Toyota Madness is Absolutely Absurd

Today, I was reading this article in Yahoo! News. I just can't figure out people. It's absurd. Absolutely absurd. I especially loved this line:

"Beyond that, Toyota has also issued some Dukes of Hazzard style maneuvers drivers should use if they're cruising along and the pedal does, in fact, stick, such as shifting into neutral or turning off the ignition (but don't take the key out!). Do they teach that in driver's ed?"

this one was pretty good too:

"If you're a concerned parent with a suspect Toyota, you could easily imagine that the gas pedal seems a little stickier than usual. And do what? Risk your kids' lives by driving them around in a death trap?"

Ah, it's the concerned parent argument. Is the only other person in the world with some sanity on this Lenore Skenazy? Remember that the only truly safe driving experience is Mario Kart. Even Mario Kart I'm sure has the risk of repetitive motion injuries. All cars are potential "death traps" - they are powerful tools that must be operated safely. "Dukes of Hazzard style maneuvers"? Give me a break. If your gas pedal gets stuck or your engine runs away for some other reason, turn it off or press in the clutch/shift an automatic to neutral. C'mon.

Personally, I can't believe people are as stupid as these recent media releases suggest. Instead, the media is trying to cause us to have an inordinate fear of the world - and thus a trust of the government and media. In this case - build mistrust in foreign cars, call them death traps (due to a USA-built component ironically) - sell more domestic cars (which our government now has an interest in due to bailouts).

There's nothing to see here people. USA-built Toyotas have a gas pedal that may get stuck. When they can, take your car in to get the gas pedal fixed. In the extremely unlikely event that something does happen, do like you would to safely bring any runaway engine safely under control - turn it off or depress the clutch or shift into neutral.

P.S. My car, a Honda Fit, has a recall too - over a switch that if it gets really wet could start a fire. An issue that should be fixed, yes. But cars can start fire and this is a very minor problem also... just try to keep it dry until they can fix it, no biggie...