by Mike Lopez
All these lead paint toy scandals are only the beginning. On July 12, 2007, Businessweek ran a story, “Made in China: Faulty Tires.” This story foreshadowed the bloodbath to come. For every scandal, we can expect several high profile lawsuits to follow. On this blog, we've been talking about how American businesses encouraged the bad system that allowed for all these scandals to happen and keep happening. It is a good thing our legal system sucks, too. These businesses are now about to feel the pain of a predatory system that loves to take advantage of scandals for profit. In fact, it looks like it has already begun:
- Mattel hit with lead paint class action suit
- Couple files suit over lead in toys
- Toy Lawsuits Push Debate
I'm not even going to mention the many, many toy lawsuit websites that have been thrown up by ambulance chaser law firms trying to score a buck off these recalls. Personally, I'm really torn. I don't know who to root for. The business that messed up and poisoned my kid with lead or the predatory lawyers that are going to steal millions from these companies. I guess there is no one to celebrate in this case. Waste begets waste begets waste. If only someone had the decency to do the right thing in the first place, we'd be spending our money on food instead of lead detector kits. I guess Enron and Worldcom really didn't teach us anything. How about a new blog label called, “Stupid?”
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I’m a liberal, so take my comments with that in mind. Corporations are good. They provide the capital and resources needed to mass produce products at cheap prices.
However, the Republican form of government and economics, whereby the best government is the least government, leads to problems like dangerous toys, food, and other products which have been recalled this year. Unregulated corporations and free markets mean that companies don’t have to submit to inspections which would have pointed out that the products they were importing were tainted.
In the Republican free market society, this problem will inevitably work itself out as consumers will become fed up with the dangerous products, toys in this instance, and stop buying from companies producing or importing these dangerous products. Those same consumers will buy toys from companies with good track records of voluntarily inspecting the toys before they sell them. However, how many kids get brain damage or die from dangerous toys is irrelevant to the free market proponents.
But in the real world, dead or seriously injured kids is a very bad thing. That is why even though I am too liberal to call myself a Democrat, I still think the Democrats would provide more oversight for toy companies and other companies who would otherwise cut every corner just to save a buck.
Furthermore, the Republicans have held the mantra of “tort reform” meaning that they despise of product liability lawsuits. While some lawsuits are either frivolous or have exorbitantly high awards to the plaintiffs, the Republicans would rather get rid of product liability lawsuits altogether instead of trying to fix the abuses.
So keep those things in mind when voting for which candidates would do a better job at protecting kids.
[…] the buck.” If you delegate something (whether it’s maintenance of train tracks or toy safety), you are still responsible, as the manager and as the delegating authority. So, I think the […]