By Patricia Burke of Safe Tech International Images courtesy Floris Freshman
A plea to United Auto Workers and the auto industry – please don’t go down with the ship. We need someone to exit the off ramp.
Ever-evolving tech-driven auto industry innovation has created a litany of safety issues, for example unintended accelerations, leaking ABS modules, roll aways, keyless entry hazards, fires, and issues with airbags. As well as complaints about headlights that blind bicyclists, pedestrians, and other drivers.
Can we look a little bit further down the road? At the commonalities between the history of tobacco, opioids, and automobiles? Denial – not a river in Egypt?
Tobacco, Opioids, and Autos Oh My
Many consumers are too young to remember the tobacco wars, or the decades of uninformed social behaviors, or the lawsuits, or tobacco CEOs lying to Congress, or the denial of horrific pain and suffering, or the corruption of research that resulted in the term “tobacco science.”
Tobacco Litigation
“To understand the world, you must first understand a place like Mississippi”. – William Faulkner
A year ago, Lawyerinc.com published the 10 Biggest Tobacco Lawsuits in U.S. History.
“The tobacco industry is estimated to be worth $45.4 billion in the U.S. Over the years, there has been a continuous filing of lawsuits against tobacco companies by individuals, states, and the federal government. The first wave of lawsuits started in the 1950s when plaintiffs targeted negligent manufacturing, advertising, fraud, and violating states’ consumer protection rights. The second wave came in the 1980s lawsuits tobacco companies were accused of adding ingredients into tobacco products to make them addictive. The third wave [] started in the 1990s when plaintiffs pursued health damages and recovery of health care costs, as states sued on behalf of citizens. “The 1998 Master Settlement Agreement” revolutionized the legal world of tobacco.” (edited for clarity)
Some of the “Top 10 Lawsuits Against Tobacco“
#6 Mississippi vs. the Tobacco Companies ($3.4 billion) In May 1994, Mississippi was the first state to sue tobacco companies [] The suit was filed by the state’s Attorney General Michael Moore. The case would serve as the basis on which the subsequent lawsuits filed by Texas and Florida would succeed. After its success [] 36 other states filed similar lawsuits.
# 3 Texas vs. Big Tobacco Companies ($15 billion) were sued for compensation for treating sick smokers for more than 25 years. The Texas Attorney General had filed the case in April of 1997. In his press statement, the A.G. stated that they had decided to Make Big Tobacco change how it does business. [] They knowingly targeted teenage smokers and took deliberate steps to hide the fraudulent marketing. The settlement was applauded by the then U.S. president, Clinton, who used the opportunity and urged congress to pass stringent laws to control malpractices by tobacco companies. The state announced that the monies would be used to revamp the state’s medical program and educate teenagers on how not to misuse cigarettes.
#1 46 U.S. states, District of Columbia $ Other Five U.S. Territories vs. the Tobacco Companies ($206 billion) In 1998 all attorneys of 46 U.S. states sued the American Tobacco Companies. The companies opted for an out-of-court settlement where they were to pay $206 billion. Also for the loss of local economies. The agreement came to be referred to as “The 1998 Master Settlement Agreement”. It targeted the Philip Morris, R.J Reynolds, Brown $ Williamson, and Lorillard companies. – Lawyerinc.com
The history of settlements may seem consoling. Do not be misled.
Most Tobacco Class Action Cases Failed
Most class action cases against tobacco manufacturers failed. We know why, at least in part. An enduring negative outcome of the tobacco wars is the “health” of the notorious “product defense” industry.
During litigation, “Tobacco manufacturers responded in full force, fighting each lawsuit and refusing to settle out of court. They relied on several defense strategies, arguing that: tobacco was not harmful to smokers; smokers’ cancer was caused by other factors; and smokers assumed the risk of cancer when they decided to smoke.
The tobacco companies prevailed in all of these early lawsuits.” – Source
(Sidenote: Was it actually the tobacco plant causing harm, or the chemicals added to cigarettes? )
One Lesson? Liability litigation cannot serve as a substitute for adequate independent regulation, premarket safety testing, post market surveillance, investigation of harm, integrity and justice.
The Failure of Tobacco Master Settlements, and Opioids
Policy analysts have been making comparisons between tobacco’s “1998 Master Settlement Agreement” and opioid litigation.
As reported by Harvard.edu “Allan Brandt, history of science scholar and ‘Cigarette Century’ author, says opioid negotiators should heed lessons from tobacco settlement.
As state and local officials weigh proposed multibillion-dollar settlements to resolve cases against Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson, and other drug companies in the U.S. opioid epidemic, public health experts have noted a cautionary tale contained in the past and present of an even larger agreement.
In 1998, state governments reached a 25-year, $246 billion deal with the country’s largest tobacco companies. The staggering sum was intended to hold the industry accountable for the lethal effects of smoking and provide support for anti-tobacco programs. But the reality has been a “giant disappointment,” says Harvard’s Allan M. Brandt, author of “The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product that Defined America,” a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2008. Despite the huge payout, much of the money has been diverted into initiatives that have nothing to do with smoking.
The $246 billion was used to fill budget gaps, build roads, and for other purposes; only very rarely was it used for any form of public health, let alone reducing tobacco use, treating those who were addicted, and protecting kids from becoming smokers. It’s become a notorious example of collecting a lot of funds through litigation, but not getting those funds to those who most need or deserve them. I think a lot of people have watched the emergence of the opioid litigation with the tobacco settlement cloud hanging over the proceedings.
They also must ensure people really understand the nature of addiction.” – Source
Yes, addiction.
How Much Harm Will Unfold if the Automobile Industry Is Misled by the Federal Government Regarding the Safety of Wirelessly Connected Cars and Roadways?
The infrastructure required by automobile manufactures to support smoking in vehicles consisted of an ashtray and a cigarette lighter (Let’s not forget, later needing to address roadway fires started by the careless disposal of cigarette butts.)
Connected and especially autonomous vehicles create the demand for an exponential increase in resources, energy, and environmental impact. The risks extend beyond local economies.
(Speaking of fires let’s not dismiss new resource demands from EV fires a. damaging roadways, b. damaging parking garages, c. excessive water consumption to extinguish battery fires, d. related cell tower and antenna collapses and fires.)
Radiofrequencies in Cars
Could auto industry workers seek confirmation that wireless applications and other “green” innovations are based on sound science, before proceeding further with connectivity, especially when “safety” is being invoked to justify additional wireless? (Remembering how cigarettes ‘treated’ a scratchy throat?) Could auto industry workers also oppose industry bullying, (for example, with the FAA and 5G), and abuse of power, human rights violations, and environmental damage at home and abroad? (Mining? Disposal?)
Testing Rats and Monkeys – for One Hour
Especially because, as Dr. Kent Chamberlain explains, theoretical radio frequency microwave radiation exposure limits were established on the basis of an hour-long study on rats and monkeys.
But the monkeys and rats were not driving on connected roadways or working in 5G factories.
4.1 Million Miles
Statista reports that “At just under 6.6 million kilometers in 2020 (approximately 4.1 million miles), the United States boasted the most extended road network worldwide.”
Should consumers and the labor force sit back and watch the wireless and automotive industry transition 4.1 million miles of roadway to connected-vehicle technology, based on 1996 safety assumptions?
“The high motor vehicle demand in the country fuels an active automotive industry. With over 1.53 trillion U.S. dollars in revenue from road vehicle and parts retail trade, the sector has swiftly recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the global automotive chip shortage and rising raw material prices are a challenge to the industry.” – Statista
In 2021, Kimberly Amadeo of The Balance wrote,”The Economic Impact of the Automotive Industry.” “In 2020, the U.S. automotive industry contributed 3% to the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP). That’s $627 billion out of the total $20.93 trillion U.S GDP for that year between vehicle manufacturing and sales. On average, the industry employed 4.1 million people in the United States, as of Q1 2021.“
The scale of the consequences of proceeding on the basis of a house of cards is nearly unfathomable.
Video of Signals Transmitted From Passing Vehicles
Source: MMWave Learning FREE EMF Educational Series – 5G Radiation Webinar – August 15, 2023 Topics Include: The effects of EMF and mmWaves; The Health Effects of RF and mmWave Sources; Intro to the Safe and Sound Pro mmWave Meter, Different 5G frequencies and Measurement Protocols; New Discoveries of mmWave Sources; Hunting mmWave towers in Southern California (3:49.18)
Captured Agencies
Like Mississippi’s history with tobacco, auto industry workers could take the lead in steering themselves and society off of the collision course created by a captured agency and industry insiders, fueled by product defense.
“Concealing health risks of exposure, misinforming other industries and the public, fraud and misrepresentation, breach of implied warranty, negligence, and conspiracy“
“The Health Consequences of Smoking —50 Years of Progress” “History of Tobacco Product Litigation” notes, “Although most class action cases against tobacco manufacturers have failed, plaintiffs have achieved some significant successes [ ]. One such success was a class action suit consisting of an estimated 60,000 nonsmoking flight attendants who had been exposed to tobacco smoke at work and had suffered diseases or disorders resulting from this exposure. The class members alleged that by concealing the health risks of exposure to tobacco smoke and misinforming the aviation industry and the public about these risks, the cigarette manufacturer defendants engaged in fraud and misrepresentation, breach of implied warranty, negligence, and conspiracy (Broin v. Philip Mor[1]ris, Inc., No. 91-49738 CA [22] [Fla., Dade Cty. Oct. 31, 1994], cited in 9.5 TPLR 2.147 [1994]).”
The Road to Autonomous Vehicles is Paved with 1996 Health Guidelines: President Bill Clinton and the Telecom Act of 1996
While former President Clinton reportedly applauded efforts to address malpractice by the tobacco industry and to protect children, did the Clinton administration unleash decades of negligent manufacturing, advertising, fraud, violating states’ consumer protection rights, addiction (including children) and violation of health rights – in drafting of the Telecommunications Act of 1996?
Safety Research and Strategies, Will the Regs Catch Up To Vehicle Autonomy?
In 2019, the highly respected Safety Research & Strategies reported, “The generally accepted wisdom that driverless cars are the future and the future is now, has presaged an influx of investor dollars and ambitious plans to level up the fleet of vehicles with no driver controls. The optimism has been as unfettered as the regulatory landscape – which is to say that this Wild West has no sheriff.
In 2016, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that its approach to this technological transition would be the light hand of guidance, and issued a list of vague conceptual statements. Last October, the Department of Transportation released its third iteration, Preparing for the Future of Transportation: Automated Vehicles 3.0. This brightly-colored, substance-free piece of public relations affirms NHTSA’s Orwellian view that although it has the authority to regulate automated driving systems, it shouldn’t. Check out some examples of NHTSA Newspeak in AV 3.0:
“The right approach to achieving safety improvements begins with a focus on removing unnecessary barriers and issuing voluntary guidance, rather than regulations that could stifle innovation.” (Fewer regulations equal more safety.)
“ADS developers are encouraged to use these safety elements to publish safety self-assessments to describe to the public how they are identifying and addressing potential safety issues.” (Industry-promulgated transparency is truth.)
“Delaying or unduly hampering automated vehicle testing until all specific risks have been identified and eliminated means delaying the realization of global reductions in risk.” (You must put yourself at risk to reduce risk.)
Indeed, the document is remarkable for its lack of attention to the most basic mandatory protections for the motoring public.”
The FCC and NHTSA collaboration is another example of a tech marriage made in hell.
The 2021 Ruling Against the FCC
In 2021, a ruling against the FCC was rendered in a consolidated case brought by the Environmental Health Trust and Children’s Health Defense.
If this were not the Wild West, the decision would have already had significant impacts.
“The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in the historic case EHT et al. v. the FCC that the December 2019 decision by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to retain its 1996 safety limits for human exposure to wireless radiation was “arbitrary and capricious.” The court held that the FCC failed to respond to “record evidence that exposure to RF radiation at levels below the Commission’s current limits may cause negative health effects unrelated to cancer.” Further, the agency demonstrated “a complete failure to respond to comments concerning environmental harm caused by RF radiation.” The court found the FCC ignored numerous organizations, scientists and medical doctors who called on them to update limits and the court found the FCC failed to address these issues:
- impacts of long term wireless exposure
- impacts to children,
- the testimony of people injured by wireless radiation,
- impacts to wildlife and the environment
- impacts to the developing brain and reproduction.” – Source
Who would give a loved one a drug if safety claims were based on theories from 1996, with no subsequent oversight or regulation? With reported harm? When ‘safety tested’ on an inanimate mannequin?
Should any industry or community be barred from questioning environmental and human health safety?
Should the auto industry be conducting human experimentation on its own workforce by using 5G in factories?
11,000 Pages of Evidence
The United Auto Workers can benefit from 11,000 pages of evidence submitted in 2019 and already reviewed by the Court in the 2021 ruling. Now there is more evidence of harm.
There are many researchers and experts ready to stand with those UAW workers who do not want to play a part in manufacturing unsafe vehicles, supporting unsafe infrastructure, and working in an unsafe workplace.
40 More Years? Let’s Not Wait That Long, The Cover-up Has Already Been Going on for a Long Time
“The Health Consequences of Smoking —50 Years of Progress” notes, “When the nation’s first Surgeon General’s report on smoking and health was released in 1964, litigation against cigarette manufacturers over the health effects of their products had been ongoing for 10 years. It would take 30 more years until tobacco litigation began to have a deep impact on the landscape of tobacco control.”
Do not follow the telecom industry mantra that “more research is needed.”
At the end of the exchange, Blumenthal concluded, “So there really is no research ongoing. We’re kind of flying blind here, as far as health and safety is concerned.”
The cover-up of RF harm has already been going on for a very long time.
See the outstanding article: Paul Brodeur, The Original Microwave Pioneer Setting the Record Straight A Personal Tribute, by Louis Slesin of Microwave News.
Microwave Hearing and the Blood Brain Barrier
“Perhaps the best example of the effectiveness of the cover-up is what happened with two important effects: microwave hearing and increased leakage through the blood-brain barrier. Both were first demonstrated in the 1960s/70s by Allan Frey, an independent and iconoclastic scientist. Both are discussed in Zapping. Understanding them might help explain reports of everything from headaches to brain tumors. The effects remain unresolved —and are as controversial today as they were 50 years ago.” – Microwave News
The inanimate engineering dummy used for safety testing does not predict these effects.
2023: Nearly 50 Reckless Pro-Industry Federal Telecom Bills
As recently reported by the Environmental Health Trust, “Congress is considering nearly 50 bills in both chambers that, collectively, would promote significant proliferation of wireless antennas, radiation, and infrastructure across the country and in space.
Local governments would lose virtually all control over the placement of not just cell towers, but wireless antennas of all shapes and sizes. Your neighbors will be allowed to put a 199-foot cell tower in their front yard – along with two towers in their backyard and more antennas on their roof. Any apartment building could have unlimited attenders attached to it. And every street and sidewalk in America would be automatically approved for unlimited towers. A wide range of towers, antennas, and other communications facilities would be exempted from the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.”
CLICK HERE to tell Congress to halt these bills and require that the FCC comply with a 2021 court order to review the science on wireless radiation.
List of nearly 50 bills: https://ehtrust.org/wp-content/uploads/EHT-federal-bills-promoting-wireless-10-2-23-2.pdf
A Hail Mary Pass
We need a Hail Mary pass.
Many wireless consumers are too young to remember quarterback Doug Flutie’s historic 1984 play against Miami. “They said it could not happen but it did.”
A short stretch of road between the Natick Mall and the Shoppers World in Natick/Framingham, Massachusetts is named “Flutie Pass” in his honor. Antenna search notes that there are 57 towers and 378 antennas within a 3.0 mile radius of 22 Flutie Pass, Framingham, MA 01701, United States. Tatnuck Magnet School in Worcester has 262 towers and 408 antennas within a 3.0 mile radius.
When is enough enough? When is it too much? Who decides?
It only takes one tower or antenna to destroy lives. A young person in Pittsfield MA, driven from home for over 1000 days, has been telling decision-makers for more than 3 years that regarding the FCC and safety, the emperor has no clothes.
The first car company (or any other industry) that stops lying to itself - and stops hiring mercenary liars to lie to the public about wireless safety - wins, on all levels.
“Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great. You be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom. Of course the task will not be easy. But not to do this would be a crime against humanity, against which I ask all humanity now to rise up.” — Nelson Mandela
Learn More:
SaferEMR.com, Hybrid and Electric Car Radiation Risks https://www.saferemr.com/2014/07/shouldnt-hybrid-and-electric-cars-be-re.html
Physicians for Safe Technology, Cars: Driverless, Hybrid and Electric Risks Physicians for Safe Technology | Cars: Driverless, Hybrid and Electric Risks (mdsafetech.org)
Slide presentation by Sarah Aminoff of Safe Tech International on why newer cars can trigger electrosensitivity and how to purchase a lower EMF vehicle. There is a glaring need to measure and rate automobiles EMF emissions from sources of wireless RF as well as magnetic fields. EMF in New Cars, Rentals and Amtrak2 Slide Presentation
See also:
CLICK HERE to tell Congress to halt these bills and require that the FCC comply with a 2021 court order to review the science on wireless radiation.
Extra Credit: Read here about the “expert” for the tobacco and chemical industry, who worked for Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds for decades denying harm, who also went to work for the wireless industry, including justifying the “safety” of smart utility meters across the country, which are causing symptom onset and disability.
The regulatory agency in question is the FCC, which essentially is the industry. Has it thrown the UAW under the bus?
Source: SafeTechInternational
Become a Patron!
Or support us at SubscribeStar
Donate cryptocurrency HERE
Subscribe to Activist Post for truth, peace, and freedom news. Follow us on SoMee, Telegram, HIVE, Flote, Minds, MeWe, Twitter, Gab, and What Really Happened.
Provide, Protect and Profit from what's coming! Get a free issue of Counter Markets today.
Be the first to comment on "Why US Autoworkers Should Sue the FCC, Right Now"