Janice Schakowsky

Well, let me ask you this, then, because I think it would be--help to outline for us.

Federal legislation, in fact, should not preempt State laws that address issues those States have encountered with patent trolls.

I see the rise of these entities as a serious threat to consumers and businesses all across the country.

So States have, up until now, been leaders in the effort to combat abusive patent trolls.

This is fundamentally a fairness issue.

At best, patent trolls are misleading, and at worst, they are extortionists.

With the passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, we took important steps on preventive medical coverage for free, and since the law went into effect, approximately 76 million Americans have received no-cost coverage for preventive…

So if the vaccine that we are using now has been viewed as 23 percent effective, and usually in the past it has been 50 to 60 percent effectiveness, are we seeing--maybe it is Dr. Schuchat, are we seeing a commensurate increase in the…

I think it is great that we are having this hearing today because this whole question of vaccines... has really been in the news.

I referred to in my----well, we can call it a rant----the Affordable Care Act made some significant changes that actually has reduced the cost of Medicare.

I find that repugnant----I am sorry, and my hair is on fire----to say that we should go to the elderly and the disabled in our country.

I say shame on us as a country that we can't afford to provide health care to our seniors and persons with disabilities.

And we do have an opportunity to end these worries forever.

I am also the co-chair of the Seniors Task Force of the Democratic Caucus, and I am concerned because Medicare beneficiaries currently find themselves in an all-too-familiar situation, worrying that they could lose their doctors if…

Section 3: ``No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath…

The truth is that the American people deserve better, and we are tired of really bad Wall Street giveaways being tacked on to other legislation. This looks like a Republican strategy to put Wall Street over Main Street.

I wanted to know why did this request go to Takata alone, either instead of or in addition to the manufacturers?

So in all of these particular cases, you did also give NHTSA the information?

Under the NHTSA statute, only manufacturers of motor vehicles and replacement equipment are required to decide in good faith whether their products contained a safety-related defect, and if so, to conduct a recall.

I want to go to another topic. You know that our ranking member of the full committee, Waxman, and I, had introduced new auto safety legislation this year.

OK. And in a timely way, 2004, 2007?

And let me just ask each of the manufacturers--oh, and one more question for you, Mr. Shimizu: Have any of these individuals, including yourself, been held accountable for these decisions?

So are you saying that it is only in high humidity areas that this is a problem, that that is the root cause?

So moving forward, Takata will be producing millions of replacement airbags. Are the replacement airbags that you are having installed as a result of the recall safe?

If our products are defective and supported by scientific data, we are responsible for that.