First it was stuck throttles supposedly caused by floormats. Then it was electronic failures of drive-by-wire throttles. Then it was brake problems. The reports of Toyota's monumental screw-ups keep rolling in. Now we have a report of a runaway Toyota Prius needing a highway patrol car to stop it from 94 mph, apparently from (again) sudden, uncontrollable acceleration. The death toll supposedly stands at 52.

Now, I could make a joke here and say you get what you deserve for buying Japanese or if you're unemployed and hungry, you can eat your foreign car. But I won't. What I wonder is where do you separate fact from fiction? When Audi was accused of runaway acceleration in the ’80s, it turned out to be a bunch of BS. Same for rollover Explorers and Firestone tires. Both were caused by driver error.

But when 52 people are dead and the problem continues and Toyota keeps stonewalling the government investigators, I smell a rat.

Anyone who has owned a hot rod has had a throttle stick at one time or another. I've never crashed because of it, but I don't trust the average driver to know how to react in such a situation—most are too busy drinking coffee, eating and talking or texting to be bothered with driving in the first place. It's definitely a strange situation.