The problem I find with the whole episode is that it would be incredibly naive to think that only VW cheats the emission tests (as apparently also evidenced by

The problem I find with the whole episode is that it would be incredibly naive to think that only VW cheats the emission tests (as apparently also evidenced by the recent news that Fiat Chrysler also did it, with likely many other carmakers doing it as well. There was also news about Samsung cheating the emission tests on their electronic products, but that made no splash whatsoever). Though all the provisions for fining VW and sentencing those guys are theoretically sound in legal terms, I can't help but feel it highly political, just like the EU's crackdown and fines on Google, Microsoft etc. There's basically an implicit trade war and accompanying trade protectionism going on.