will basically revive people and get
them back alive in a fighting chance. It's amazing.
Yeah, it's a good one. Was anyone a type O blood
donor? Not me. No. I have to ask my mom every
couple of years what my blood type is because
I continually forget. Why do you need to know
what your blood type is? Well, I mean, I feel
like I'm stupid for not remembering it, but for
whatever reason, it goes in one ear and right
out the other and I forget it. And so, you know,
I'll ask my mom next time I see her what it is
and forget it again. OK, listen, this is a tough
one to score, honestly, this week. I mean, my
gaslight ended with Michael saying that was pretty
good. I mean, that's bonus points right there.
Brad here got the. hidden little angle of that
Waymo, a little toss -off to Waymo was hidden
in this article about Musk being a jackass. Yeah,
he squeaked his way to Waymo through Musk. Yeah,
that was some next -level ninja -type moves.
And then, Michael, you do the anti -gaslight?
I think I'd give it to Michael. Some good news
from time to time is always welcome on the show.
Well, for trying to think you can judge Fred,
you just lost. I was going to give, I'm going
to pull the Phil Kopman rule. And I think everybody's
a winner this week. I got the t -shirt. Everybody's
a winner. That was a good one. I like a nice
positive story. One thing they point out that
this will have to keep funding this program because
blood expires. Oh, because a lot to keep getting.
And I believe there's a blood shortage going
on right now too. So that's, everybody get out
there and donate blood if you're capable. Right.
I've done it once. It was a good time. I got
cookies. Anything for a cookie. Let's jump back
over to our friends in Europe. And the Europeans,
they have their version of NCAP, which is the
New Car Assessment Program. And from an article
in cbtnews .com, which we get all your cannabis
tobacco news from. I'm not really sure what that
stands for. I'm going to quote from this article.
European safety officials say political dynamics
in the United States are slowing the pace of
vehicle safety advancements. Raising concerns
about the country's ability to keep up with global
standards. And to that, I say, screw you, Europe.
You don't know nothing. OK, we're pulling out
of NATO now. Going to insult us? No, they basically
point out saying, yeah, we we have to completely
go our own. I mean, Euro NCAP standards been
stronger than the US for quite some time at this
point. And they're basically saying we can't
even we can't even look at what the US is doing
to. to base things off of just because every
few years you guys just switch and go the other
direction. It's just a distraction. That was
my takeaway. Well, the article, I mean, there's
some things here that aren't completely accurate.
I mean, they say in the article that, you know,
the regulatory structure governing the National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration requires
key decisions to pass through Congress, creating
delays and limiting the agency's flexibility.
That's not really correct. Most of what goes
through Congress regarding – I would say there
are two important things that go through Congress.
One of them you could say does delay the agency,
and that is the budget. Appropriations and it's
not getting enough money, yes, that creates delays.
Yes, that limits the agency's flexibility to
update safety protocols. But the agency's decision
-making in regards to rulemakings and in regards
to safety is not – does not hinge on congressional
approval. The agency has the authority to prop
up rules and regulations that benefit motor vehicle
safety broadly. As long as they can prove that
there's a benefit to motor vehicle safety, they
can put a rule in place. That's not really the
case. Congress isn't standing in the way on individual
NHTSA actions and rules and regulations, although
I would argue that they are standing in the way
on getting NHTSA the money they need to properly
create those rules, do the research, and do everything
the agency needs to do to make America's roads
safer. Nonetheless, the article's point remains,
you know, NCAP in the United States is so far
behind Europe at this point that I'm concerned
it may never catch up. You know, we even see,
you know. bills moving through the house specifically
right now, which would allow automakers to submit
their own voluntarily submit testing results
for vehicles, which is absolutely the opposite
of what NCAP was designed to be. And in fact,
NCAP was designed to be independent. It was designed
to be the fast way for NHTSA to start doing research
and start taking a look at testing and things
that they could do to make the fleet safer without
having the constraints that are imposed on rulemaking
and the other processes that are far less flexible.
So there's a lot of problems here. I think the
number one issue, I think, for NCAP is that its
budget has been slashed even over the last decade.
They just don't have the money there to conduct
the type of testing that they need to be able
to conduct. to ensure safety on the roads and
to expand that testing over time to accommodate
for newer designs, new software, crash avoidance
features, partial autonomy. There's so many issues
that are coming down the road that... the NCAP
needs to get started on, but it's at the same
time still hasn't caught up to a lot of the issues
that have been plaguing safety for the past few
years. So NCAP needs reform. It needs an overhaul.
But, you know, in my opinion, the number one
thing that can be done there right now is to
give the NCAP program more money. to carry out
its mission. I think I've mentioned in previous
podcasts that the budget NCAP has right now makes
it hard for them even to buy the cars they need
to test, much less improve their programs, put
in new tests and do the type of research they
need to succeed at all that. Excellent. Now I'm
going to take a left turn and go to our friends
from the Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety.
They did a public poll recently. And I'm going
to quote a little bit from it. The poll found
that 81 % of respondents are concerned about
sharing the road with driverless cars, including
50, 42 % were very concerned. Trepidation is
even higher for driverless tractor trailer and
delivery trucks. And the public also strongly
backs federal safeguards. The poll found 76 %
support requiring a driverless car vision test.
Now, that was my big takeaway. Now, I get most
people are like, I don't know. There's an automatic
car. Maybe I don't want to be on the road with
it. I don't want to be on the road with the Tesla.
I don't want to be near a BMW driver. I think
BMW drivers a little more scary to me than a
Waymo. But that's a different story. So but what
I really liked is here and I didn't see the poll.
Maybe, Michael, you can elucidate it. But the
poll found 76 percent support requiring a driverless
car vision test. And now. Fred's been talking
about this since podcast episode number three.
I'm not sure if it was the third episode. It
might have been the first episode. It was the
second. It was the second episode. There we go.
So we, I love this idea, but Mike, what, what,
what is this? What was the question asked? Like,
and what does this look like? Can we actually
put in there? Can we actually give Fred a job
where he holds up like a giant letter E in front
of an AV and have it say, yes, I see. It's the
letter E. Hopefully, the test is going to be
a little more complicated than that, right? Otherwise,
just like with NCAP, manufacturers design the
vehicles just to recognize the letter E and get
away with the test. But this is something that
I think the most important part about this poll
to me is that it found that Americans want the
government involved in setting safety standards.
to make sure these vehicles are operating capably
and safely. The responses are overwhelming. And
if you go down the list, the poll looked at basically
three main categories, autonomous vehicles, advanced
safety technology, automatic emergency braking,
speed prevention technology, that kind of thing,
and then truck safety. And what you'll see here
is that the public is... not only concerned,
but they also really want the government taking
positions and, you know, doing their part to
advocate for safety, which is something, an area
where we think the government is failing in a
number of areas right now. Definitely around
autonomous vehicles where the federal government
and some states seem more concerned with, you
know. propping up the fortunes of billionaires
in order to get something on our roads that we're
not really sure we want or need or we're not
really sure what the negative impacts will be.
Even beyond safety, it looks like a lot of negative
impacts, there may be safety impacts and there
probably will be. But beyond that, the impact
of having extra congestion and all the other
issues that we've seen around AVs could be very...
you know, put people off more than the rare safety
circumstance, right? I mean, if you're driving
around every day and you're seeing AVs stopping
the road or causing traffic, or you're seeing
empty AVs running around everywhere that are
causing traffic, that's going to piss you off
a lot more than hearing about a crash that happened
in a state across the country that involves someone's
safety. So, you know, there's, I think, overwhelmingly,
The poll found that Americans want the government.
to get involved here and set standards. And I
think the vision test is a great example of one
of those standards that the public wants, because,
you know, we've got to make sure that these vehicles
are capable of recognizing every single one of
us out on the road, whether we're in a car or
outside of a car, and so that a robot's not running
over us, right? So that's number one. But also,
you know, the poll went further and found that
there's a lot of support to require companies
to report crash information to the DOT, right?
that's obviously something that needs to be tracked
if we're going to advocate and ultimately get
rules in place that can help out with the safety
of these vehicles. There was also some input
on remote drivers following up on, you know,
Senator Markey's report and some of that stuff.
And there's a lot of support for, you know, making
the current rules better. Right. Making the.
Making AEB, which the automatic emergency braking
rule that came out and is still being challenged
by the industry, is not good enough, right? It's
still not geared to recognize bicyclists, motorcyclists,
and all sorts of other conveyances that people
are riding around on. And the industry is opposing.
You know, strengthening that rule at the same
time as they're claiming that they can build
these autonomous vehicles that presumably can
recognize bicycles and motorcycles and all these
other people and stop on the road. So there's
a lot of there's a there's a big gap there in
what the industry is saying and doing. And so
I think this poll is really interesting and something
that that's worth checking out. If you know,
just if anything, just to get it. Get an idea
of how the public feels about the issue and how,
you know, the bigwigs in Washington are ignoring
the public in favor of promoting corporate growth
and wealth. Or anybody who's interested in issues
that they would address, we have a checklist
for AV safety or regulators that's on our website
and give you some ideas of the scope of considerations
that might be included. In regulations. And before
we move on, I just want to jump in there. Michael,
you're talking about the negative aspects we
see with AVs, but the positive ones, those are
just theoretical, honestly, at this point. I'm
still waiting to see this. I mean, I can see
where there could be. Theoretically. So I could
see where there could be some. I mean, there
are some. I think some of the arguments from
the disabled community, you know, are valid.
Yeah, eventually. And potentially. Yeah. If the
industry actually focuses on that. Right. I'm
still not convinced that the autonomous vehicle
industry isn't just using the disabled as kind
of an emotional crutch to get them to help them
out in their lobbying. And then when they finally
do deploy these vehicles and they find out that,
oh, it's really expensive to put a wheelchair
equipment into these vehicles or it's really
equipment to do this. be, then are they really
going to do it? I don't think so, but we will
see. Crazy. With that, hey, Fred, you got some
towel for us? I do. This is on the death of critical
thinking and automated gullibility. Oh, is this
about me? Yeah. Could be. Could be. We'll find
out as we go through this. So I'm thinking about
Chad GPT and his ilk. There's substitute trailing
indicators from published information. or forward
-looking critical thinking and innovation. And
when I think of it, I really think that AI is
just the opposite of human intelligence. It's
not a substitute. Because human intelligence
starts with a specific observation and then generalizes
to its potential applications. AI instead generalizes
from the information that it sees in databases.
and then attempts to apply whatever conclusions
it's reached from the generalizations to the
specific instance that it's currently addressing.
So, for example, when Einstein discovered that
E equals MC squared, he did not anticipate Hiroshima.
That was an application that came out of people's
use of that specific equation to generalize into
the world of atomic energy and atomic weapons.
But when AI states that AVs are X times safer
than human drivers, it does not apply to the
safety of the specific Waymo that's taking you
to the airport today. Accepting the safety of
that ride is an example of automated gullibility.
And that's a great example of automated gullibility
by the ubiquity of statements about automated
vehicle safety on the highways that you can get
from your computer. AI -enhanced searches will
highlight erroneous references to driverless
miles, as discussed earlier, without a human
death at fault of the AV. But those results are
based on numerous publications by Waymo, which
is, by the way, owned by the same company that
owns Google, which means that it's an expert
in propagating misinformation. The results are
based on numerous publications by Waymo on critical
consumers of the propaganda and by reporters
who regurgitate Waymo's nonsense, thus reinforcing
the myth, all mediated by Alphabet and its ubiquitous
Google search engine. But ubiquity is not proof.
It's only proof that the urban myth propagation
has worked. Unfortunately, reporters... For example,
we'll hang on every word that slides out of President
Trump's mouth without emphasizing to its readers
that you can tell when he's lying because his
lips are moving. You know, that's the derivative
report they base, they publish, and you read
and you accept is really an example of automated
gullibility. It just shows up in front of you
and you absorb it. There's a word for that, anoesis,
which means... the uncritical absorption of data
through pure sensation. I can only add my small
voice to everyone's high school history teacher's
warning to be skeptical, to look under the covers
and assure yourself that the information you've
heard and maybe tended to repeat is true and
not just truthiness. Humans throughout history
have been encouraged to be gullible by their
rulers. It's really troubling that the business
of gullibility has now been automated and is
controlled by a very small group of unimaginably
wealthy and conservative oligarchs who, in the
context of AVs, are using that gullibility to
destroy local economies and the lives of the
people in the communities who depend on providing
real human value to their transportation ecosystems.
End of rant. There you have it. You know, I want
to thank you because some weeks it's a struggle
to come up with a title for this episode. But
I think you got it there with automated gullibility.
I thought it was going to be an oasis or equals
MC square. Yeah. An oasis. Good luck with that
translation software. Yeah, that's not going
to happen. Automated gullibility. You know, listeners,
go to autosafety .org, click on donate. You're
not automated or gullible. You're just a good
person. You're a good person. Go to autosafety
.org, click on donate. You're a good person.
You know why I know you're a good person? Because
unlike me, you probably have a fire extinguisher
in your car. That's right. Before we jump into
recalls, this is a good little article about
you should have a fire extinguisher in your car.
Now, I have a fire extinguisher in my kitchen.
It's under the sink. I could get to it in a struggle.
But I don't have a fire extinguisher in my car,
unlike Mr. Brooks, who thinks he's better than
me. Well, I mean, it's not it's not because I
have a fire extinguisher in my car that I think
that it's just it's a fire extinguisher car.
You know, obviously, you know, I'll repeat this
again and again, but vehicle fires are somewhat
rare. I mean, you know, the odds of you being
in one are. not exceedingly high. The odds of
you coming across one are, you know, even a minor
fire in a small collision, you know, a fire extinguisher
could do a lot to protect, you know, your vehicle.
I mean, it might be the difference between having
a crispy vehicle after a minor collision or being
able to put out something. that caught fire quickly
and having minimal damage that you can have repaired.
But beyond that, you know, if you come upon a
situation where there's someone, you know, in
a vehicle that could be trapped and you have
the ability to put out that fire, I mean, I kind
of think these things in this way, and I think
a similar way about, you know, Narcan, you know,
I... Don't ingest any opiate related drugs. But
I do have a little pack of Narcan in case I come
across someone who might be in that situation.
And it's more a matter of guilt for me. Like
if I come upon the scene knowing that I could
have been prepared, but I didn't, I don't think
I'd feel really good about myself. So I guess
carrying the fire extinguisher with me. Hearing
a fire extinguisher with me in the car makes
me feel like I'm prepared for an eventuality
that if, you know, if it does occur, I'm ready
and, you know, hopefully can help someone or
possibly help myself or put out a fire in my
own car. But at the same time. It allows me to
not not feel like I could have done something
and failed at a later point. So, you know, fire
extinguishers aren't super expensive. If you
can afford one, get one of the you know, the
regular the good old regular fire extinguisher
was the one that was recommended. This article,
basically the the ABC. And you can get a compact
fire extinguisher. You can get a larger one.
Mine is, you know, somewhat medium size. I'd
say about, you know, probably a five to ten pound
one. Where do I put it? They're great to have.
I keep mine in my trunk. And most fire extinguishers
you purchase, I think, will come with some type
of kit where you can strap the fire extinguisher
down. Believe me, you'll want to because it will
roll around all day long if you don't fix it
somewhere. But it's I would recommend having
a fire extinguisher to everyone if that's, you
know, if it's within your budget, you know, not
everyone can afford just, you know, stick you
to $100 items here and there just to buy for
the off chance that they might see a vehicle
fire occurring. But and, you know, having a fire,
an extra fire extinguisher around if you have
a house fire and you just have to run out to
your car and grab it is also a good thing. So
I think that it's a good idea. Okay. Well, you
heard it here first. When you're at the Piggly
Wiggly picking up your Narcan and your EpiPens,
make sure to grab a fire extinguisher. Yeah,
EpiPens are another good thing. Yeah, EpiPens
are super expensive. You can't get EpiPens without
a prescription either. That makes that more difficult.
They're also like a thousand bucks. Benadryl,
however. Keep Benadryl with you. Yeah, they were.
Weren't they? Yeah, there's a patent on it. Was
it Martin Shkreli or was it one of those? Those
pharma bros that tried to boost the price of
EpiPens back in the day. The drug itself is dirt
cheap. It's the injector that they have a patent
on that is very expensive. That's absurd. It
is. It is. But with that, let's jump into recalls.
And the first one up we have is from Hyundai.
294 ,128 vehicles. The 2023 to 2026 Genesis G90.
Same year as the Hyundai Ioniq 6. Oh, I like
the Ioniq 6. The 2024 to 2026 Santa Fe hybrid
and same year as the regular Santa Fe. The front
seatbelts in the subject vehicles may not be
sufficiently attached to the seat frame due to
a damage snap on anchor. And I feel like we've
come across this before with Hyundai specifically.
If not, we've come across this recently with
people with their seatbelt anchors not being
here. Or am I just having lame dreams again?
I'm dreaming. I mean, if I had to pin it down,
I think there was something involving. Rivian
vehicles and seatbelt anchors, but there've been
a few lately that have involved either their
seatbelt buckle, not properly latching the seat
back, not properly working with the, I mean,
you know, there's, I don't think I've seen one
exactly like this from Hyundai, but essentially
they're going to, they're going to. put a reinforcement
clip onto the vehicles. I mean, obviously, this
is a huge safety problem. If your seat belt isn't
secured to the seat, it's not going to function
properly and keep you restrained in a collision.
And so they've come up with some type of retaining
clip that's going to fix this issue. They've
already put this into their manufacturing process,
but it looks like it's going to be June before.
They're going to be able to get the remedies
out to owners by recall. So you've got a couple
of months there where if you're driving one of
these vehicles, you know, I would certainly be
concerned that I'm driving around with a vehicle
with a bad seat belt. So, you know, I think it
might even be worth, you know, if this was me,
I might even want to go visit my dealer and have
them take an early inspection if they're willing
to. Great. Next up. Mercedes -Benz 24 ,092 vehicles.
Oh, Fred, your vehicle's in here. The 2018 to
2020 Maybach S560 4MATIC. Same year, it's just
not the Maybach version. A whole bunch of other
dumb -name Mercedes vehicles. The 450 MATICs,
4MATICs, and the coupes, the wagons, the cabriolets,
the sedans. Pages and pages of silly, silly names.
Let's see. The due to a loss of lubricant at
the universal joint behave, which in the further
course of operation can lead to the fracture
of the universal joint. As a result, the connection
between the transfer case and the front axle
transmission would no longer be assured, and
a loss of propulsion without warning cannot be
ruled out. As a result, the risk of crash would
increase. Huh? Now you're basically losing your
driveshaft's ability to work. You're going to
lose propulsion. You know, essentially you're
stalled in the middle of the road or, you know,
you lose propulsion while you're engaged in some
type of maneuver that, you know, timing is important.
Crossing a, you know, four lane highway or something
like that where you need to get across your drivetrain
fails and you're stuck and you're a target. So
this is essentially I think they're going to.
So you're going to go into the Mercedes dealer,
they're going to check your driveshaft, see if
it's damaged, see if it's got this defect, because
not all of them have it. And then they will change
the driveshaft, replace it if they find this
condition. And it looks like that's going to
be starting up in early June. Fred, for 1000
points, name the American TV show that featured
the fictional rock band named Driveshaft. I lose.
It was on ABC. Michael, use your background as
a hint. Michael's background is a beach scene.
Oh, let's see. I don't know. Three's company.
Lost. The answer was lost. That's right. All
right. Final recall. Volkswagen 6077 vehicles.
The 2026 Audi Q3. Let's see. The target data
container for the sunroof control unit was programmed
incorrectly. As a result, the sunroof closing
function may not comply with FMVSS number 118,
power operated window partition and roof parallel
systems. So what happens? Does this start closing
on my hand if I have my hand in the way? It's
not even that. It looks like the problem is that
they're allowing remote closure of the sunroof,
which means that. And I'm assuming that it doesn't
have an auto reverse function, which FNDSS 118
requires in certain circumstances. So the theory
is here, you could be, you know, this is really
bad parenting, but you could be in a grocery
store parking lot. You left your kids in the
car. Yeah, you could be a piggly wiggly and you
left your kids in the car, which you shouldn't
do. But, you know, which is something that I
think a lot of us experienced in the 70s before
we were smarter. And, you know, the kids could
be playing out of the open, you know, playing.
If I'm going to open sunroof and I'm stuck in
a hot car, where am I going to be out the sunroof?
You know, probably yelling things at other patrons
at the grocery store and acting like a kid. You
could actuate that remotely without even being
near the vehicle, without even being able to
check to see if anyone is inside of the frame
of the sunroof. And without an auto reverse function,
then you're going to you could see some serious
injuries or death associated with it. And so
essentially, FMVSS 118 wants to make sure that
in situations where you don't have that function
that, you know. I think it's the remote operation
here that's the problem, because there's not
a driver or an operator there to check for a
human or other obstruction in the in the sunroof.
Well, listeners, just like FMVSS 118, we care
about your safety. And with that, we'll be back
next week. Bye bye. Bye bye. Thank you for listening.
Michael, this is where you say goodbye. I'm just
thinking about leaving and going to the post
office to pay my taxes. Stop thinking. Start
addressing the issue. Start yelling at patrons
in the parking lot. All right, I'm clicking stop.
For more information, visit www .autosafety .org.