Ralph Nader's Blog, page 44

Will Any Disgusted Republicans Challenge Trump in the Primaries?

By Ralph Nader

July 18, 2019

In 1956, then Senator John F. Kennedy authored a best-selling book titled Profiles in Courage, in which he told the stories of Senators in American history who, on principle, bucked the tides of power. Today, some Republican writer or conservative syndicated columnist – George Will or Max Boot – should write a book called Profiles in Cowardliness. It should cover Republican leadership’s near total cowardliness in the face of Donald Trump, whom they despise on many fronts. Many in Republican leadership believe he has hijacked their Grand Old Party (GOP).

Clearly the Republicans – except for Rep. Justin Amash, who recently quit the Party after accusing Trump of impeachable crimes – are intimidated by this foul-mouthed president. Republican politicians are cowed by Trump’s bellicose personal rhetoric. We have seen this cycle repeat itself countless times, with the media boosting their ratings by recklessly repeating Trump’s insults.

Republicans remember what Trump did to Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio during the 2016 Republican primary. They observe how loud-mouthed Donald spews toxic falsehoods at Democrats and gets away with it. Why, Republicans ask themselves, should they take any chances provoking this unstable Twitter Emperor and his ditto-heads on social media whom he deliberately incites? The answer: because patriotism demands action.

Donald Trump acts as if he is above the law – coming off his career as a corporate criminal, he has become a government outlaw. He has always cheated justice. Trump flouts the Constitution, refuses to faithfully execute the laws preventing corporate crimes, and obstructs justice.  Just as bad are Trump’s ethical and personal failings; he has brought disgraceful personal behavior, serious daily lies, expensive nepotism, denials of grave realities facing the country, bigotry, violent incitement, and disrepute to the White House. All of these failings are why the Founding Fathers gave impeachment authority to the House of Representatives and the authority of open trial to the Senate.

There are many more indictable and impeachable offenses, but the focus here is on why the entire GOP has completely fallen in line.  Only former Republican Governor of Massachusetts William Weld has dared to officially challenge Trump in the upcoming Republican primary.  This week, former Republican Congressman and Governor of South Carolina Mark Sanford announced he is testing the waters for a run against President Trump, emphasizing Trump’s huge expanding deficits. It is shocking that so few opponents have emerged considering Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 and remains more consistently unfavorable in the polls than any president in modern times.

Republicans must think “crooked Donald” is invincible. So why try? Plenty of Republican politicians consider Trump to be a clear and present danger to Party and country. They include Former Senators Flake and Corker; current Senator Mitt Romney; former Governor of Ohio John Kasich; former New Jersey Governor and EPA head, under Reagan, Christine Todd Whitman; and former House Speaker Paul Ryan. All have spoken out about Trump’s dangerous ignorance and loutishness. All believe him to be unqualified and fear his reckless actions. On trade, immigration, climate crisis, and his open admiration of brutal dictators, they find him appalling.

Yet there are few signs of a serious challenge. In the 1990s, John Kasich was the Chairman of the powerful House Budget Committee. At the time he was critical of the wasteful, unauditable Pentagon budget then (imagine now). Asked about 2020, Kasich told The Washington Post that he’s “never gotten involved in a race that [he] didn’t think [he] could win,” adding, “things are very volatile in this business and you just cannot predict what might change.” Such words hardly signal anything beyond extreme caution.

One would think, these persons and others who could take on Trump (for example, the very popular former Governor of New Jersey Thomas Kean) would want to stand up for traditional Republican principles and positions (think about Senator Robert Taft, Presidents Dwight Eisenhower, Theodore Roosevelt, and of course, Abraham Lincoln). In sharp contrast, current Republican leaders almost never criticize Trump publically apart from a mild op-ed (Romney) or the occasional public comments (Whitman).

It gets worse. Apart from William Kristol, Trump’s arch-critic, there doesn’t seem to be any activity among Republican kingmakers to find a challenger or even consider mounting a third party accountability challenge from the political right.

There is someone, were he younger, who would take on Trump. He is former Republican Senator from Connecticut, Lowell Weicker. He was known in the Senate as a ferocious defender of the Constitution and was prominent during the Watergate hearings that exposed Richard Nixon.

Apart from elected officials, what about those cabinet secretaries and White House chief of staff, whom Trump praised to the skies, before he drove them out with a frenzy of ruthless epithets (“dumb as a rock,” etc.)? They know the insides of mad Trump’s White House, which would receive media attention.

At the least, Republicans who challenged Trump in the primaries would put Trump on the defensive and hold him more accountable.

Time is passing on the road to November 2020. There are countless Republicans who deeply believe that Trump is a disgrace to his office and a threat to the Republic, as well as to the future of the Republican Party. Who amongst them will stand up and be counted?

Is their moral courage totally AWOL?

Nader Outlines Criteria for Next FAA Administrator

On July 10, 2019 the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee voted 14-12 in favor of Mr. Dickson’s nomination.  The nomination will now go to the full Senate for a vote.

On July 11, 2019, Ralph Nader sent a letter to President Donald Trump regarding Stephen Dickson, his nominee to be the next Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator. See the letter below.

July 11, 2019

President Donald J. Trump

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW

Washington, D.C. 20500

The Senate Commerce, Science & Transportation Committee today voted to advance the nomination of Stephen Dickson to become the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

Concerns about Mr. Dickson’s appreciation of and support for whistleblowers have come to light. Recently, whistleblowers have exposed significant problems with the Boeing 737 MAX before and after the crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia. Unfortunately, the FAA’s attention and response to whistleblower disclosures are seriously lacking. These tragic crashes have also revealed significant problems with the FAA’s regulatory oversight of aircraft manufacturing that jeopardize public safety. Given the importance of regulating airline carriers and aircraft manufacturers, the FAA Administrator should be receptive to issues related to air safety and passenger rights. Whistleblowers from within the FAA and the airline industry play crucial roles in alerting the public, Congress and the media to potential air safety matters.

Evidence of regulatory lapses regarding the 737 MAX has eroded public trust and confidence in the FAA. In addition, the lack of candor by Boeing has created a situation where a plane was allowed to fly without proper safety oversight and without the benefit of proper pilot training.

The Statement of Captain Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger III before the Subcommittee on Aviation of The United States House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (June 19, 2019) is clear and compelling and should be required reading for the next FAA Administrator.  Attached please find a summary of some of the things Captain Sullenberger has said about the 737 MAX.

Several air safety leaders have recommended additional mandatory simulator training regarding the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) scenarios as part of routine recurrent training. Pilots have said that without proper simulator training, pilots are not prepared to respond to MCAS malfunctions.

In his June 19, 2019 testimony before the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Daniel Carey, a 35-year career captain with American Airlines and president of the Allied Pilots Association (APA) said:

The 737 MAX was designed to provide the same aircraft feel to the pilots as the 737. This was intended to minimize the operating cost to Boeing’s customers by allowing the MAX to be certified by the FAA as a 737. The point was to provide Boeing’s customers with a new advanced aircraft while minimizing the training cost associated with a different aircraft certification. This led Boeing’s engineers to add the MCAS system. Many mistakes were subsequently made by Boeing engineers as MCAS was designed as a “federated” not “integrated” system. As a single-point-of-failure design, this meant that any redundancy to the system, if it failed, was completely dependent on the Captain and First Officer of the aircraft.
The huge error of omission is that Boeing failed to disclose the existence of MCAS to the pilot community.
The final fatal mistake was, therefore, the absence of robust pilot training in the event that the MCAS failed.

It is imperative that the next FAA Administrator resist industry and political pressure to unground the 737 MAX without a full, top to bottom, certification and review of this aircraft. Moreover, the certification must have comprehensive and independent oversight by properly trained FAA officials.

Victims’ families, consumer advocates, flight attendant representatives, pilot representatives, mechanics, aircraft controllers and other stakeholders should be represented on the FAA panel that oversees full recertification of the 737 MAX. The process should be transparent and thorough. There should be opportunities for public comment and input. Boeing and airlines – not the public via taxes and fees – should shoulder all costs associated with assessing the MAX and compensating the victims’ families.

It is also important that an independent advisory board with members from the consumer and airline safety communities be involved in reviewing the FAA’s oversight of the airline industry.

The attached recommendations (some old and some new) from oversight bodies, airline safety organizations and airline professionals regarding the FAA should be presented to Mr. Dickson for his review. The public deserves to know if Mr. Dickson possesses the requisite determination and independence to think broadly about the FAA’s deficiencies and take immediate corrective actions. More importantly, we need to know if Mr. Dickson will act boldly to start the process of making the FAA a more effective watchdog rather than an industry lapdog.

Passenger and crew safety equals public trust equals the future of the airline industry.

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader

P.O. Box 19312

Washington, DC 20036

 

An Unsurpassable Sterling Record of Stamina!

By Ralph Nader

July 10, 2019

I’ve always been fascinated by stamina. Lou Gehrig was my boyhood hero, and not just because of his batting average, clutch hitting, and dignified comportment. From 1925 to 1939 he played 2,130 ballgames in a row, not missing one, despite injuries and illnesses. (It was the record until eclipsed by the Baltimore Oriole’s formidable Cal Ripken in 1987).

Stamina by underdogs over great odds in various areas of lawful human endeavor is engrossing because of all the elements in its making. Focus, determination, resilience, skill, self-renewal, strategy and, at its best, reflective idealism.

Who isn’t fascinated by bee hives, ant colonies, birds and squirrels dutifully building nests, and the sheer alert stamina required of mammals raising their young during constant peril?

This background provides context for contemplating the end of radio’s John Sterling’s record announcing 5,060 straight New York Yankees baseball games without missing one. Since 1989, whether ill or injured, Sterling showed up every day in city after city to command the airwaves and perform his duties. He was undaunted by fatigue or repetition.

As an unreconstructed Yankee fan (from the days of Gehrig, DiMaggio and Mantle), I did not know about Sterling’s dedication. In between articles on contract negotiations, player trades injuries and modest misbehaviors, the New York Times finally reported this stunning streak of stamina.

It took a bout of exhaustion and his physician’s advice to convince Sterling to take some days off, sleep a lot, eat a little more to recover weight, and drink a gallon of water every day. “I’m just run down,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with me,” the 81 year old radio marathoner  told the Times.

Sterling’s record could be more unbreakable than Joe DiMaggio’s still standing 56 game hitting streak.

For five years in the nineteen eighties, the amazing Sterling broadcast both the Atlanta Braves baseball games and the Atlanta Hawks basketball games.

For a game with so many tedious intervals between pitches and innings, Sterling and his co-anchor Suzyn Waldman, make baseball more interesting with their banter, humor, and player vignettes. Sterling has been a unique voice in baseball, calling home runs with rhyming ditties on the hitters’ names and, of course, his breathless game-ending call when “Theeeeeeeeeee Yankeeees Wiin.” For her part, Suzyn keeps tediously reporting the pitch counts and pitch speeds, over batting averages.

The Times wrote that Sterling was going to use his time-off to catch up with a pile of mail, too long ignored. I can resonate with that chore. Neither John nor Suzyn chose to respond to my letter in 2012 regarding the non-stop, irritating, in-play advertising that takes the spirit out of exciting plays. I expressed my sympathy for their having to read these blizzards of ads that interrupt their peak narrative. Such as “Judge’s homerun is brought to you by Kia,” or “this consultation at the mound brought to you” by some law firm. Yeah, sure.

There was no in-play commercial corrosion when their famous predecessor, Mel Allen, used to call the Yankee games on radio. Ballantine Ale, a major sponsor, was promoted only between innings.

In my letter to the heads of the Yankees and Major League Baseball, including former Yankee manager, Joe Torre, I included a detailed listing of these interruptive in-play ads for one whole ball game. Maddening. Why would advertisers want to turn off so many fans?

None of my letters were accorded a response, or even a courteous acknowledgement. (The Times did briefly write up this story).

The Yankee baseball corporation, a corporate welfare king by virtue of its stadium and other tax breaks has been, alas, both censorious and very sensitive to criticism. Recently, John and Suzyn interviewed New York Times sports reporter Bob Klapisch during a ball game. Klapisch is the author of the recently released book Inside the Empire: The True Power Behind the New York Yankees. It seemed to be a friendly narrative.

All three were gushing about the genius of long-time Yankee manager Brian Cashman for his brilliant trades that have led to the Yankee’s first place standing in their Division, despite a dozen or more injuries to their starters. Unmentioned were the disastrous and very expensive trades over many years that turned out to be bad deals – getting over-the-hill stars, for instance, by trading away their talented young farm team players plus gobs of cash from Cashman.

For over a decade, Cashman wrecked the celebrated Yankee minor league farm teams that had brought forth the great players like Yogi Berra and Derek Jeter, who won more World Series than any other team. Year after year, under Cashman, the Yankees’ registered failure after failure, despite their superior cash hoard, due mostly to “bad deals” Brian. The one silver lining is that he has proven to both fans and major league baseball that the biggest treasury no longer gets the biggest victories. That was always the “knock” on the Yankees of yore from historic rivals like the Boston Red Sox, still smarting over the sale in 1920 of the great young pitcher – hitter, Babe Ruth to build the dreaded “Bronx Bombers.”

Friends often  joke about my rooting for the New York Yankee imperialists–  especially during the long period of corporate ownership by loud George Steinbrenner, a jolting, edgy personality whom Donald J. Trump must have studied carefully.

My response: there are some loyalties absorbed by four year old boys that never go away.

Highly Recommended Books for 2019 Summer Reading

By Ralph Nader

July 1, 2019

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power by Shoshana Zuboff (PublicAffairs, 2019): You’re already experiencing the early stages of Big Corporations becoming Big Brother while Big Government becomes the Big Pussycat. Unfortunately, indentured Members of Congress drink the milk of campaign contributions and dream of industry job offers. This constructive book is chilling and will curb your digital enthusiasm.
Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom by Katherine Eban (Ecco, 2019): This book exposes the price gouging U.S. Drug Companies that are outsourcing production of medicines (and their active ingredients) to China and India with disastrous results. We are at the mercy of these largely uninspected, often contaminated, foreign labs and are not given labeling information regarding the country of origin of vital medicines. Did you know that the U.S. no longer produces antibiotics? Once you read Eban’s work, you won’t look at prescription medications the same way.
Strength Through Peace: How Demilitarization Led to Peace and Happiness in Costa Rica, and What the Rest of the World can Learn From a Tiny, Tropical Nation by Judith Lipton and David Barash (Oxford University Press, 2018): Lipton and Barash expertly tell the story of how Costa Rica outperforms the U.S. in meeting basic human needs. The book humbles our native ethnocentricity and our culturally accepted, elementary school-taught myth that the U.S. has little to learn from other countries.
Banking on the People: Democratizing Money in the Digital Age by Ellen Brown (Democracy Collaborative, 2019): Brown offers an in-depth exploration of the problems with big banks and the “shadow banking” industry. The book explains how reckless bankers affect your livelihood, waste your tax dollars, and unduly influence an increasingly corporate-owned government. Nestle with this book until you see the wonderful future that could be ours, by recovering control of OUR OWN MONEY.
The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption by Dahr Jamail (The New Press, 2019): The intrepid Jamail went to the shaken places where global warming is fracturing our planet in very plain sight. His book serves as a tour of climate disasters for the climate disruption deniers who ignore what is clearly happening before their very eyes.
Ethics, Politics, and Whistleblowing in Engineering by Nicholas Sakellariou and Rania Milleron (CRC Press, 2018): It is not only Boeing engineers whose better judgments about aircraft safety were overridden by profit-obsessed management (Axe the Boeing 737 Max!). Engineers in many industries provide expert judgments on the health, safety, and durability of products and processes. These experts are routinely ignored by avaricious corporate bosses looking to maximize profits at the public’s expense. A recent high profile example of this was the disastrous Boeing 737 Max crashes, which might have been prevented if Boeing management had heeded the advice of their more conscientious engineers. At last, there is a book with case studies, professional vision, and a cast of heroes for engineering students, practicing engineers, and all the rest of us that will raise our expectations for the engineering profession (Proud to say that Rania is my niece).
Conflicts of Interest In Science: How Corporate-Funded Academic Research Can Threaten Public Health by Sheldon Krimsky (Skyhorse Publishing, 2019): In this collection of articles, Krimsky delves into the devolution of scientific research from the integrity of academic science to the secret, profit-driven domination of corporate science. This book brings together many examples of the impact of corporate funded research on health and safety.  Taxpayer dollars and public trust are at risk in the current scientific climate. Krimsky compellingly advocates for full disclosure and the need to shield university scientists from the pressure or temptation to sell out consumers, workers, and the environment.
Viking Economics: How the Scandinavians Got It Right-and How We Can, Too by George Lakey (Melville House Books, 2016): Given the upcoming presidential primaries and elections, this book is a contemporary necessity. Lakey illustrates how Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland have used social democratic policies to make their citizens the world’s healthiest and happiest people. Relatively, the Nordic countries are a model for good governance, equitable prosperity, and responsible environmental leadership. This is the “most fun economics book” you’ve never read. Voters and candidates alike should read it before the November 2020 election.
Whistleblower at the CIA: An Insider’s Account of the Politics of Intelligence by Melvin A. Goodman (City Lights Books, 2017): As a career CIA intelligence analyst and truth-teller Goodman shows how the secretive CIA has been anything but “intelligent.” The modern CIA blunders through the world with major, inaccurate forecasts, violent covert action, general lawlessness, and cover-ups that ignore President Harry Truman’s original intention for the organization. This book explains why CIA actions have contributed to our country’s disastrous foreign policy. A personal, readable, and authentically patriotic story.
Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster by Adam Higginbotham (Simon and Schuster, 2019): Adam Higginbotham’s recent book prompted one reviewer to say that the author “gives us a glimpse of Armageddon.” The atomic power meltdown in Ukraine 33 years ago has produced a large uninhabitable region and driven deadly radiation effects, short and long term, into humans, their genes, and the flora and fauna. Together with the widely viewed HBO series on Chernobyl, this book explains why people should reject any notion that nuclear energy is a solution to global warming. Far, far better is to invest in energy conservation, solar energy, and wind energy – energy options that are cheaper, quicker, safer, and more community based. The catastrophic consequences and security threats posed by using nuclear power (the purpose of which is to boil water) are unacceptable. Remember Fukushima—nuclear disasters can happen anywhere.

Letter to Chairman Clayton

June 27, 2019

Chairman Jay Clayton

Securities and Exchange Commission

100 F Street, NE

Washington, DC 20549

Dear Chairman Clayton,

Given the prominent media coverage and the class actions filed by shareholders of the Boeing Corporation regarding the effect of the 737 Max crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia on the company’s share price, the SEC has directed increased attention to that company’s governance. On May 24, 2019 Bloomberg News reported:

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating whether Boeing Co. properly disclosed issues tied to the grounded 737 Max jetliner, according to people familiar with the matter, as regulators intensify their scrutiny of the company following two deadly crashes.

Officials in the SEC’s enforcement division are examining whether Boeing was adequately forthcoming to shareholders about material problems with the plane, said the people who asked not to be named because the probe isn’t public. The agency is also reviewing the aircraft manufacturer’s accounting to make sure its financial statements have appropriately reflected potential impacts from the problems, the people said.

An issue is deemed “material” if “there is a substantial likelihood that a reasonable investor would attach importance in determining whether to buy or sell securities.” The actions of Boeing’s management have clearly had a material impact on Boeing shareholders.

Since the Ethiopia Airlines crash, class action lawsuits have been filed against Boeing on behalf of investors. The first of these suits was filed in Chicago by Richard Seeks, a Boeing investor. The Washington Post reports Mr. Seeks claims that Boeing “‘effectively put profitability and growth ahead of airplane safety and honesty.’ The suit said investors suffered economic losses because of Boeing’s omissions and is seeking damages for alleged securities fraud violations.”  The suit also alleges that Boeing “hid from investors and passengers that it prepared its own reports and statements to the FAA certifying its planes as safe to fly and that these statements and reports were undermined by Boeing’s conflicts of interest in having been delegated authority by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to examine, test, and help certify its own planes and to provide the safety analysis for the 737 MAX.”

Additional lawsuits have been filed that “accuse Boeing of concealing the full extent of safety problems caused by the placement of larger engines on the 737 MAX that changed the handling characteristics from previous models. These handling characteristics included the danger of the increased pitch-up tendency of the aircraft, which required special safety features, some of which Boeing installed only as ‘extras.’”

Plaintiffs also claim that material omissions and false and misleading statements inflated the price of Boeing stock, so when the recent plane crashes brought the truth to light, Boeing’s investors suffered damages.

At the April 29, 2019 shareholders meeting, a resolution to separate the roles of CEO from Chairman of the Board received 34 percent of the vote. (Institutional Shareholder Services, a major shareholder advisor on corporate governance and responsible investment, urged Boeing to split the role of chairman and chief executive officer).

Presently, Dennis Muilenburg holds both positions – a dual role many corporate governance scholars and other experts view as seriously compromising the independence of the Board of Directors.

Indeed, Boeing’s governance is so compromised that the present Board could be described as a collection of highly paid rubberstamping puppets with each director receiving over $300,000 a year. Most of the members of the Board have no experience in commercial aviation. Many board members are chosen for their celebrity status and their malleability (See attached names of Boeing’s Board of Directors). As reported in the Washington Post, the proxy advisor Glass Lewis recommended, after the Ethiopia crash, replacing Audit Committee Chair Lawrence Kellner because he “should have taken a more proactive role in identifying the risks associated with the 737 Max 8 aircraft.” 

Boeing’s Board also approved a handsome bonus for the company’s CEO and approved an additional $20 billion of stock buybacks in December 2018, after the Lion Air crash. This decision was suspended after the Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max crash in March 2019.

Many questions about Boeing’s management are emerging in the press, and from Members of Congress, Congressional Committee staff, and investigators with the Department of Transportation’s Inspector General’s office. The Justice Department is conducting a criminal probe and has issued grand jury subpoenas. According to The Seattle Times, “after two fatal crashes of Boeing’s 737 MAX, a federal agent served a grand jury subpoena … seeking information from an aviation flight-controls expert and consultant as part of a sweeping and aggressive criminal investigation into the jet’s certification.”

If the members of Boeing’s Board were essentially kept in the dark by management — as were the pilots, airlines, FAA, and SEC, then the very well paid executive “hired hands” committed serious violations of the most basic principles of corporate governance.

If the members of Boeing’s Board were more fully informed than the above mentioned stakeholders in Boeing’s commercial and “regulatory” circles, and failed to act, the Board is complicit in acts that may give rise to charges of criminal negligence. Many indicators of negligence have been convincingly documented since the March 10, 2019 crash of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302.

Amy C. Edmondson wrote in the Harvard Business Review:

In the aftermath of the two fatal accidents of Boeing 737 Max jets, tentatively blamed on the over-automation of Boeing’s flight systems, renewed attention to Boeing production facilities was perhaps inevitable. Evidence is now trickling out that workers in the troubled Boeing 787 Dreamliner plant in South Carolina were pushed to maintain an overly ambitious production schedule and fearful of losing their jobs if they raised concerns. This is a textbook case of how the absence of psychological safety – the assurance that one can speak up, offer ideas, point out problems, or deliver bad news without fear of retribution – can lead to disastrous results.

The accidents and the resulting media attention together create a real wake-up call for Boeing, which I expect will now embark on an examination of every aspect of its operations. What’s required, however, is more than operational fixes. It is nothing less than a full organizational culture change. But how telling it is that it takes a cataclysmic event (two, actually) for executives to take culture seriously? And yet, sadly, this is the way a thoroughgoing change in the culture of an organization happens most often: AFTER a big, visible failure or tragic event.

With the information already submitted by Boeing to the SEC, more than enough is publicly known to warrant additional steps be taken by the SEC. The following initiatives are merited given the importance of safety in the aviation industry and the significant role this industry plays in the U.S. economy. According to the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA), aerospace and defense “accounted for nine percent of all U.S. exports in domestic goods and is the nation’s third largest exporting industry.” And Boeing alone accounts for approximately 43 percent of global commercial airline industry revenues.

The SEC should:

Hold a public forum to solicit comments from various stakeholders on the impact of stock buybacks on safety and the ultimate impact on investors;
Solicit comments from airline safety organizations, pilot, flight attendant, corporate governance, institutional shareholder and other organizations on the benefits of creating independent board committees in the aviation industry to oversee safety issues; and
Issue a “Concept Release” to solicit public input on the best corporate governance models to ensure that (a) aircraft safety is a priority for aviation companies (b) internal communication about safety is unfettered and if needed, reviewed at the board level, and (c) that whistleblower protections are meaningful.

All three of these initiatives will have an impact on future aviation safety and for shareholders and other stakeholders.

For the memory of 346 innocents – crew members and passengers – in the two Boeing 737 Max crashes and in the interest of truthful and full corporate disclosure beneficial to airline passenger safety and investor well-being, I have included the following materials for your review:

Testimony of retired Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, before the House Transportation Committee, June 19, 2019;
Make Passengers Safer? Boeing Just Made Shareholders Richer. By William Lazonick, American Prospect, June 25, 2018; and
Boeing and the Importance of Encouraging Employees to Speak Up By Amy C. Edmondson, Harvard Business Review, May 1, 2019.

I look forward to your response regarding the SEC taking the above proposed actions and to the enclosed materials.

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader

P.O. Box 19312

Washington, DC 20036

cc:

Commissioner Robert J. Jackson Jr.

Commissioner Hester M. Pierce

Commissioner Elad L. Roisman

Endnotes: 

     Benjamin Bain  and Matt Robinson , “Boeing Faces SEC Investigation Into Its 737 Max Disclosures,” Bloomberg,  May 24, 2019,  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articl....
    See: Basic Inc. v. Levinson, 485 U.S. 224, 231-32 (1988) (quoting TSC Industries, Inc. v. Northway, Inc., 426 U.S. 438, 449 (1976)) (“[T]o fulfill the materiality requirement ‘there must be a substantial likelihood that the omitted fact would have been viewed by the reasonable investor as having significantly altered the ‘total mix’ of information made available.’”); see also 17 C.F.R. § 240.12b-2. For the purposes of this report, when we use the word “companies,” we are referring to those public companies subject to the registration and reporting requirements of the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.”
      Hamza Shaban, “Boeing Shareholder Files Class-Action Lawsuit, Alleges Plane Maker Concealed 737 Max Safety Risks,” Washington Post, April 10, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/busine....
      Steve Miletich, “Boeing Shareholder Files Class-Action Suit over Fallout from 737 MAX Crashes,” Seattle Times, April 10, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business....
      Michael Katz, “Boeing Faces Slew of Class-Action Suits over 737 MAX Crashes,” Chief Investment Officer, May 30, 2019, https://www.ai-cio.com/news/boeing-fa....
      Richard Seeks V. The Boeing Company, Dennis A. Muilenberg, and Gregory D. Smith, Case: 1.19-cv-02394,P.22 https://www.documentcloud.org/documen...
      Mark Matousek, “Boeing’s CEO Survived a Shareholder Vote Seeking to Prevent Him from Also Being the Company’s Board Chairman,”  Business Insider, April 29, 2019,  https://www.businessinsider.com/boein....
     Douglas MacMillan, “‘Safety Was Just a Given’: Inside Boeing’s Boardroom Amid the 737 Max Crisis,” Washington Post, May 5, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/busine....
     Dominic Gates and Steve Miletich, “Grand Jury Subpoena Shows Sweep of Criminal Probe into Boeing’s 737 MAX Certification,” Seattle Times, April 1, 2019, https://www.seattletimes.com/business....
   Amy C. Edmondson, “Boeing and the Importance of Encouraging Employees to Speak Up,” Harvard Business Review, May 4, 2019, https://hbr.org/2019/05/boeing-and-th....
   “The Facts on Trade,” Aerospace Industries Association, https://www.aia-aerospace.org/researc....
   “How Will Boeing Gain Market Share?,” Forbes, February 21, 2019, https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspe....
   Concept Release. The Commission at times issues a “concept release” to seek public input to help identify theappropriate regulatory approach, if any, prior to issuing a rule proposal. In a concept release, SEC describes the area of interest and the Commission’s concerns; identifies different approaches to address the problem; and includes a series of questions that seek the views of the public on the issue. GAO Climate-Related Risks: SEC Has Taken Steps, GAO-18-188: Published: Feb 20, 2018. Publicly Released: Mar 22, 2018 https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-18-188

 

Trump Invites Debates Over Omnivorous Crony Capitalism

By Ralph Nader

June 27, 2019

Donald J. Trump’s 2020 election strategy is to connect his potential Democratic opponents with “socialism.” Trump plans to use this attack on the Democrats even if Senator Bernie Sanders, who proudly calls himself a “democratic socialist,” doesn’t become the presidential nominee (Sanders has been decisively re-elected in Vermont).

Senator Elizabeth Warren is distancing herself from the socialist “label.” She went so far as to tell the New England Council “I am a capitalist to my bones.”

Sanders and Warren are not what they claim to be. They are both updating Roosevelt’s New Deal and more closely resemble the Social Democrats that have governed western European democracies for years, delivering higher standards of living than that experienced by Americans.

The original doctrine of socialism meant government ownership of the means of production – heavy industries, railroads, banks, and the like. Nobody in national politics today is suggesting such a takeover. As one quipster put it, “How can Washington take ownership of the banks when the banks own Washington?”

Confronting Trump on the “socialism” taboo can open up a great debate about the value of government intervention for the good of the public. Sanders can effectively argue that people must choose either democratic socialism or the current failing system of corporate socialism. That choice is not difficult. Such an American democratic socialism could provide almost all of the long overdue solutions this country needs: full more efficient Medicare for all; tuition-free education; living wages; stronger unions; a tax system that works for the people; investments in infrastructure and public works; reforms for a massive, runaway military budget; the end of most corporate welfare; government promotion of renewable energies; and the end of subsidies for fossil fuels and nuclear power.

In my presidential campaigns I tried to make corporate socialism – also called corporate welfare or crony capitalism – a major issue. Small business is capitalism – free to go bankrupt – while corporate capitalism – free to get bailouts from Washington – is really a form of corporate socialism. This point about a corporate government was documented many years ago in books such as America, Inc. (1971) by Morton Mintz and Jerry Cohen.

Now, it is even easier to make the case that our political economy is largely controlled by giant corporations and their political toadies. Today the concentration of power and wealth is staggering. Just six capitalist men have wealth to equal the wealth of half of the world’s population.

The Wall Street collapse of 2008-2009 destroyed eight million jobs, lost trillions of dollars in pension and mutual funds, and pushed millions of families to lose their homes. Against this backdrop, the U.S. government used trillions of taxpayer dollars to bail out, in various ways, the greedy, financial giants, whose reckless speculating caused the collapse.

In May 2009, the moderate Senator from Illinois, Dick Durbin, said: “The banks – hard to believe when we’re facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created – are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place.”

Is there a single federal government agency or department that can say its most powerful outside influence is NOT corporate? Even the Labor Department and the National Labor Relations Board are under more corporate power than union power.

Who better than Trump, on an anti-socialist fantasy campaign kick, can call attention to the reality that Big Business controls the government and by extension controls the people?  In September 2000, a Business Week poll found over 70 percent of people agreeing that big business has too much control over their lives (this was before the horrific corporate crimes and scandals of the past two decades). Maybe that is why support in polls for “socialism” against “capitalism” in the U.S. is at a 60 year high.

People have long experienced American-style “socialism.” For example, the publicly owned water and electric utilities, public parks and forests, the Postal Service, public libraries, FDIC guarantees of bank deposits (now up to $250,000), Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, etc.

What the public is not sufficiently alert to is that Big Business has been profitably taking over control, if not outright ownership, of these public assets.

In the new book, Banking on the People, by Ellen Brown, readers can get an idea of the way large banks, insurers, and the giant shadow banking system – money market funds, hedge funds, mortgage brokers, and other unregulated financial intermediaries – speculate and shift deep risk and their failures onto Uncle Sam. These corporate predators gouge customers, and, remarkably, show a deep aversion for productive investment as if people matter.

Moreover, they just keep developing new, ever riskier, multi-tiered instruments (eg. derivatives) to make money from money through evermore complex, abstract, secret, reckless, entangled, globally destabilizing, networks. Gambling with other people’s money is a relentless Wall Street tradition.

The crashes that inevitably emerge end up impoverishing ordinary people who pay the price with their livelihoods.

Will the Democrats and other engaged people take on Trump, a corporate welfare king himself, tries to make “socialism” the big scare in 2020? Control of our political economy is not a conservative/liberal or red state/blue state issue. When confronted with the specifics of the corporate state or corporate socialism, people from all political persuasions will recognize the potential perils to our democracy. No one wants to lose essential freedoms or to continue to pay the price of this runaway crony capitalism.

The gigantic corporations have been built with the thralldom of deep debt – corporate debt to fund stock buybacks (while reporting record profits), consumer debt, student loan debt, and, of course, government debt caused by drastic corporate and super-rich tax cuts. Many trillions of dollars have been stolen from future generations.

No wonder a small group of billionaires, including George Soros, Eli Broad, and Nick Hanauer, have just publicly urged a modest tax on the super wealthy. As Hanauer, a history buff and advocate of higher minimum wages, says – “the pitchforks are coming.”

Congressional Interns and Congress Redirections—A Meeting

By Ralph Nader

June 19, 2019

On a beautiful, breezy day last week, I spoke to a roomful of Congressional summer interns working in the House of Representatives. The subject was “Corporate Power, Congress and You.” (“You” referred to the interns as the citizenry).

I noted that they were a special group because they were willing to spend an hour listening to a talk about corporate power. I told them about how small groups of ordinary citizens became leaders in the nuclear arms control movements, the anti-tobacco drives, and consumer rights movement. I also talked about the expansion of equal rights and opportunities for people with disabilities. I took note that many of them in the room – women and people of color— would not be there if not for their predecessors’ tireless efforts to advance civil rights.

No more than one percent of Americans – sometimes far less – made the many advances in peace and justice take hold, backed by a growing public opinion.

In the 15,000 or 20,000 days these young people have, it will be their responsibility to stop the following omnicidal threats to humanity and the natural world:

Climate crisis or climate disruption, which is already wreaking havoc. A student asked me about the ‘Green New Deal’, which urges dramatic action. I recommend that they make the strong case that we must plan ahead for the sake of the planet. It will cost trillions to solarize our economy and otherwise reduce greenhouse gases, but that pales in comparison to the trillions of dollars that will have to be spent on mitigating the effects of climate catastrophe, which would fundamentally damage our fragile planet. In fact, International Renewable Energy Agency research found that transitioning to renewable energy will save between “$65 trillion and $160 trillion [between now and] 2050.”  These costs would include spending to save coastal cities from ocean over-runs and all the other violent weather patterns and convulsions in habitat coming on this fragile planet Earth.
A runaway nuclear arms race between countries, which threatens to cause untold destruction. A nuclear arms race can increase the risk of nuclear weaponry being used on innocents, whether intentionally or by accidental computerized launch. Donald J. Trump seems to think that ending our treaties with Russia (without Senate approval) regarding reduction of nuclear war heads will “make America great again.”
Global pandemics caused by mutations of viruses and bacteria are a lethal threat. Malaria, dengue fever, and transmittable deadly avian flu are just a few of the diseases that have the potential to spread further because of habitat disruption, tourism, and travel. The U.S. is spending far too little money to protect its people from such invisible disease vectors. Less than a fourth each year of what one redundant aircraft carrier (largely obsolete except for purposes of Empire force projection) costs. While Americans today might not think much of this threat, millions of Americans died in the 1919-1920 flu pandemic.
Endemic poverty and grave inequalities afflict billions of human beings. Roughly one in four children in the world suffers from chronic malnutrition, if not semi-starvation. Most will wither in pain and resignation. Some will be searching for vengeance using physical violence against the institutionalized violence of global corporations and corrupt governments taking their favors.
The emerging corporate fascistic states are dispossessing the citizenry of their rights, remedies, and facilities to organize and express their voices. The U.S. is now a maturing corporate state. Wall Street owns more of Washington and turns our government against its own people while feeding privileges, immunities and gigantic freebies and tax escapes to demanding global companies. When commercial values are allowed supremacy over citizen values, societies decline relentlessly.

I continued my remarks about how corporations have been given by the Federal Courts the same rights as human beings. Even though, neither the words “corporation” or “company” ever appear in our Constitution. Add this corporate “personhood” to the expanding privileges and immunities of corporate power, in these times of corporate crime waves, and equal justice under law between U.S. citizens and Exxon/Mobil or Pfizer or Wells Fargo is a cruel mockery.

I told the students to look at the fine print contracts they sign or click on that have taken away their precious freedom of contract and sometimes their historic right to pursue wrongdoers in court.

What is worse, youngsters grow up ‘corporate’ rather than grow up ‘civic’ – think of all the corporate ads they are subjected to that are not contradicted. Young people don’t even realize what has been stripped away from their rightful protections.

Interns are spending the summer with Congress – the smallest yet most powerful branch of government in the Constitution – where some 1,500 corporations have undermined the peoples’ delegated power. These corporations rent or own a majority of the Senators and Representatives and tell them how to vote on many serious matters.

Yet, as Patti Smith sings, the people do have the power, if they wish to exercise it. People have formidable democratic tools – they are the sovereign power, they have the vote. They own the greatest wealth in the country (vast public lands, public airwaves, and trillions of dollars in pension and mutual funds, which own the stocks of large corporations).  The peoples’ tax dollars have led to government-sponsored research and development that have spawned the major industries of our times.

Led by one percent of active citizens in their communities the people – left and right – can achieve a living wage economy, full health insurance, law and order for corporations, a fair tax system, and organizing rights for workers, consumers, and small taxpayers. We can develop solar energy capabilities quicker. Our public budgets can be redirected to critical domestic public works infrastructure and away from costly Empire building abroad.

Students informed me of their focus on electoral reforms, the use of manipulative euphemisms, and opportunities for work in civic engagement. I was encouraged.

Most picked up our materials, including the card on how to reform Congress (see ratsreformcongress.org). They left the room, I hope, with higher civic expectations for themselves.

Unpublished Letter to the Washington Post Editor

March 14, 2019

Dear Editor:

Regarding the op-ed by the Dalai Lama and Arthur C. Brooks: “All of Us Can Break the Cycle of Hatred,” March 11, 2019.

Did the Dalai Lama, with his message of love and peace, realize that Arthur C. Brooks, President of the American Enterprise Institute, runs the most concentrated center of lawless war advocates and opponents of government mandated life-saving health and safety standards in the United States? The list of these monetized, cold-blooded minds is a rogues gallery of people who, like John Bolton, Paul Wolfowitz and John Yoo, held high positions in a war crimes government, including having key roles in the Iraq catastrophe. Brooks has the gall to quote Jesus “Love your enemies” and the contagion of “warm-heartedness.”

This column gives a new dimension to brazen hypocrisy.

Sincerely,

Ralph Nader

It is Time to Rediscover Print Newspapers

By Ralph Nader

June 12, 2019

Friends often ask me why I spend so much time reading print versions of newspapers. I respond with the usual general reasons about learning what is happening, worsening or improving, in the world. I also point out that I send people helpful clippings.

Unfortunately, my responses do not get many people to expand their print newspaper reading time. Some recent topics that caught my attention might encourage you to revisit the printed version of your newspapers:

“It’s the middle of the night. Do you know who your iPhone is talking to?” The Washington Post’s Geoffrey A. Fowler says this is not true. With his screen off, he showed 5,400 hidden app trackers guzzled his data in a single week. Shame Apple and CEO Tim Cook. You lied.
“Take a Page From Kids Who Care” – The Washington Post’s Christina Barron starts with the now famous Greta Thunberg’s weekly protests on climate disruption before the Swedish Parliament and goes on to reference eight new books “in which kids engage, in ways big and small, to better the world.”
“,” by Karen Tumulty of The Washington Post. About time a writer did this. When will reporters stop being Trump’s bullhorn for his scornful, ugly nicknames, without printing rebuttals or nicknames coined by Trump critics– like “Draft-dodging Donald,” or “Lying Donald,” or “Corrupt Donald,” for example.
“MacKenzie Bezos Pledges to Give Half of her $36 billion Fortune to Charity,” by Washington Post’s Rachel Siegel. One very rich couple’s divorce may mean better lives and saving lives for many people if Ms. Bezos spends money to promote justice and we might need less charity. Her Foundation is coming.
“The Shadow Banks are back with another Big Bad Credit Bubble,” by The Washington Post’s incomparable Steve Pearlstein. With weak or no regulation of these speculators/lenders, there may be a replay of the 2008 financial crisis.
“Many teens sleep with their phones, survey finds—just like their parents” by The Washington Post’s Craig Timberg. This practice undermines “cognitive function and mental health while increasing obesity rates” and causing household conflicts.
Joshua A. Douglas is out with a key book,  Vote for US: How to Take Back Our Elections and Change the Future of Voting . Reclaiming the electoral process is crucial for our democracy and –to improve the quality of life in our country.
“Why We May all Have to Give Up Pork”—letter to the editor of The Washington Post by Patricia E. Perry. She cites documented infectious diseases and Trump’s move to sideline federal inspectors and allow even more self-inspection by the meat packers wanting to speed up the slaughter-processing assembly lines. Ugh!
“Hogan Will Not Challenge Trump, Leaving Trump’s GOP Critics with Limited Options,” by The Washington Post’s Robert Costa. Like Maryland governor Larry Hogan, other fearful, viable challengers like Senator Mitt Romney, former Ohio governor John Kasich, Arizona ex-Senator Jeff Flake, and former U.S. trade representative Carla Hills aren’t going to challenge Trump. Trump is clearing the Republican primary field with foul mouthed intimidation. No matter these Republican politicians really believe Trump is a clear and present danger to our Republic and to the future of the Republican Party. Only the laid back former governor, William Weld, has his hat in the ring.
“The NFL Has Finally Been Consumed by the Concussion Issue. Why Hasn’t the NHL?” by The New York Times’ John Branch. Consumed, that is, after years of cover-ups. The Hockey bosses literally stage fights between players kept on the team just to fight for the boisterous crowds. Head injuries have taken the lives and diminished the brain functions of scores of players over their shortened lives. This is criminal and sets a bad example for youthful amateur sports where concussions are not taken seriously enough. See our Leagueoffans.org.
“Art Festival is Welcome, But Not the Huge Crowds,” by The New York Times’Helene Stapinski. The 13th annual free “Figment Arts Festival” on Roosevelt Island is overwhelmed by 30,000 visitors. “Huge crowds forced the tram to shut down and the bridge to close, overwhelming the subway platform.” Makes you wonder why civic conferences, open free to the public, dealing with the most precious matters of livelihood, peace, and justice beg to fill the empty seats.
“If Trump Doesn’t Warrant Impeachment, Who Does?” by The Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson. It’s useful to have Robinson list many of Trump’s impeachable offenses in one place. He still left out several serious acts such as blatantly, openly dismantling the enforcement of health and safety laws in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the law and conducting illegal wars without Congressional declarations and appropriations.
“The Cybersecurity 202: Democratic Base Fired Up by Effort to Ban Internet-Connected Voting Machines.” By Joseph Marks of The Washington Post. Why not an easy solution? While we are at it, why not adopt the Canadian system of paper ballots fully counted by 11pm on election day in that vast country with no proprietary software and corrupt procurement of voting machines.
“When will the Republican Silence on Trump End?” An op-ed by William S. Cohen, former Senator from Maine and Secretary of Defense. Hmm, when will Mr. Cohen decide to practice what he preaches and run against Trump in the Republican primaries?
“Why are so many doctors burning out? Tons of real and electronic paperwork,” by Daniel Marchalik in The Washington Post. Physicians are quitting because they have too little time to practice medicine. Not so in Canada where they have Medicare for all and almost no billing nightmares for themselves and their patients.

Newspaper publishers want readers to discover that print versions of newspapers can expose you to content that you don’t already agree with or like online. You aren’t likely to go searching for an article saying “You can’t stop Robocalls, You Shouldn’t Have to.” The New York Times put Brian Chen’s article on this topic on a page for you. By reading the print edition of a newspaper, you might just see something that your online news alerts or search engine algorithms don’t automatically present.

FAA’s Boeing-biased Officials: Recuse Yourselves or Resign

By Ralph Nader

June 7, 2019

The Boeing-driven FAA is rushing to unground the notorious prone-to-stall Boeing 737 MAX (that killed 346 innocents in two crashes) before several official investigations are completed. Troubling revelations might keep these planes grounded worldwide.

The FAA has a clearly established pro-Boeing bias and will likely allow Boeing to unground the 737 MAX. We must demand that the two top FAA officials resign or recuse themselves from taking any more steps that might endanger the flying public. The two Boeing-indentured men are Acting FAA Administrator Daniel Elwell and Associate FAA Administrator for Aviation Safety Ali Bahrami.

Immediately after the crashes, Elwell resisted grounding and echoed Boeing claims that the Boeing 737 MAX was a safe plane despite the deadly crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia.

Ali Bahrami is known for aggressively pushing the FAA through 2018 to further abdicate its regulatory duties by delegating more safety inspections to Boeing. Bahrami’s actions benefit Boeing and are supported by the company’s toadies in the Congress. Elwell and Bahrami have both acquired much experience by going through the well-known revolving door between the industry and the FAA.  They are likely to leave the FAA once again for lucrative positions in the aerospace lobbying or business world. With such prospects, they do not have much ‘skin in the game’ for their pending decision.

The FAA has long been known for its non-regulatory, waiver-driven, de-regulatory traditions. It has a hard time saying NO to the aircraft manufacturers and the airlines. After the aircraft hijackings directing flights to Cuba in the 1960s and 1970s, the FAA let the airlines say NO to installing hardened cockpit doors and stronger latches in their planes. These security measures would have prevented the hijackers from invading the cockpits of the aircrafts on September 11, 2001. The airlines did not want to spend the $3000 per plane. Absent the 9/11 hijackings, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney might not have gone to war in Afghanistan.

The FAA’s historic “tombstone” mentality (slowly reacting after the crashes) is well known. For example, in the 1990s the FAA had a delayed reaction to numerous fatal crashes caused by antiquated de-icing rules. The FAA was also slow to act on ground-proximity warning requirements for commuter airlines and flammability reduction rules for aircraft cabin materials.

That’s the tradition that Elwell and Bahrami inherited and have worsened. They did not even wait for Boeing to deliver its reworked software before announcing in April that simulator training would not be necessary for the pilots. This judgment was contrary to the experience of seasoned pilots such as Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger. Simulator training would delay ungrounding and cost the profitable airlines money.

Boeing has about 5,000 orders for the 737 MAX. It has delivered less than 400 to the world’s airlines. From its CEO, Dennis Muilenburg to its swarms of Washington lobbyists, law firms, and public relations outfits, Boeing is used to getting its way. Its grip on Congress – where 300 members take campaign cash from Boeing – is legendary. Boeing pays little in federal and Washington state taxes. It fumbles contracts with NASA and the Department of Defense but remains the federal government’s big vendor for lack of competitive alternatives in a highly concentrated industry.

Right now, the Boeing/FAA strategy is to make sure Elwell and his FAA quickly decide that the MAX is safe for takeoff by delaying or stonewalling Congressional and other investigations.

The compliant Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, under Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS), strangely has not scheduled anymore hearings. The Senate confirmation of Stephen Dickson to replace acting chief Elwell is also on a slow track. A new boss at the FAA might wish to take some time to review the whole process.

Time is not on the side of the 737 MAX 8. A comprehensive review of the 737 MAX’s problems is a non-starter for Boeing. Boeing’s flawed software and instructions that have kept pilots and airlines in the dark have already been exposed. New whistleblowers and more revelations will emerge. More time may also result in the Justice Department’s operating grand jury issuing some indictments. More time would let the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, led by Chairman Peter DeFazio (D-OR) dig into the failure of accountability and serial criminal negligence of Boeing and its FAA accomplices. Chairman DeFazio knows the history of the FAA’s regulatory capture.

Not surprising on June 4, 2019, DeFazio sent a stinging letter to FAA’s Elwell and his corporatist superior, Secretary of Transportation Elaine L. Chao, about the FAA’s intolerable delays in sending requested documents to the Committee. DeFazio’s letter says: “To say we are disappointed and a bit bewildered at the ongoing delays to appropriately respond to our records requests would be an understatement.”

The FAA and its Boeing pals are using the “trade secret” claims to censor records sought by the House Committee. When it comes to investigating life or death airline hazards and crashes, Congress is capable of handling so-called trade secrets. This is all the more reason why the terminally prejudiced Elwell and Bahrami should step aside and let their successors take a fresh look at the Boeing investigations. That effort would include opening up the certification process for the entire Boeing MAX as a “new plane.”

The Boeing-biased Elwell and Bahrami have refused to even raise in public proceedings the question: “After eight or more Boeing 737 iterations, at what point does the Boeing MAX 8 become a new plane?”  Many, including Cong. David Price (D-NC), chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee, which oversees the FAA’s budget, have already questioned the limited certification process.

Heavier engines on the old 737 fuselage changed the MAX’s aerodynamics and made it prone-to-stall. It is time for the FAA’s leadership to change before the 737 MAX flies with vulnerable, glitch-prone software “fixes”.

Notwithstanding the previous Boeing 737 series’ record of safety in the U.S. during the past decade – (one fatality), Boeing’s bosses, have now disregarded warnings by its own engineers. Boeing executives do not get one, two, three or anymore crashes attributed to their ignoring long-known aerodynamic engineering practices.

The Boeing 737 MAX must never be allowed to fly again, given the structural design defects built deeply into its system.