What's behind GOP attack on product-safety database?

[Elmore Furth]

And a big FU to consumers from the GOP.

By David Lazarus
July 5, 2011

. . .the Republican-controlled House Appropriations Committee has approved a spending bill that not only slashes the budget of the Consumer Product Safety Commission but also cuts off all funding for a recently launched database of product-safety complaints.

The online database is one of the most important consumer tools to emerge from Washington in years. It enables people to report potentially faulty or harmful products, as well as to research goods before making a purchase.

So why is Emerson so opposed to the database? Perhaps the answer lies in her close ties with the business world. She raised more than $2 million in contributions in the 2009-10 election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Koch Industries — run by billionaires Charles and David Koch, who are active in conservative causes — also reported spending more than $200,000 lobbying against creation of the database.

You've got to wonder why businesses are fighting so hard to keep this resource away from consumers. . . is it because the last thing they want is a consuming public armed with the latest and most thorough information on the safety of their goods?

And if it's the latter, you might now ask, what are they trying to hide?

What's behind GOP attack on product-safety database?

[Old and In the Way]

1. Republicans simply want to level the playing field.

They want each of us to have to deal individually with the corporations. Guess who wins 99.999% of the time in that scenario?

[mrcheerful]

2. Because product safety adds to production costs plain and simple

Remember it was product safety that lead to the demise of lawn darts as well as the demise of the 3 wheel ATV's. R's liked the good old days when it was buyer beware. Never mind that kids were killed when the baby beds gate dropped or the mattress could be pulled up and babies smothered in them. In a way I kind of miss the good old days when a lawn mower had no safety bar on the handle and if you tripped and fell you could lose feet hands or other body parts, there used to be a sense of danger when mowing the lawn.

[KT2000]

3. Freedom from liability

the less you know the less you can hold a manufaturer accountable.
The most pathetic part of that is that prevention comes close to informing about potential liability so the less prevention the better for - manufacturers, retailers, insurance companies etc.

[starroute]

4. It goes along with tort reform

They're not so much afraid that people won't buy their products. It's the big lawsuits that really terrify them. And if it can be shown that there were widespread reports of product defects and they did nothing to correct them, that leaves them wide open.

They've got the Supreme Court undercutting the right to class-action lawsuits. This is just another loophole they're trying to plug.

[blue97keet]

5. IT might put the spotlight on toxic counterfeit everything made in China

and get their corporate sponsor China lapdogs too upset.

[dissidentboomer]

6. Money and greed. What the hell else would be behind it?