Psychobabble from HHS Secretary Leavitt

A White House panel studying ways to improve import safety said the U.S. should shift to a preventive system focused on risky products, conceding that the U.S. can never inspect enough foreign goods to protect consumers from every potentially harmful item.

Under such a system, the government would collect data from private and public sources, identify safety hazards along the entire "life cycle" of the imported products and manage the risk earlier in the import process

"It's a change from an intervention-focused strategy to a risk-based approach focused on prevention with verification," said Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, who heads the panel of senior officials from 12 federal agencies. "Instead of a point-in-time assessment at the border, we're recommending a focus on the full import life cycle, building safety into the products that we purchase every step of the way."

What does this mean? "Full import life cycle". It sounds expensive.

How about this: "here are new safety guidelines you must meet. Importer: You must provide us a piece of paper from one of these registered testors, and we will allow your merchandise out of customs." No "intervention-focused strategy", no "full import life cycle, building safety into products", just a piece of paper that shows that you have tested a certain percentage of the products in your container and the lead count is low.

This creates jobs for enterprising Americans in the testing business (we already do it for many products - wood floors, scales) and forces manufacturers to internalize costs that have contributed to an artifically low import price.