Monday, March 30, 2009

Government Motors


The whole GM business just stinks.

We, of course, learned over the weekend that GM CEO Rick Wagoner would be stepping down. Then we learn that it was at the behest of The White House. Now I don't care WHO the president is, this is just wrong.

I know that Bush opened the door for this with the initial bailout of the auto makers. I'm referring to the December bailout, the one AFTER the election, the one he consulted with Obama on during that smoothest transition EVAH, and the one approved by the Democratic congress. Most conservatives, myself included, were against the bailout from the git-go, as my mother would say, but again, water under the bridge at this point.

So here we are with Barack Obama guaranteeing your warranty.

" If you buy a car from Chrysler or General Motors, you will be able to get your car serviced and repaired just like always. Your warranty will be safe. In fact, it will be safer than it's ever been because starting today the United States government will stand behind your warranty.
"

Well don't we all feel better!

Obama has never run anything more complicated than a pencil sharpener; how are we to take solace in the fact that he is now de facto CEO for GM? Because he feels your pain.

"I’d like to speak directly to all those men and women who work in the auto industry or live in countless communities that depend on them. Many of you have been going through tough times for longer than you care to remember, and I won’t pretend that the tough times are over. I can’t promise you there isn’t more difficulty to come.

But what I can promise you is this: I will fight for you. You are the reason I’m here today. I got my start fighting for working families in the shadows of a shuttered steel plant. I wake up every single day asking myself, what can I do to give you and working people all across this country a fair shot at the American dream?"

Were those violins in the background?

Rush Limbaugh asked today, "Where are the unions in all of this?" Well yeah. Hello? Can somebody please hold the unions accountable? Or is BHO just paying them back now by handing GM to them on a silver platter?

And remember, according to BHO, this whole move is not a condemnation of Wagoner - it's just that Wagoner didn't have the right vision. The "right" vision? And who, pray tell, does have the "right" vision? Tim-Turbo-Tax Geithner? And what actually makes him qualified to decide that? His vast experience in business? Hmmm, probably not.

It doesn't matter WHO was behind this debacle at this point. It's just wrong. In fact, now we even have Obama telling Chrysler that they HAVE to reach a merger agreement with Fiat or consider themselves SOL. The bottom line is that this is not how capitalism works. We are a free market society. We do NOT have the White House telling companies with whom they must merge.

Oh but wait. Now we do.

One day you will look at your grandchildren and tell them about the free country that America used to be.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"One day you will look at your grandchildren and tell them about the free country that America used to be."

Yes, we can explain how wonderful it was to live in a place where the markets were so unregulated that a few companies brought the world economy to its knees and eradicated the life savings, retirement, and jobs of millions across the country and world.

Whether you believe it or not, your indignation is misdirected. You blame government for intervening in a system which has terribly damaged the lives of millions of people who have done nothing but do their jobs. Your anger is not directed at the failure of that system, but at those who are attempting to rectify this mess. In fact, the funniest thing about your argument and every other conservative who has a radio show or a computer is that they somehow scream bloody horror about bailouts and the eradication of freedoms when it was their beloved FREE MARKETS which have led us here.

Of course, Republicans/conservatives don't offer solutions, they offer ideological griping. (Simply read your post....no alternative, just griping) Their supposed solution for soliving the problems caused by free markets, is to not intervene. Yes, no bailouts, just cut pork and lower taxes and the markets will keep us prosperous and free! Wake up and quit espousing viewpoints whose negative effects are being seen across the world right now.

Its very little wonder why the conservative viewpoint has become the voice of the antiquated.

yukio ngaby said...

To Anonymous:
That's a very long comment for someone too cowardly to even leave a name. Real brave.

I would suggest you offer some evidence of this free market tyranny you describe. Go ahead.

I'll give some examples of command system (govt. controlled market) tyranny: 1) The Great Leap Forward in China. 2) The Ukraine's farm collectivization under Stalin. 3) Hitler's usurption of the German markets in early the 1930s. 4) Idi Amin's nationalization of industry in Uganda 5) The relatively recent redistribution of farm and other industries in Zimbabwe...

Shall I go on? There's more...

It's sort of amusing to me that when there is a market readjustment (in this case brought on much quicker and made much harder by government intervention in the form of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the recent interpretations of the Community Reinvestment Act, and de facto Congressional guarantees of sub-prime loans) people start running around screaming about the "failure" of and the "suffering" brought on by FREE MARKETS. Readjustment is a fact of life. Trying to avoid it is like trying to avoid earthquakes. Where's that anti-earthquake legislation we've all been looking for?

Free market principles are not an ideology. Market economics are a reality. An ideology is how much false and damaging control people try to exercise over these realities.