From: Mike Hunter on
The Tribune Newspapers report the Senate slammed the NHTSA for not
identifying the obviously serious safety problems leading to Toyotas massive
9,500,000 vehicle recall.

NHTSA today up its number of fatalities involving sudden unintended
acceleration in Toyota vehicle to 54 with 38 injuries in a total of 43
accidents.

Senator Rockefeller said "NHTSA actions and inactions in the years leading
up to today, are deeply troubling. The NHTSA would rather focus on floor
mats than microchips because they didn't understand electronics."

The Transportation Secretary said "I don't know if NHTSA turned a blind eye
because it did not understand chips or the electronics. The agency has 125
engineers, including one software engineer and one electronics engineer.
Perhaps the agency officials are too cozy with the industry it oversees."

Senator Dorgan questioned whether several former NHTSA officials, who later
went to work for Toyota, helped get many of these cases closed without
recalls.