On Fri, 7 Jan 2005 12:21:39 -0500, "Daniel J. Stern"
> wrote:

>On Fri, 7 Jan 2005 wrote:
>
>> On 6 Jan 2005 18:09:19 -0800, wrote:
>>
>> >thanks for the suggestion. 1 week and $260 later my car passed the smog
>>
>> $260 is pretty cheap compared to some of the horror stories I heard
>> from failed car owners. In NJ, it seemed like the state was making
>> money from failing cars.
>
>When I was interning as an investigative reporter for the NBC-TV news
>affiliate in Denver, we ran a story about a lady who was the original
>owner of her 1981 Cadillac. It passed the tailpipe test with lots of room
>to spare, but was denied an emission sticker because the "Check Engine"
>light didn't come on when the ignition was first turned to "on". That was
>because the car had no such light, and never had. She produced ample
>documentation from the factory service manual clearly demonstrating there
>was no such light on the car, and even a letter from GM's regulatory
>compliance department stating the same. But Envirotest's infallible
>database claimed the car had such a light, so the state wouldn't budge. In
>the end, she wound up having to spend several hundred dollars to have a
>Cadillac dealership disassemble the dashboard and physically prove the
>nonexistence of any "check engine" light or space for such a light, under
>the supervision of a Colorado state agent. All in order to get a smog
>sticker for the low-original-miles, one-owner car that passed the tailpipe
>test with room to spare.
>
>DS


State running laws like this is a conflict of interest. Cars of some
of the biggest purchase a person makes, so they are some of the
biggest revenue generators for sales tax. Therefore, if you force
people to get rid of older cars faster, you have to buy more newer
ones faster.

Hmmmmmm...... sounds like a problem. Now if a slick set of lawyers
were interested in getting some money, this could be a nice lawsuit.

Just thinking.......

later,

tom @ www.MedicalJobList.com