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The investigation is tied to an incident on an Alaska Airlines flight in early January. Boeing also told a Senate panel that it cannot find a record of the work done on the Alaska plane.

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[–] [email protected] 149 points 9 months ago (2 children)

If it's anything like other criminal inquiries in this country, they will find the lowest paid chump on the totem pole to pin all the blame on while the C-Suite once again walks away with Golden god damned Parachutes.

[–] orclev 62 points 9 months ago (4 children)

It's optimistic to assume they'll even bother finding someone in the company guilty even if it's some low level chump. I don't actually expect anyone to be found guilty in this whole thing. The only time corporations in this country actually suffer repercussions for their actions is when they cost shareholders significant money Enron style.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 9 months ago

This is absolutely right. The worst case scenario in these situations is a settlement with no admission of fault.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

I think even this isn't as hurtful to major shareholders - the ones that have decisionmaking power - as you'd hope. They typically have more information and pay more attention than the small fish. They'd offload their shares earlier, for longer, as to not disturb the price too much, leaving the remainder to hold the bag once shit hits the fan. The stock market enables that. They've extracted a shit ton of money by steering the company over the last couple of decades. The ones that would really bear the brunt are the shareholders that never had any decisionmaking power, and the company's workers.

[–] Kill_John_Lennon 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Or when they’re foreign companies.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Oh I'm sure their Legal team will get QA people to do a full audit trail to find out who was on shift at the assembly line and blame them.

[–] SpaceNoodle 8 points 9 months ago (8 children)

Just this country? Remember the diesel scandal at VW?

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[–] FlyingSquid 120 points 9 months ago (4 children)

I assume Boeing's response to this criminal inquiry will be a stock buyback.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 9 months ago (2 children)

How else will their stock price go up amidst all this controversy lol.

Accountability should be held at the top. If they can benefit from cost cutting that can potentially kill people through negligence, they need to face criminal consequences for doing so.

[–] Zron 16 points 9 months ago

Not potentially.

MCAS did kill several hundred people just a few years ago.

A system Boeing put in place and snuck past regulators specifically to deploy a cheaply developed product that could compete with airbus.

The executives at Boeing already have blood on their hands. They should have faced manslaughter charges for the 2 flights that went down due to MCAS.

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[–] rockSlayer 16 points 9 months ago

Only after they lay off the subcontracted QA department

[–] FenrirIII 14 points 9 months ago

Increase their lobbying budget too

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

Oh Mr Oliver, thank you for imparting your wisdom.

[–] orclev 56 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (5 children)

Sadly nothing Boeing has done is criminal in the US even though it absolutely should be. It's just the bog standard corporate pursuit of profit at the expense of all else. Cutting corners, ignoring safety, rushing everything, and all with fewer people to do the work than are necessary. If Boeing is found criminally guilty for that half the corporations in the US are in trouble.

No, this is just political theater, much like the TSA is. Boeing has fucked up enough that people are starting to take notice, so this is just a little reminder to them that they need to stop fucking up quite so publicly. The executives will sweat a little, temporarily improve things, and then go right back to their usual bullshit in a year or two when things calm down. Worst case scenario they'll put out a series of BP style "We're sorry" videos where they emphasize how much quality and safety supposedly mean to them.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

much like the TSA is

While mostly true, the TSA was also a stealth jobs program for flunkies who couldn't get jobs anywhere else (and to help Bush pump his jobs numbers, which were abysmal). You kind of have to be a motivated fucking idiot to spend every day undermining the fourth amendment and acting like you're doing a service to society. Especially with all the evidence of TSA agents using their authority to just outright steal shit. They're not hiring the best, and everyone knows that they hire the worst of the worst for these jobs, so it's hard to even call it "theater" anymore when everyone sees right through it. Hypernormalization.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

While you're correct in your assessment, I'd like to remind people to not be assholes to TSA when they're going through security. They're people just trying to do their jobs like the rest of us. It's a shit job with no recognition and a ton of public contact. The agents aren't there because they want to stomp on your rights; they have bills to pay and people to take care of.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

Being assholes to them is irrational, they can be more of a nuisance to you than you can be to them. However I disagree people doing those jobs deserve any respect, doing evil because it's a job and it pays and they can't think of anything better… that doesn't mean it suddenly becomes acceptable. The pawns don't feel like they're responsible for abuses.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 9 months ago (7 children)

Sadly nothing Boeing has done is criminal in the US even though it absolutely should be.

I doubt that you know whether Boeing has or has not broken any laws.

[–] orclev 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

OK, well nothing there's anything public about anyway. It's always possible they've been embezzling or I don't know, running a drug smuggling ring out of their warehouses, but nothing they've probably done is illegal. Remember this is all just a response to the multiple accidents related to manufacturing defects in their planes. At this moment the worst charge they're looking at is maybe criminal negligence.

[–] meco03211 7 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Cover up is where I'd put money. Supplying a federal agency with falsified documents or otherwise lying would start getting into criminal territory. Though I agree that we, the public, have no evidence of that.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

The FAA and the DOJ are not the same as TSA. Not at all.

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[–] Tronn4 43 points 9 months ago (4 children)

Slap on the wrist incoming

[–] a9249 5 points 9 months ago

Yeah thats about the extent of consequences for American corps.

[–] werefreeatlast 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The CEO of Boeing is running for president!

[–] werefreeatlast 7 points 9 months ago

Can't be sued right now, he's running for president....20 years later... still running for president....

[–] UnderpantsWeevil 3 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Slap on the wrist? More likely they'll get the Federal Legislature to send in another multi-billion dollar bail-out.

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[–] Aceticon 34 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

Somehow I doubt American Ju$tice will jail the executive who went laughing all the way to bank with the bonuses they made from cutting corners in design, manufacturing and QA, cutting costs down to the bone and using Boeing employees acting as in-house FAA "representatives" to self-certify the pieces of junk Boeing now makes.

(As somebody else pointed out, the deaths attributable to such practices, namelly in the MCAS debacle, should've been treated as manslaughter).

[–] UnderpantsWeevil 7 points 9 months ago

Its a functional state-financed monopoly that isn't owned or operated by the state and gets to charge taxpayers an absurd markup per unit by passing every expenditure through half a dozen shell companies that each get to squeeze out profit on the margins.

But hey, we get the latest in aviation technology, right? Not like they're just churning out lemons that fall apart in midair.

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[–] anarchy79 33 points 9 months ago (14 children)

I'm making four flights soon with the Boeing 737 Max 8. I'm sure the software is probably all updated and debugged properly.

[–] anarchy79 14 points 9 months ago

I also took an iPad course.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's never too late to write your will. Just don't take it with you, leave it with a close reltive.

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[–] TheBat 9 points 9 months ago
[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Boeing assures you everything is properly debugged. Only known issues is that the engines could explode if the anti-icing is accidentally turned on, but the pilots have got a foolproof plan to avoid killing everyone with the flip of a switch:

Post-it note in cockpit saying "ENGINE Anti-Ice 5 mins"

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

The likelihood that there will be anything wrong with your flights is minuscule. A hundred thousand planes fly around the Earth every single day and they almost never have any issues.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Trust me bro.

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[–] werefreeatlast 24 points 9 months ago

Rosie the riveter is getting old and can't keep up with the assembly speed...

2 years jail for Rocie for riveting slowly

2 weeks community service for the CEO who required managers to push Rocie faster

I'm a manager, so I'm pretty sure we're blameless lol.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 9 months ago (6 children)
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[–] UltraMagnus0001 11 points 9 months ago (5 children)

I wonder if John Oliver had anything to do with it by bringing attention.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 9 months ago

Nah, the door blowing off the airplane was world news. The 2 Boeing crashes a handful of years ago were world news. It's a massive American company. The writing has been on the wall for a while.

[–] repungnant_canary 12 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Ummm, it's a long going story which John reported quite late actually

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago

There was a documentary about Boeing that was very detailed and it was largely ignored. Oliver's platform helped get the problem the attention it deserved.

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[–] PMFL 5 points 9 months ago

Well you can trust them, kuf, kuf...

Boeing 777 weel fall off:

https://youtu.be/BeGo79nRMwU?si=S_9Of9EJyhTNhSrY

Boeing 737 Max 8 leanding gear colapse:

https://youtu.be/BeGo79nRMwU?si=S_9Of9EJyhTNhSrY

[–] phoneymouse 3 points 9 months ago

I’m sure their accountant CEO will know how to fix all their engineering problems.

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