Marisa’s Musings: Dow Plummets/Toyota Woes/Missionairies in Haiti Charged

Disappointing day on Wall Street, Toyota's recall woes continue and the American missionairies in Haiti are charged…I'm Marisa Bramwell and here's the latest from the ABC News Desk:

STOCKS SLIDE: The Dow Jones industrial tanked this afternoon amid disappointing jobless claims numbers, dipping just below 10,000 before closing at 10,002.18.  Here’s Dan Arnall: “It is the worst percentage drop for the Dow since July 2, 2009 (-2.63%). It is the worst point drop for the Dow since April 20, 2009 (-289.6). Every Dow component except Cisco (which release bullish quarterly results this morning) traded down today.”
“Anxiety about where the job market is headed was just one of the worries dragging stocks down today,” Betsy Stark reported on WORLD NEWS.  “The Dow has now dropped 700 points in a little over two weeks.  The message of the market is that investors are losing faith in the outlook for this economic recovery.”  Other factors that sent stocks down include “growing fears about the financial health of European countries, including Greece and Spain, and investors are worried that Washington will now deliver higher taxes along with bigger deficits,” Stark reports. 
Tomorrow morning the January jobs report is released at 8:30am ET.

TOYOTA WOES:  Just when you thought you heard it all – Toyota now has a problem with its well regarded hybrid, the Prius.   Once again, Brian Ross is on top of the story:  “The disclosure by Toyota officials that its highly thought of Prius had a brake and software problem, was a bombshell. And once again, Toyota has been caught failing to disclose to its customers and the government all it knows about its cars defects.” And now, Brian says, there is a whistleblower ready to crack the company’s veil of secrecy: “Dimitri Biller is a former Toyota lawyer who handled product liability lawsuits and says officials in Japan ordered cover-ups of safety issues.” Biller says Toyota was hiding, concealing and destroying evidence.   And Brian says those remarks haven’t gone over well with the automaker:  “Dimitri Biller and Toyota are now involved in their own lawsuit, with the company claiming he is violating his severance agreement by making unfounded allegations. In a two-way hook-up, Biller says the public needs to know what he saw at Toyota, citing the case of an unfavorable engineering report.”  And, there’s more – as Brian explains,:  “Safety advocates also claim Toyota has used its corporate clout to limit investigations of its runaway cars by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, NHTSA.  A former government investigator, Chris Santucci, has admitted in testimony that six months after leaving NHTSA and going to work for Toyota, he met with his former government colleagues to get them to exclude the most serious, high speed accidents from the government's investigation of electronic throttle issues.”  In the meantime, Toyota dealers have their hands full, as Kate Snow found out today:  “A lot of dealers haven't shut their doors since yesterday– they're staying open 24 hours– working to fix cars that drivers bring in, but also trying to fix the accelerator pedals on all those cars on the lot that were recalled so they can sell them.” Finally, just a short while ago, Toyota revealed it’s also investigating brake problems on its luxury Lexis hybrid, since its system is the same as the Prius.  (Thanks to Ed Bailey for this entry)

AMERICAN MISSIONAIRES IN HAITI:  Haitian officials today charged the 10 American Baptist missionaries with kidnapping and criminal association for trying to take 33 children across the border to the Dominican Republic last week.  The missionaries were expecting to leave Haiti today – their bags were packed and David Wright reports “their lawyer in the Dominican Republic had even chartered them a plane to get out.” But tonight they remain in jail, their fate uncertain.  “Bail is possible but rarely granted here,” Wright tells us.  “A verdict could come in as little as 3 months, although a magistrate has the authority to free the Americans earlier.  Worst case scenario: 15 years for each kidnapping count.  Each conspiracy count carries a maximum penalty of nine years.”  An American ambassador told ABC News this evening the State Department is working with Haitian officials about the possibility of moving their case to the US.

TEA PARTY CONVENTION:  The first Tea Party National Convention kicks off Friday in Nashville, TN.
One of the convention’s principle organizers “put together this convention to try to harness the political power of the Tea Party movement,” John Berman reported on WORLD NEWS, “a movement that helped fuel rallies and marches last summer…and helped mobilize support for Scott Brown last month in Massachusetts.”  The convention, Berman reports, includes “seminars on how to run voter registration drives” as well as ideological speeches:  “One of the scheduled speakers is giving a talk entitled ‘Correlations between the current administration and Marxist dictators in Latin America.”  The Tea Party convention concludes Saturday with keynote speaker Sarah Palin. 

SWEAT LODGE DEATHS:  Motivational speaker James Arthur Ray has pleaded not guilty to three counts of manslaughter for his role in the deaths of three participants at one of his sweat lodge ceremonies.  Ray’s being held at the Yavapai County jail on $5 million bond, and faces a minimum of three years on each count.

POTUS-DALAI LAMA:  Against the urging of Chinese leaders, President Obama will meet with the Dalai Lama later this month at the White House, his administration announced today. The Dalai Lama is scheduled to be in Washington on February 17-18. 

MCCHRYSTAL ON AFGHANISTAN SECURITY:  From Luis Martinez: “Gen. Stanley McChrystal has told reporters that the security situation in Afghanistan remains serious, but is no longer deteriorating, which is how he‘d characterized it this summer.   He says significant progress has been made on the security front, but he’s ‘not prepared to say we’ve turned a corner.’…McChrystal says he has no official metrics to back up his assessment, but he’s basing it on intuitive metrics…He says he’s not prepared to say NATO is now winning in Afghanistan, he’s confident ‘that we are going to see serious progress this year.’”  Martinez also reports that “McChrystal believes that the fight in Afghanistan is a war of perceptions, he says it’s not about how many Taliban you kill or how much land you capture…perception is very important.  That’s why, in response to this question, he said it might be unconventional, but that it was an attempt to signal to the Afghan population that ‘we are expanding security where they live.’  He added it was also to signal to the Taliban and druglords in the Marjah area ‘that it’s about to change.  If they want to fight, then obviously that will have to be an outcome, but if they don’t want to fight, that’s fine too.’” 

FDA/PEPPERED SALAMI:  The Food and Drug Administration provided an update on its investigation into the salmonella outbreak from peppered salami:  “The Food and Drug Administration, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, continues to work closely with the Rhode Island Department of Health and other states in the investigation of an outbreak of Salmonella Montevideo infections associated with certain Italian-style sausage products including salami/salame.  The CDC reports that 207 people have been infected with a matching strain of Salmonella Montevideo in at least 42 states and the District of Columbia. Recently, the CDC and public health officials in multiple states conducted an epidemiologic study by comparing foods eaten by 41 ill and 41 well persons. Preliminary analysis of this study suggested salami/salame as a possible source of illness.” 

MANDELA ANNIVERSARY:  Former South African President Nelson Mandela celebrated his 20th anniversary of being freed from prison at his home in Johannesburg Thursday.  Video of the celebration shows the leader surrounded by family, friends and political comrades as they paid tribute to him.  Mandela was released from prison February 11, 1990 after being jailed for 27 years by the apartheid government.

BROWN SWORN-IN:  Senator-elect Scott Brown was sworn-in this evening as the 41st Republican Senator, ending the Democrats’ super-majority reign in the Senate.  Brown was sworn in by Vice President Joe Biden a week earlier than planned so he could participate in upcoming Senate votes.  

WINTER STORM: Winter storm warnings are in effect for the Northeast, Mid West and mid-Atlantic region Friday.  At least 6 inches of snow is forecast to blanket the entire region, with some areas getting as much as 2 feet of snow.  According to Accuweather, the storm is expected to last less than 24 hours, meaning snow fall rates could be as high as 3 inches an hour.  Matt Hosford reports “In advance of the mid-Atlantic storm, some airlines are pre-cancelling flights and most are waiving fees for passengers who need to change travel plans.  American, Delta, US Air, Air Tran, Jet Blue, Southwest, United and Continental are all offering to waive change fees for travelers affected by this storm.”