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GM ignition switch trial cleared to begin on January 11

US District Judge Jesse Furman didn't accept General Motor's attempt to dismiss a civil trial over the automaker's faulty ignition switches, and set a January 11 start date for the case to begin, according to Reuters. The judge found that plaintiff Robert Scheuer had the evidence to proceed with the case. Scheuer was injured in an accident in his 2003 Saturn Ion in 2014 when another vehicle forced him off the road, and he crashed into some trees. The airbag didn't deploy, and Scheuer alleged this was the result of the faulty ignition switch. According to Reuters, Scheuer's trial is one of six bellwether cases over GM's ignition switch problem in the coming year. Juries' decisions in these lawsuits should provide an example of how similar trials could end, and these results would help The General decide whether to settle other pending cases or to keep fighting them. The ignition switch fiasco has already cost GM billions. For example, the company's compensation program offered $594.5 million in 399 cases of people killed or injured by the defective parts. Anyone that accepted this money agreed not to sue GM for the problem later. The company also came to a $900 million criminal settlement with the US government and paid $575 million in civil resolutions in September.

Honda wins Commercial of the Decade, but not for the ad you think [w/VIDEO]

Honda's Commercial of the Decade: "Grrr" - Click above to watch video
The mad men at Adweek recently voted for the Commercial of the Decade (Super Bowl commercials not included) and Honda took top honors over memorable ads from the last ten years by companies like Nike, Budweiser and Sony. That's not a big surprise considering Honda often puts a huge amount of effort into its on-air spots. However, the Japanese automaker didn't win for the commercial you might have expected: "Cog." Though Honda's famous commercial that breaks down a European Accord Tourer into a Rube Goldberg-esque machine was also a finalist, it was beaten by another Honda commercial called "Grrr" that's narrated by Garrison Keillor of all people. You've probably never seen it, but you can after the jump.
Volkswagen also made the list of finalists, but the particular ad chosen out of all the comical VW ads we've seen was unexpected as well. Most surprising carmaker with a commercial in the finals: Saturn. Who knew...

US database may have overstated deaths in GM ignition switch recall

The FARS analysis didn't take into account fatal accidents where the airbags weren't supposed to deploy. Earlier today, we reported that the actual death toll attributable to GM's ignition switch problem had crested the 300 mark according to new research, well up from the original reports of 12 to 13 deaths. Now, word is breaking that the US government database that informed the study that the report was based on may have significantly overstated the correlation between the study and the GM recall. The initial study was conducted by Friedman Research on behalf of the Center for Auto Safety, and used something called the US Fatality Analysis Reporting System. To recap, the study claimed that over a 10-year period, 303 people were killed in Chevrolet Cobalt and Saturn Ion coupes and sedans when their airbags failed to deploy. These undeployed airbags were then linked to GM's ignition switch recall, which as we've explained before, can turn the ignition out of the "run" position and into the "off" or "accessory" position, disabling the airbags in the process. Now, according to a report from The Detroit News, which cites research from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and the National Study Center for Trauma and EMS at the University of Maryland, the FARS analysis didn't take into account fatal accidents in conditions where the airbags weren't supposed to deploy (which isn't to say crashes and deaths weren't caused by loss of control from the ignition switching off in the GM vehicles). According to the report, this was a significant number of the cases. There is another potential problem, too. According to that same report, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration uses both FARS and another database on fatalities, called the National Automotive Sampling System/Crashworthiness Data System (NASS/CDS). Where FARS uses what the DetNews calls "not always reliable" police data to record vehicular deaths within 30 days of a crash, NASS/CDS relies on what's known as a probability sample. It collects data on 5,000 crashes each year – including some found in the FARS database – to calculate a probability figure. According to a 2009 IIHS study, "Among crashes common to both databases, NASS/CDS reported deployments for 45 percent of front occupant deaths for which FARS had coded nondeployments." In plain English, FARS doesn't provide a reliable count airbag deployments.