Airbags kill more kids than school shootings.
PATRICK BEDARD http://www.caranddriver.com/Article/print/display/0,1835,2073,00.html
Life with airbags has turned out very differently from the one promised by
Joan Claybrook back in 1977. That's when she told Congress that those
friendly balloons in every car would pillow away 40 percent of crash deaths
each year.
Last year, Dwight Childs, 29, of Broadview Heights, Ohio, screwed up. He ran
a red light, resulting in a 10-mph crash. It was exactly the sort of mistake
airbag supporters have always said "you shouldn't have to die for." Childs's
two-month-old son, Jacob Andrew, strapped into a rear-facing child seat on the
passenger side of a 1997 Ford F-150 pickup, was killed by the airbag, and
Childs himself was charged with vehicular homicide.
The man's crime? He didn't switch off the airbag.
Judge Kenneth Spanagel piled on the punishment: 180 days in jail, suspended
except for two cruel and unusual days; Childs must check in to jail on Jacob's
first birthday and on the first anniversary of the crash. Childs was ordered to
make radio and TV ads about airbag safety for the Ohio Department of Public
Safety. He was also placed on probation for three years, his license was
suspended, and he had to pay $500 in fines and court costs.
I'll boil it down for you. First, government forced this man to buy airbags,
because bureaucrats in Washington know better than he what's needed for his
well-being. Then, when he failed to deactivate the safety feature he was
compelled to buy, it sent him to jail. Airbags have turned America's sense of
justice on its head.
Judge Spanagel and the rest of society are groping now that we've bought fully
into Claybrook's promise—about $40 billion worth of airbags on the
road—only to discover that it defies common sense. Remember that airbags
were sold as "passive restraints" for Beavis and Butt-head, that layer of society
so brain dead it runs red lights and can't be bothered to buckle up.
We always knew whom we were dealing with; Beavis and Butt-head are the
type who just don't get it, and they still don't. So we're making things better for
them now by killing their kids?
Of course, you and I and the folks who listen to NPR and read the
Washington Post all know that kids are supposed to go in the back seat, or if
you're driving a Miata or an F-150 with no back seat, then switch off the
airbag. But why are we expecting Beavis and Butt-head to get it when they
never got the far simpler buckle-up message?
Dwight Childs is no Butt-head. He did almost perfectly what caring parents
are supposed to do. His son was in a child seat. That seat was properly
buckled into the only spot available; the truck had no back seat. His killer
mistake was leaving Claybrook's friendly pillow switched on, and for that
small omission, he lost his son in a low-speed crash that would have been
easily survivable without an airbag. The Cleveland Plain Dealer account of
the trial said Childs "was visibly upset" and "unable to speak when prompted
by the judge."
"I think they sentenced the wrong person," says Sam Kazman, general counsel
at the Competitive Enterprise Institute whose first case, back in Reagan times,
tried to overturn the airbag mandate then being pushed by Transportation
Secretary Elizabeth Dole. But blaming the victim is the only defense left for a
government that insists these child killers be standard equipment in every car
and truck.
Doesn't anyone notice the irony here? We live in an era in which the lowest
political hacks grab for sainthood by pushing programs for "our children." In
his state-of-the-union address this year, President Clinton hauled out the
C-word 22 times to show how caring he is. "In memory of all the children
who lost their lives to school violence, I ask you to strengthen the Safe and
Drug-Free School Act, to pass legislation to require child trigger locks, to do
everything possible to keep our children safe."
Just a few months later, the massacre at Columbine High School pushed to the
redline our national anxiety about guns. Never mind that at least 17
weapons-control laws were broken by the cold-blooded killers—anti-gunners
called for still more laws. I understand their alarm. Since 1993, 82 students
have been murdered in shootings at schools, according to the National School
Safety Center.
But here's a greater tragedy. During that same period, 99 children have been
killed by airbag deployments, including 21 yet to be "confirmed" by the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (one of the unconfirmed is
Jacob Andrew Childs).
You'd think a President eager "to do everything possible to keep our children
safe" would have noticed this looming body count from a child killer more
lethal than guns. Unless, that is, our society has done the unspeakable and
made a deal with itself to trade off the lives of these kids to save a few adults.
Will future generations look back at this airbag deal in embarrassment, just as
President Clinton two years ago looked back from the White House at the
Tuskegee Syphilis Study, which ran for 40 years starting in 1932? Black men
with syphilis, 399 of them, were left untreated so that medical observations
about the disease could benefit the rest of society.
"We can look at you in the eye," Clinton said in a formal apology to survivors,
"and finally say on behalf of the American people, what the United States
government did was shameful, and I am sorry."
How many black men should society trade off to gain a syphilis cure for the
rest of us? That's the shame of Tuskegee.
How many children should we trade off so that a few adults can escape crash
deaths? That's the shame of airbags.
In his apology, Clinton made a point of saying that the Tuskegee men were
used "without their knowledge and consent."
NHTSA and the safety establishment have never leveled with us about airbags,
either, and they're not coming clean in the case of Jacob Andrew Childs. As
part of his sentence, Dwight Childs must do airbag-safety ads on radio and
TV. The script thrust on him by the Ohio Department of Public Safety has
him saying, "I made the fatal mistake of strapping my son's car seat,
rear-faced, in the front seat of a vehicle equipped with a passenger-side airbag .
. . don't make my mistake."
No, that's not his mistake. His truck had no other seat. The trial clearly
establishes not switching off the airbag as his mistake. But the script never
mentions switching off. That would crack open the door to choice. Why have
an airbag in the first place if it makes that seat too dangerous? No, the airbag
deal has already been made by our government, and it doesn't want Beavis,
Butt-head, and the rest of us to be thinking about opting out.
PATRICK BEDARD http://www.caranddriver.com/Article/print/display/0,1835,2073,00.html
Life with airbags has turned out very differently from the one promised by
Joan Claybrook back in 1977. That's when she told Congress that those
friendly balloons in every car would pillow away 40 percent of crash deaths
each year.
Last year, Dwight Childs, 29, of Broadview Heights, Ohio, screwed up. He ran
a red light, resulting in a 10-mph crash. It was exactly the sort of mistake
airbag supporters have always said "you shouldn't have to die for." Childs's
two-month-old son, Jacob Andrew, strapped into a rear-facing child seat on the
passenger side of a 1997 Ford F-150 pickup, was killed by the airbag, and
Childs himself was charged with vehicular homicide.
The man's crime? He didn't switch off the airbag.
Judge Kenneth Spanagel piled on the punishment: 180 days in jail, suspended
except for two cruel and unusual days; Childs must check in to jail on Jacob's
first birthday and on the first anniversary of the crash. Childs was ordered to
make radio and TV ads about airbag safety for the Ohio Department of Public
Safety. He was also placed on probation for three years, his license was
suspended, and he had to pay $500 in fines and court costs.
I'll boil it down for you. First, government forced this man to buy airbags,
because bureaucrats in Washington know better than he what's needed for his
well-being. Then, when he failed to deactivate the safety feature he was
compelled to buy, it sent him to jail. Airbags have turned America's sense of
justice on its head.
Judge Spanagel and the rest of society are groping now that we've bought fully
into Claybrook's promise—about $40 billion worth of airbags on the
road—only to discover that it defies common sense. Remember that airbags
were sold as "passive restraints" for Beavis and Butt-head, that layer of society
so brain dead it runs red lights and can't be bothered to buckle up.
We always knew whom we were dealing with; Beavis and Butt-head are the
type who just don't get it, and they still don't. So we're making things better for
them now by killing their kids?
Of course, you and I and the folks who listen to NPR and read the
Washington Post all know that kids are supposed to go in the back seat, or if
you're driving a Miata or an F-150 with no back seat, then switch off the
airbag. But why are we expecting Beavis and Butt-head to get it when they
never got the far simpler buckle-up message?
Dwight Childs is no Butt-head. He did almost perfectly what caring parents
are supposed to do. His son was in a child seat. That seat was properly
buckled into the only spot available; the truck had no back seat. His killer
mistake was leaving Claybrook's friendly pillow switched on, and for that
small omission, he lost his son in a low-speed crash that would have been
easily survivable without an airbag. The Cleveland Plain Dealer account of
the trial said Childs "was visibly upset" and "unable to speak when prompted
by the judge."
"I think they sentenced the wrong person," says Sam Kazman, general counsel
at the Competitive Enterprise Institute whose first case, back in Reagan times,
tried to overturn the airbag mandate then being pushed by Transportation
Secretary Elizabeth Dole. But blaming the victim is the only defense left for a
government that insists these child killers be standard equipment in every car
and truck.
Doesn't anyone notice the irony here? We live in an era in which the lowest
political hacks grab for sainthood by pushing programs for "our children." In
his state-of-the-union address this year, President Clinton hauled out the
C-word 22 times to show how caring he is. "In memory of all the children
who lost their lives to school violence, I ask you to strengthen the Safe and
Drug-Free School Act, to pass legislation to require child trigger locks, to do
everything possible to keep our children safe."
Just a few months later, the massacre at Columbine High School pushed to the
redline our national anxiety about guns. Never mind that at least 17
weapons-control laws were broken by the cold-blooded killers—anti-gunners
called for still more laws. I understand their alarm. Since 1993, 82 students
have been murdered in shootings at schools, according to the National School
Safety Center.
But here's a greater tragedy. During that same period, 99 children have been
killed by airbag deployments, including 21 yet to be "confirmed" by the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (one of the unconfirmed is
Jacob Andrew Childs).
You'd think a President eager "to do everything possible to keep our children
safe" would have noticed this looming body count from a child killer more
lethal than guns. Unless, that is, our society has done the unspeakable and
made a deal with itself to trade off the lives of these kids to save a few adults.
Will future generations look back at this airbag deal in embarrassment, just as
President Clinton two years ago looked back from the White House at the
Tuskegee Syphilis Study, which ran for 40 years starting in 1932? Black men
with syphilis, 399 of them, were left untreated so that medical observations
about the disease could benefit the rest of society.
"We can look at you in the eye," Clinton said in a formal apology to survivors,
"and finally say on behalf of the American people, what the United States
government did was shameful, and I am sorry."
How many black men should society trade off to gain a syphilis cure for the
rest of us? That's the shame of Tuskegee.
How many children should we trade off so that a few adults can escape crash
deaths? That's the shame of airbags.
In his apology, Clinton made a point of saying that the Tuskegee men were
used "without their knowledge and consent."
NHTSA and the safety establishment have never leveled with us about airbags,
either, and they're not coming clean in the case of Jacob Andrew Childs. As
part of his sentence, Dwight Childs must do airbag-safety ads on radio and
TV. The script thrust on him by the Ohio Department of Public Safety has
him saying, "I made the fatal mistake of strapping my son's car seat,
rear-faced, in the front seat of a vehicle equipped with a passenger-side airbag .
. . don't make my mistake."
No, that's not his mistake. His truck had no other seat. The trial clearly
establishes not switching off the airbag as his mistake. But the script never
mentions switching off. That would crack open the door to choice. Why have
an airbag in the first place if it makes that seat too dangerous? No, the airbag
deal has already been made by our government, and it doesn't want Beavis,
Butt-head, and the rest of us to be thinking about opting out.