Michael Fumento

I can't count how many people sent me items about how NHTSA says the whole Toyota Tempest has now been determined by the government to have been driver error. Hallelujah! Case closed!

Wrong.

The ruckus began with a Wall Street Journal pieces with the unfortunately ambiguous titles: "Crash Data Suggest Driver Error in Toyota Accidents" and "Early Tests Pin Toyota Accidents on Drivers."

It stated:

The U.S. Department of Transportation has analyzed dozens of data recorders from Toyota Motor Corp. vehicles involved in accidents blamed on sudden acceleration and found that the throttles were wide open and the brakes weren't engaged at the time of the crash, people familiar with the findings said. The early results suggest that some drivers who said their Toyotas and Lexuses surged out of control were mistakenly flooring the accelerator when they intended to jam on the brakes.