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Volkswagen Sued For Violating State Environmental Statutes With Dieselgate (theverge.com)
The attorneys general of New York, Massachusetts, and Maryland are suing Volkswagen for violating state environmental regulations with its diesel emissions cheating scandal. The states say that the car company has violated their air quality laws, combined with some sort of anti-fraud measure for the defeat mechanisms to bypass emissions testing. The move comes after many states agreed to a $14.7 billion settlement for violating consumer protection and EPA and California state environmental regulations. The Verge reports: "Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche defrauded thousands of Massachusetts consumers, polluted our air, and damaged our environment and then, to make matters worse, plotted a massive cover-up to mislead environmental regulators," said Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey in a statement. This was echoed by New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman, who released his own statement saying "the allegations against Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche reveal a culture of deeply-rooted corporate arrogance, combined with a conscious disregard for the rule of law and the protection of public health and the environment."
Volkswagen will just file bankruptcy!
The thing I haven't seen explained well is if the software detects the car is being tested and emits only the allowed level of pollutants, why not just an update that runs in that mode all the time? Does something overheat and catch fire or what?
For blatant environmental disregard such as this, the corporation should not offer protection to the officers and directors. The corporate veil should be pierced, and the state should go after the officers and directors both criminally and civilly. The corporate protection from liability should just be there to protect against legal action arising from unforeseen circumstances in the evolution of a company. In this case, the emissions rules were purposefully disregarded and, there should be a heavy price to pay for that.
Shortly after this started, someone reported that GM, Chrysler, and Ford performed substantially-similar to Volkswagen, with the caveat that Volkswagen was more efficient: everyone's vehicles are tuned to hit emissions standards in testing conditions, and quickly increase their output as you leave those standards; Volkswagen happened to enter a different mode of behavior under testing conditions, instead of playing the wink-and-nudge.
Someone accused everyone involved of protectionism, trying to push foreign companies out in order to strengthen local manufacture. I think it's more that people are more forgiving of villains who twirl their moustaches at you while you interact, as they feel they've gotten a fairer deal when someone violates the spirit of the rules than if the terms were hammered out and the other guy just bluntly cheated. Same outcome, but one of these pisses people off.
Those of us who are more level-headed (read: introverts) tend to miss the group-think and not care as much about the other guy being a dick (because of a lack of investment in squishy feelings of companionship), and so are a little less misgiving about the guy who brazenly cheated, and a little more concerned with the rules being set up such that cheating and playing by the rules are essentially the same thing, since this implies that the rules don't work (why have them at all if breaking them doesn't actually change anything?).
So my understanding is there is a larger problem here in which everyone gets to cheat, but most people do so in an acceptable way, and this is all a bunch of feel-good measure being taken to quell people's personal feelings of unfairness, and has actually no material impact on the world. That is to say: all the stuff about polluting your air and defrauding consumers is bullshit by way of literally every alternative being both acceptable and functionally identical.
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Sure, what VW did was flaky, bad, evill, and so on. But now we are getting into the "obligitory" cash grab, none of these law suites will result in resources to address "climate change" or give VW owners more than a cupon for a Big Mac.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
With All the Governments piling on, will VW be able to survive? One of the biggest auto companies failing? Is VW "too big to fail"? (It's bigger than GM was at the time of its failure.) 100Ks of employees (VW, dealers, suppliers, etc.) out of work? This is a really big catastrophe in the making. BTW, I would be interested in one of the originally coded diesel engines with higher mpg than the "test code"/EPA dehanced diesel engines that are coming. I'll bet there are plenty of people who want one.
Please stop using the word "-gate" on any story that has some sort of scandal. Watergate was over 40 years ago....LET IT GO! and just use the word scandal.
VW should just pull out of the American market and leave you "environmentalists" alone with your gas guzzling SUVs. Fucking hypocrites.
I really hope the lawsuits fail, or is at least delayed until after the buyback/fix program. This has already been settled at the federal level. I think the states in the lawsuit are just looking for a payout. As a VW TDI owner the buyback/fix applies to, lawsuits that can delay this or bankrupt the company hurt me and the environment. If the company goes bankrupt before the 3.0L engines are addressed, those owners will either be continuing to drive non-compliant vehicles, or be left with a vehicle they paid for and can't legally use. The environmental damage is done. The company (and shareholders that probably didn't know about this) is being punished. Right now the priority should be to bring the vehicles into compliance or get them off the road.
I don't condone what VW did, but this smells of greenwashed greed. If this was about justice, they should be trying to get the individuals responsible for the fraud extradited and criminally tried.
The aim should be to ensure that the managers responsible for the decision get prison time - fed an air flow of their car's diesel fumes naturally. Anything else is window dressing - but sadly I don't see it happening. Merely extracting money from a company is to damage its shareholders, most of whom are not culpable for the criminal acts done in their name.
is exactly what the original university (WV?) researchers did.
Interestingly, as I recall, their research consortium was partially funded by Ford.
Eventually you'll have defrauded enough people that nobody will buy your shit anymore.
It's amazing how the argument against The Market for Lemons boils down to "but so many people are employed fixing our broken windows!" If I have to spend $100 to get your shit inspected, that's $100 less I am able to pay you for it even if it does manage to be nonfraudulent.
Please stop complaint-gating.
That is all.
When you get your NY State Emissions test on your vehicle....does the inspector somehow trigger the software to activate? How has this gone unnoticed when every vehicle gets tested annually?
About this.
There, I said it. VW does not deserve to continue as a going concern. It should be liquidated and its assets sold to pay for the untold environmental damage they have caused, which is completely immeasurable except to say that it is immense.
Things like this are precisely why we need to elect Jill Stein. She's the ONLY candidate that gives any concern to the environment we live in, and she would never let companies get away with this as our current government has.
Jill Stein 2016!
They simply have to do what everyone else does to get around emissions -- classify their vehicles as trucks. *EVERY* pick-up and SUV is a "truck" in the eyes of federal law, and therefore don't need to meet the strict emissions guidelines for passenger automobiles.
Take the Golf, Jetta, Passat and every other Diesel car and have them reclassified as a truck. You'll probably have to make some "campaign donations" to some senators and congressmen, but it's probably far cheaper than this scandal.
And that's it. If the TDI Golf is a truck, then case closed, it can pretty much pollute as much as it wants. This looks like the easiest way out and I believe that VW should spend what they need to, to buy off Congress and get on with their business of being a "job creator" that avoids paying taxes and performs other heinous acts in the name of "good business".
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
"Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche defrauded thousands of Massachusetts consumers, polluted our air, and damaged our environment and then, to make matters worse, plotted a massive cover-up to mislead environmental regulators," said Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey
She then got in to her Cadillac Escalade and drove away.
Gategategate! Appgate! Cowgategate! Dieselgateappgategatecowgategategategate!
VW got caught with its pants down and now it's time to tar and feather them. This is the natural way. My only regret is that I can't get a popcorn and a soda and watch the family murder-suicides that might ensue in Germany due to astounding unemployment after liquidation of VW and all its assets to pay its penalties. Alas, there is no justice in the world and even if they pay what everyone is asking they will still be around. C'est la vie.
Thank you for using the -gate suffix right in the headline. It immediately told me that this story is not worth reading.
Why am I saying this? Because I don't want to remain ignorant of your side. I want to know all sides of this issue. But the use of -gate tells me that you feel that this issue cannot stand on its own merits, that you must fluff it up in order for people to take notice.
In otherwords, it is Click Baiting. And anyone partaking in Click Baiting is not worth listening to. Their position might be worth listening to, and I will gladly listen to someone who does not resort to Click Baiting to get their message across. But you, personally, I will not listen to.
"the allegations against Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche reveal a culture of deeply-rooted corporate arrogance, combined with a conscious disregard for the rule of law and the protection of public health and the environment."
"the allegations against top US political parties and leaders reveal a culture of deeply-rooted political arrogance & corruption, combined with a conscious disregard for the rule of law and the protection of public Rights, freedom. and the Rule of Law."
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman, who released his own statement saying "the allegations against Volkswagen, Audi and Porsche reveal a culture of deeply-rooted corporate arrogance, combined with a conscious disregard for the rule of law and the protection of public health and the environment."
Just Wow.
We The People released our own statement saying:
"The attorney generals of each state, as well as congress and our representatives, reveal a culture of deeply-rooted corporate arrogance, combined with a conscious disregard for the rule of law and the protection of public health and the environment"