Someone got the muda mixed up with the kaizen down there at the Toyota plant.

Before they became notorious for trying to kill their customers with evil floormats and sticky accelerators, Toyota was better known for having mastered the vehicle and subdued their employees using deep thinking tactics like those in the book "The Toyota Way."

The system (or religion) is offered up as a series of tools to get you to find purpose in what you do; to avoid wasting too much doing it (the muda); and if you're not doing it right, to get busy improving it (the kaizen). There are also many other meaningful words or mantras to make you think they build their cars using a wooden rake in a rock garden over there.

That Zen and the Art of Mass-Market Car Maintenance stuff is all good -- until the muri hit the fan. That means the people or equipment have been overloaded, or maybe over-accelerated. Last count by the maker is 8.1 million vehicles being recalled because of a sticky gas pedal. The government is now heading an investigation. These numbers do not include the problems on the 2010 Prius brakes that could stem an even bigger recall. Looks like the muri just obliterated the kaizen.

Keep reading to find out how Toyota lost sight of the 14 Principles of the Toyota Way and put a big crack in its half full glass.

The Toyota Recall will cost the car company about $2 billion. The culprit is the gas pedal, and the fix is a metal plate about the thickness (and probably cost) of a nickel that needs to slide between two parts to keep them from sticking together. But that's just the harbinger here. It's the decision to pull eight different models from the showroom and loss of sales that's costing Toyota. Hmm. Let's meditate on that.

Is quality slipping for Toyota? According to a poll on AOL Autos, 52 percent of people are not affected by the media and will still consider purchasing a Toyota. But if you map out quality over a decade, Toyota's is slowly slipping. That glass half-full has a slight crack in it.

Further polling shows 69 percent will still drive their recalled Toyotas. Toyota's advice is to keep driving unless you experience something out of the ordinary. Sorry, we missed the "if" or "when" in that statement that would give it real meaning.

We have mixed feelings about the advice. During the time of spinach contamination, we certainly didn't keep it around for wraps, salads or just to intimidate the arugula. We got rid of it. We did some kaizen of our own.

It appears Toyota is making an addendum or adding a new principle to The Way. Number 15 looks to be called the Forming of the Global Quality Task Force. In true Japanese management style, it begins with a public apology from the head duck himself, the grandson and company President Akio Toyoda with a vow to lead the team to brake and acceleration glory. The not-so-inspiring Japanese word for that is sumimasen, which translates roughly to: "Dude! I am so, so sorry. Seriously. And please tell your mom I'm sorry, too."