Warren Buffett, sleep easy

"(G.M.) is again losing market share, and its stock, of which taxpayers own 26 percent, was trading Thursday morning at $21, below the $33 price our investor in chief paid for it and below the $53 price it would have to reach to enable taxpayers to recover the entire $49.5 billion bailout."  - George Will

Simply allowing G.M. and Chrysler to declare bankruptcy would've allowed them to restructure their truly godawful union arrangments, rework their deals with suppliers, and would've let them make the multitudes of changes necessary to compete in a world that's changing every day. 

That was politically impossible. 

But somehow, some way, our investor in chief likes to declare that G.M. is "roaring back". 

Incredible. 

Please, please, please somebody make Barack Obama stay at home

Remember that William H. Macy movie called "The Cooler"? 

Macy plays a degenerate gambler whose luck is so bad that Alec Baldwin, playing a casino owner, actually pays him to sit down next to other gamblers who are on winning streaks.  Macy's mere presence at the table is enough to chase good luck away.   

If Barack Obama ever walks into a casino when I'm playing blackjack, I'm gone. 

First, Obama appeared at solar panel manufacturer Solyndra, praising them and their products for leading the way into the new, green, wholesome, stimulus-funded, just freakin' awesome future.  Solyndra went bankrupt. 

Then came LightSquared.  Obama himself was an early investory in the company.  Now there are nasty allegations that folks at the White House encouraged an Air Force general to change his sworn testimony about the company's finances.  LightSquared isn't bankrupt yet, but it is getting ugly.  If you need the White House to destroy your competitors, you're probably about two laps away from the drain. 

I won't bore you with all the failed "stimulus" boondoggles.  Let's get to the latest financial misadventure of this deluded little man who just happens to have access to your money to your great-grandchildren's credit cards. 

And that would be the Chevy Volt.  The taxpayer subsidy on each of these little go-carts is already set at $10,000.00 each.  We've already had to save G.M. from bankruptcy. 

Here's an enthusiastic video of "The Cooler" at the G.M. Hamtramck plant making a victory lap around a Chevy Golf Cart that needs a new $9,000.00 battery every five years.  (And the old battery is hell to get rid of in an environmentally responsible way.  I'm not a greenie, but I do care about taking care of the earth, avoiding negative externalities, etc.)  A Fresh Coat Of Whitening to Michelle Malkin for the link to this video, BTW. 



Flash forward two years.  Here's the Detroit Freep:

General Motors has told 1,300 employees at its Detroit Hamtramck that they will be temporarily laid off for five weeks as the company halts production of the Chevrolet Volt and its European counterpart, the Opel Ampera.


“Even with sales up in February over January, we are still seeking to align our production with demand,” said GM spokesman Chris Lee.

"Aligning our production with demand".  What a glorious statement.  That was the problem faced by the last buggy-whip manufacturer.  The makers of New Coke also had to deal with aligning production with demand.  Ditto for the producers of Milli Vanilli's last CD.  Kodak recently failed to align production with demand.  When you fail to align production with demand, you go broke.  That's what generally happens when politicians try to "produce" with stolen money.  They have no freakin' clue what consumers "demand".  One thing they don't demand is the Chevy Volt. 

Lee said employees were told Thursday that production would put on hold from March 19 to April 23.


The Chevrolet Volt, an extended-range electric car, is both a political lightning rod and a symbol of the company’s technological capability.


Chevrolet sold 1,023 Volts in the U.S. in February and has sold 1,626 so far this year.


In 2011, Chevrolet sold 7,671 Volts, but fell short of its initial goal of 10,000.


GM had planned to expand production of its Volt plug-in hybrid to 60,000 this year, with 45,000 earmarked for the U.S.

At 1,626 for the year, they're on pace to sell about 9,500.  IF people aren't scared away by the exploding batteries.  Did you know that the batteries explode?  Here's what it looks like when you leave a Volt in your garage unattended for a week:

 
Last fall, the GM and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration spent several weeks trying to explain why two Volts whose batteries were punctured caught on fire after sitting around for at least a week.


NHTSA determined that the range-extended electric Volt is as safe as any gasoline-powered vehicle on the road.


GM said on Jan. 5 that it would improve the structure and battery-coolant system of the Volt sedan to protect it better against fires after crashes.


The incident also was the subject of a congressional hearing in January that included testimony from GM CEO Dan Akerson.


“We did not design the Volt to become a political punching bag and that’s what it’s become,” Akerson told Congress on Jan. 25.

Sorry dude.  The only reason your product exists is politics. 
Now you've been visited by "The Cooler". 
You're doors are going to close. 
Man, I used to love my Chevy pickup.  This is a shame. 

The picture of the Chevy Volt fire came from here.  The cartoon of all the Chevy Volt subsidies came from here.  The propaganda below came from the White House website. 

Coincidence??

69% of Americans believe that it is likely that scientists have falsified Global Warming / Cooling / Climate Change research. 

In related news, GM sold only 125 Chevy Volts last month. 

The "Green At All Costs" Chevy Volt

Go here for a brilliant analysis of Government Motors' new Chevy Volt.  In the words of the email that brought this to my attention,  This was printed in the New York Times!  How bad have things gotten when Bammy can't even trust Pravda on the Hudson to shill for him anymore?

GENERAL MOTORS introduced America to the Chevrolet Volt at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show as a low-slung concept car that would someday be the future of motorized transportation. It would go 40 miles on battery power alone, promised G.M., after which it would create its own electricity with a gas engine. Three and a half years — and one government-assisted bankruptcy later — G.M. is bringing a Volt to market that makes good on those two promises. The problem is, well, everything else.


For starters, G.M.’s vision turned into a car that costs $41,000 before relevant tax breaks ... but after billions of dollars of government loans and grants for the Volt’s development and production. And instead of the sleek coupe of 2007, it looks suspiciously similar to a Toyota Prius. It also requires premium gasoline, seats only four people (the battery runs down the center of the car, preventing a rear bench) and has less head and leg room than the $17,000 Chevrolet Cruze, which is more or less the non-electric version of the Volt.

In short, the Volt appears to be exactly the kind of green-at-all-costs car that some opponents of the bailout feared the government might order G.M. to build. Unfortunately for this theory, G.M. was already committed to the Volt when it entered bankruptcy. And though President Obama’s task force reported in 2009 that the Volt “will likely be too expensive to be commercially successful in the short term,” it didn’t cancel the project.

You know, somebody should have known this would happen before we put all this money into it.

Oh wait, we did.

Are we going to give Toyota the benefit of another show trial?

So are we going to have another show trial? 



Are we going to reimburse Congress's GM and Chrysler's competitors? 

Is Obama going to set up a slush fund escrow account to pay off Toyota dealers, mechanics, and salesmen because of the harm done to their business, kinda like we're doing for the victims of the BP oil spill?  Is Obama going to call Reid and Pelosi into the White House, and tell them how much they're going to set aside for their victims? 

I don't think so. 

Oh well.  You can go here for details.  Old people tend to confuse the gas pedal with the brake.  Move along, people.  Nothing to see here. 

Government Motors vs Toyotas that discriminate against the elderly

You may have witnessed the Government Motors Board of Directors grilling the upper management of Toyota a few days ago.   

Here's Theodore Frank, writing in The Washington Examiner.  It seems that the Toyotas with the accelaration problems tend to discriminate against the elderly. 

In the 24 cases where driver age was reported or readily inferred, the drivers included those of the ages 60, 61, 63, 66, 68, 71, 72, 72, 77, 79, 83, 85, 89—and I’m leaving out the son whose age wasn’t identified, but whose 94-year-old father died as a passenger.

These “electronic defects” apparently discriminate against the elderly, just as the sudden acceleration of Audis and GM autos did before them. (If computers are going to discriminate against anyone, they should be picking on the young, who are more likely to take up arms against the rise of the machines and future Terminators).
But Toyota is being mau-maued by Democratic regulators and legislators in the pockets of trial lawyers—who, according to the Associated Press, stand to make a billion dollars from blaming Toyota for driver error.
And that is before hundreds of past run-of-the-mill Toyota accidents that killed or injured people are re-classified in future lawsuits as an electronics failure in an attempt to win settlements against the company.

So why are G.M.'s owners so enthusiastic about orchestrating a full-blown witch hunt against Toyota?  Well, after saving G.M. and Chrysler from bankruptcy, and taking a bazillion dollars in donations from the UAW, it probably seemed like the most logical step.   

Say No To Government Motors

Parodies like this one have been around since the early days of the bailouts.



But I always wondered when legit marketing efforts would appear.
Go here for details.

Iowahawk takes over the GM marketing department

This is a continuation of the previous post.
I've been having these recurring dreams about going to the final G.M. bankruptcy auction in the year 2014. These dreams have been curiously episodic, with each one beginning where the previous dream ended.....

As I wonder how I'm going to explain spending two grand on a "Hillary" doormat, I begin to wonder what it was that finally put G.M. out of business in 2014. Was it the fact that design changes had to go through the Deparment Of Commerce? Was it the Imperial Decree from President (of the U.S.) Obama to the President (of G.M.) Obama that all vehicles must get 83 miles per gallon? Was it the lawsuit over red cars not being "green" enough?

One of the many, many reasons for the G.M. bankruptcy: They didn't have a decent marketing department. The ads were curiously unappealing, despite being produced by my online friend Iowahawk. Check out this one, about the Pelosi GTxi SS/RT Sport Edition:



I woke up at 4:14 this morning, screaming about the horror of late 1970's dance moves.
I've got to stop obsessing over this. Yes, the president of the United States has fired the President of General Motors.
Yes, he knows nothing about running a car company.
And no, it can't possibly end well.
Their problems are not my problems. Deep down inside, I know this. Its just the principle of the thing. Presidents shouldn't install themselves as CEO of corporations whose donors are in trouble.
Am going to try Vicodin, just to see if the dreams stop.

I Have A Dream ! (And Buy Some Stuff I Don't Need)

This is a continuation of the previous post.
I've been having these recurring dreams about going to the final G.M. bankruptcy auction in the year 2014.


These dreams have been curiously episodic, with each one beginning where the previous dream ended.....


In my dream, I wipe my feet on the Hillary doormat and go into the former office of General Motors' CEO Barack Obama.

GM's President Obama had the strangest career path in automotive history. From his early days as a failed community organizer, then his unremarkable tenure as a constitutional law professor, to his generic stay in the Illinois state senate, and a brief pit stop at the U.S. Senate., Obama finally used all of his non-experience as a launching pad to become leader of the free world for about six months.

But what Obama really wanted to do was make cars. Using his status as president of a less vital organization to mount his hostile takeover, Obama forced Rick Wagoner, GM's Old School president, to resign.

Then Obama started rebuilding every element that mattered in the GM organization - the union, the lobbyists, the environmental compliance officers, the get-out-the-vote specialists, the Card Check goons, the retirees' pension fund administrators, the rent seekers, the UAW liaisons, and the company logo.

Judging by campaign contributions from employees and vendors, things went well at first. But then it became necessary to sell some cars, and the government could only purchase so many for itself. So the government began issuing new coupons to low income families. These coupons were good for Agricultural College staples like eggs and cheese, or could be traded in for a Chevy Cavalier.

Within a few months, middle schoolers were calling all GM products "Loser Cruisers". No amount of marketing (Tipper Gore was brought in for a YouTube video in a failed attempt to revive the GTO) could restore any level of coolness to GM automobiles.

There was a failed re-branding campaign....

....and then the company continued its sad slow decline.

I slid into the chair behind Obama's desk, and put my feet up. To my left was the famed trophy case, still containing Hillary's pride and Larry Summers' integrity. To my right was a large bookcase displaying titles like CEO For Dummies, Auto Design For The Complete Idiot, and several hundred copies of Dreams Of My Father. The office had a massive picture window looking out over the now-quiet assembly line, and I could barely hear the auctioneer droning away.

How sad it would have to be, to work one's entire life to become President of a major car company, only to have it go out of business.

I make a note to bid on the trophy case, and go back into the hallway toward the production floor. The auctioneer is on a rolling platform, obviously frustrated that there is no longer a market for much of what he is selling....

"Ok, let's move on to the next lot," he says. "Who'll give me three million dollars for this inline paint system? Who'll give me two million? Somebody start us off. One million? 500K? Somebody get us going...."

Mr. China looks at his shoes. Mr. Japan heads to the restroom.

"What do you want to pay for this system? Somebody start us off. It cost 40 million when they installed it in the nineties. Who'll start us off at fifty thousand?"

Mr. China says something about not having enough carbon credits. Mr. Taiwan is unseen, remaining the silent online bidder. They both look at me, and I have to explain that I'm not registered with the cap-and-trade system. Eventually I offer $500, out of guilt more than anything else, and the auctioneer immediately says "Sold". If I'm lucky, I'll clear enough from a scrap dealer to purchase a McDonald's Value Meal.

No one bids on the welders. They emit gases into the atmosphere.

No one bids on the shears or machining centers. The insurance is too expensive. Lawsuits waiting to happen.

No one bids on the giant punch presses - they're now White Elephants. With permits, fees, sin taxes, and other regulations, no one can afford to drive any of the large cars this machine once created. Most new model 2014 cars are small enough to be made on an anvil.

The auction goes on and on, with most of the lots going unsold, or selling for pennies on the dollar. And then I find myself raising my hand for one more irrational purchase.

I woke up at 6:00 this morning, wondering how I was going to explain paying $2,000 for a "Hillary" doormat. Thank God it was a dream. I get a feeling I'm going to dream about this damn auction again tonight.

The G.M./Obama logo came from Black & Right, an African-American blogger who makes me seem calm and reasonable. The Obama cap was emailed from The Moxie Mom.

I Have A Dream ! (of General Motors in 2014)

I go to a lot of auctions.
A few of these are held at workplaces that are selling off surplus equipment, but most of the time the company has simply gone bankrupt. Auctions are the best way to determine fair market value when selling assets to pay back creditors.

At some point during the sale, I usually find some excuse to visit the CEO's office, sit down in the chair from which he directed his vast empire, and wonder what went wrong.

Some places suddenly go under with 6 months' worth of orders still waiting to be manufactured. Others are slowly starved out of existence. Sometimes, there's a lawsuit that shuts them down.

Occasionally I can stroll through the maintenance area and understand the big picture. There will be a vast collection of hot rods, boats, classic cars, 4WD hunting vehicles, plus lots of other toys the owner purchased with company funds. Never a good sign.

Last night, I had a dream....

I'm walking down Highway 360 in Arlington, Texas. It's sometime in the year 2014.

The weather is pleasant, considering that the earth is supposed to already be past Al Gore's "Tipping Point" in 2014.

I follow the "General Motors Auction" signs to a vast factory.....

The parking lot isn't very crowded, considering that billions of dollars worth of equipment is about to change hands. Several of G.M.'s infamous 48-year old retirees are milling around the entrance.

"Want to buy our pensions?" one of them asks. "Sorry, but I'm already on the hook for them," I apologize.

I fight my way past several Union Organizers who are still trying to register passersby for Card Check, and am surprised to see that there's no waiting line at the registration table.

This is unusual.

I give the clerk my business card, and a letter of credit for $350 million dollars. (Remember, its the year 2014, and the bailout and stimulus money has now infiltrated our financial system. It now takes at least fifty grand to get a pizza delivered.)

"Here's your auction catalog and bidder number," says the clerk. "You'll be bidder number 4."

"There are only three other bidders here?" I ask.

"Well, the gentleman from China registered yesterday, the Japanese representative arrived sometime this morning, and the Taiwanese government is bidding online. This could be your lucky day !"

I walk past the registration desk toward the famed G.M. assembly line. It's a manufacturing geek's paradise. There are robotic welders that could weld Juicy Fruit wrappers to a Coke can. There are massive punch presses that could stamp a block of steel into a Chevy Tahoe. These machines demand respect and reverence as you approach them. These are the machines that made the parts for Buicks, Cadillacs, Saabs and Saturns.

I'm walking down the assembly line that for the last five years has manufactured the Michelle 4x4, the Sasha 401K, the new GTO (Malia edition), and the Biden Gaffemaster convertible. Incredible.


With nothing on the assembly line but chassis assemblies, it's hard to tell what particular car was in production when the line shut down. Possibly the Geithner Evader 4.0

"All right, everyone, it's time to get started," I hear the auctioneer say.
This is surreal. There's no one in the plant but the Chinese bidder, the Japanese bidder, and me.

"We're here this morning to sell off the assets of the General Motors Arlington Texas Facility, at the request of the United States Government and President Barack Obama. Getting a facility of this size ready for an auction isn't easy, and we're thankful for all the help and cooperation we've received from General Motors President and CEO, unhhh, Barack Obama."

"All goods are sold 'as is, where is, and with all faults noted', and all sales are final. You will have 10 days to remove your purchases from the factory unless you are high bidder on the building and surrounding real estate. The real estate is part of a package bid that will include The George W. Bush/Texas Rangers Ballpark, the Dallas Cowboys' Arlington Stadium, the Jerry Jones Triumphal Arch, and several other bankrupt taxpayer-funded boondoggles."

"Any questions before we begin?" the auctioneer asks. "Good. Let's get started. Lot #1 is a Kyoto brand emissions tester....Who'll give me $50,000 Who'll start the bidding at $50,000?"

I wander away, leaving the Chinese, Japanese, and Thai bidders to fight it out for the regulatory equipment. I look into the design rooms. The progression from drafting tables to Autocad to Solidworks to Feng Shui Lao Tzu (3.0) has made these auctions a lot less interesting. There are never any leftover drawings to burrow through. But I do find a clay mockup of the prototype Lewinsky Hummer, a model that never made it into production. Everyone said it sucked.

I journey down another hallway, trying to find President Obama's office. This is one of those dreams where each hallway leads to another. I go past the Office Of Regulatory Oversight. I see the Office Of Parallel Authority. I accidentally wander into the lair of the U.S. Government Dispensers Of Red Tape, whose jobs required them to keep the U.S. Government Red Tape Elimination Bureau in business and running at full capacity. I spend an hour trying to find my way out of the Department Of Diversity, the Chamber Of Change, and the Hall Of Hope. Everywhere I look are papers. Filing cabinets full of papers. Reports about papers. None of them have anything at all to do with making cars. The auctioneer's voice begins to fade in the distance as my walk carries me closer and closer to Waco, Texas.

Finally, I see what I'm looking for. At the end of the hallway is a door labeled "Barack Obama, CEO, General Motors". I wipe my feet on the "Hillary" doormat, and go inside.

I just woke up and hit my alarm clock. This dream will probably continue tonight.

Photos from here and here.

The Weekly Radley and Congressman Eric Massa and two fuel cell cars and two SUV's

Let's start with someone calling himself HydroKevin, at the Hydrogen Cars Now website, who has blessed us with this heartwarming story.

Eric Massa, a new Congressman from upstate New York is driving a Chevy Equinox Fuel Cell vehicle today from his home in Corning to Washington DC for the swearing-in ceremony. The Democratic Congressman is making the 282-mile trip to promote the creation of green energy jobs in the 29th district where the Equinox FCV is currently being produced (Honeoye Falls).
According to Massa, “Taking this GM electric fuel cell car to Washington reflects all that I will stand for as your representative - creating good jobs in western New York, breaking our addiction to foreign oil, taking meaningful steps toward addressing global warming, and getting our economy back on the road to success. I look forward to being sworn into office on Tuesday so we can get to work.”
Massa is a former Republican who decided to turn Democrat because of his opposition to the Iraq War. On Capitol Hill, Congressman Massa is also interested in gaining a position on the House Transportation Committee. (emphasis mine)
So far the journey is going well for the Congressman interested in promoting green energy. At least he learn a lesson from the Big 3 Automaker CEO’s and didn’t take a private corporate jet to Washington to talk about alternative fuels at the swearing-in ceremony.

But Radley Balko gave us this addition to the story in the latest issue of Reason magazine. Keep the giggles to yourself, please:

"The problem was that the distance between those two points is 280 miles, and the car's range tops out at 250.
So Massa drove one fuel cell car to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and had an SUV tow a second fuel cell car behind him. He then switched cars and continued to the nation's capital while the SUV towed the first car back to Corning. Once Massa arrived in Washington, D.C., in the second fuel cell car, a second SUV towed that car back to Corning.
In other words: To make a point about conservation and energy efficienty, Massa made the equivalent of three trips from Corning to D.C., two of them involving an SUV."

HydroKevin, please take note.....The point of the Green movement is to acquire Green government subsidies for your business. Nothing more. Please stop acting like it is for real. Please. It bothers those of us who know better.



And I think those of us in the freight, shipping, and logistics industry should do whatever is necessary to get Eric Massa onto that House Transportation Committee. With thinking like that, business will boom. Fuel cell vehicle backhauls, anyone?

pic of the green dollars from here (worth reading, BTW)

A heartfelt prayer for General Motors

Dear God,

You remember that day about 15 years ago when I almost bought that little Chevy pickup, but went with the less expensive Ford Ranger?
I want to thank you for that day. I had to go against everything my father taught me when I bought a Ford instead of a Chevy. Looking back, I can see that it was your hand that guided me. I'm truly not worthy.

Please be with the people who own not only Chevys, but also Buicks, Pontiacs, Saturns, and Cadillacs. They're going to have a hard time getting replacement parts. Not because the company has gone under, and their patents sold off to competitors, but because Barack Obama is now running General Motors. And he's never even been the cashier supervisor at a Taco Bell.

They can't even staff the Treasury. Please help them, God.


Wait, I take that back. Please, please, please don't help them. They don't need encouragement. But thy will be done.

Our government, which runs the post office, V.A. hospitals, and the Department of Motor Vehicles, has taken over the world's largest auto manufacturer, in hopes of making it more "lean, mean, and competitive". Lord Jesus come quickly, for no one here appreciates irony.

They're also going to give us vouchers to encourage us to buy more cars. Each voucher will be worth $3,000 to $5,000. But is there anything worse for the environment than cars? "The earth lies polluted under its inhabitants; for they have transgressed laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant." (Someplace in Isaiah, I think....) And yet, we will soon be paying more for everything but cars in order to protect the environment. Save us from this wicked generation, O God.

Thank you for the United Auto Workers Union. May they all find jobs with my enemies, so they can do for them what they've done for G.M.

God, please be with Rick Wagoner, the G.M. Chief Executive Officer who Obama forced to resign. Thank you for setting Wagoner up with a $20,000,000.00 severance package. When I first heard the news, I was afraid that I would have to bring Wagoner and his family some canned goods and used clothing from the church. You truly work in mysterious ways your wonders to perform.

God, please give us the wisdom to know the difference between the words "Socialism" and "Fascism", and let us know which one we're approaching.


We ask these things in the name of The Obamessiah, The Chosen One, & "The Teleprompter Jesus",


Amen.

P.S. - I don't mean to dance on the graves of any company, God, but if the G.M. plant in Arlington shuts down??? When they have the auction do you think you could get me a good deal on some more freight scales and stretch wrap machines? Not a big deal; I'm just wondering.