It's Halftime in Canada, Mexico and Italy

UPDATED: 07-Feb-12

image ripped from Jalopnik

Yesterday, like most Americans, I watched the game (and commercials) and enjoyed both. I thought the Clint Eastwood Chrysler ad at halftime was excellent. It never occurred to me that this was an overtly political ad, or endorsing Obama's re-election, or supportive of corporate bail-outs. Who knew? Apparently I am not sufficiently politicized to recognize the offensive polarizing nature of the ad.

I naively saw the ad as simply a straight-line continuation of the theme and style of Chrysler's excellent "Imported from Detroit" Eminem ad last year.

Here is the 2011 Eminem ad:

Best Blog Post Title Of The Week

Maybe - best of the month.
Maybe - best of the year.
Maybe it is simply...

Best. Blog. Post. Title. Evah.

D.A. Ridgely at Positve Liberty:

"Free Money Program Proves Surprisingly Popular"

From the New York Times:

The House of Representatives voted to provide an emergency $2 billion for the “cash for clunkers” program on Friday, and the White House declared the program very much alive, even though car buyers appear to have already snapped up the $1 billion that Congress originally appropriated.

Refresh my memory. When exactly did Congress decide the word “emergency” means “popular with voters”?

My 1999 Jeep Grand Cherokee V8 is officially rated as 16 mpg in the city and 18 mpg on the highway. Average 16 mpg. The free money cutoff for SUV's is 15 mpg.

No soup for me.

NOTE: Lost track of where on the intertubes I found this animated graphic. Happy to credit the source here if anyhone knows who created it.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Friday Flotsam - The "Please listen to what Obama says and pay no attention to what he does" edition.

Wherein we take a stroll down the metaphorical beach of the DWSUWF blog and note the detritus that has washed ashore and cluttered our little island of rationality in the great big blogospheric ocean. The beach is particularly messy now as we have neglected it for a few months. Your loyal blogger was distracted, spending time touring foreign lands and working on other projects.

While not a comprehensive cleanup, permit me to point out a few of the shiny items washed up on the beach.

ITEM - You should still buy a Ford
Last December, DWSUWF outlined why Ford was the only Detroit based automobile manufacturer that should be considered by Americans buying an American manufactured car. Since then, Ford has continued to reject government bailout money, managed to show some financial improvement, has rasied money from the private sector to improve their balance sheet, and their stock has more the tripled. This is a well managed American car company, surviving in tough times without government handouts. They deserve our support. Particularly since Ford will need to compete against the walking dead automotive monsters reanimated in the grotesque, experimental economic laboratory of Dr. Frankenobama.

Yes, back at the lab, GM and Chrysler continue to be fed intravenously at the Obama intensive care unit. They will continue to live for exactly as long as they stay on taxpayer life support and not one minute after (if?) the plug gets pulled. To the surprise of no one, it is now certain that the taxpayer "loans" to GM and Chrysler (as they were characterized by the President) will never be repaid.

The now familiar Obama administration communication philosophy of "Say anything they want to hear, but do whatever we want" is on full display. Obama actually said the government does not want to run the car companies, but the Obama administration and their proxy, the automotive task force, are hiring and firing CEO's, negotiating the bankruptcy terms with lenders, forcing mergers with a foreign buyer, deciding whether, when, and how to restructure GM and Chrysler, setting advertising policy, and deciding which dealers will remain open. Not surprisingly, Obama even wants to tell them what kind of cars to build, among other things.

But it is a relief to know that they don't want to run the car companies.

ITEM - Guantanamo in da moonlight.
I'll be heading to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan next week for an annual fishing holiday at our family camp. An ex-governor recently suggested that the U.P. would be a good home for any remaining detainees when Guantanamo is finally closed. Michigan headline writers are having a field day with this idea. [NOTE: It occurs to me that in order to appreciate this headline, one must be familiar with the straight-to-video, widely ignored Jeff Daniels cult comedy classic "Escanaba in da moonlight"]

Guantanamo in da moonlight?

Detroit Free Press
"How about Michigan, for a change, solving a problem for the U.S. government, instead of the other way around?That's one way to look at an idea floated recently by former Gov. John Engler to offer the Upper Peninsula, already home to a dozen state prisons, as a place to move the 200 or so enemy combatants and terror suspects now housed in a camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. President Barack Obama intends to close Guantanamo, just as soon as the administration figures out what to do with the prisoners there, a knotty problem considering they may include some of the most dangerous people on the planet..."

Move Gitmo to da UP, eh
By Ed Brayton
"Former Michigan Gov. John Engler has an interesting idea to bring some revenue into Michigan: Turn the UP into Guantanamo Bay North... Not an idea that Michigan political leaders are likely to get behind."

Al Qaeda, eh?
"Former Michigan Governor John Engler suggested last week that the more than 200 prisoners currently housed at the soon-to-be-closed Guantánamo Bay, Cuba prison be relocated to to the Upper Peninsula. We certainly could use the money and people actually moving into Michigan to live would be big news.

Which would be fine until winter arrived, when a UP prison would run afoul of the Obama Administration's prohibition against torture"

Hey - If it moves some money and jobs to the UP... why not, eh?

ITEM - Obama is committed to fiscal restraint - BWAHAHAHA.
Honest to God - I mean how f***ing stupid does the administration think the American people are? Obama actually had the unmitigated gall to call a press conference and say this with a straight face:

"We can no longer afford to spend as if deficits do not matter and waste is not our problem," he said in his formal remarks. "We can no longer afford to leave the hard choices for the next budget, the next administration or the next generation."

WTF? This is the same guy that only weeks before proposed a $3.7 triillion dollar budget, quadrupling the deficit, and forced through a monstrous "emergency" trillion dollar "stimulus spending plan" that does not actually - you know - stimulate.

Even the liberal San Francisco Chronicle didn't buy it:

"To date, the president's rhetoric exceeds his results. He has long said he would require his team to scrub the budget "line by line" for savings. Thursday's release is the product of that review, though an administration official was careful to call it "only a step in the process" of dealing with the deficit problem.. In reality, in the short term, deficits do not matter much to the administration. His aides would say that's justifiable given the scale of the economic recession that greeted them in January. They have decided to spend freely to jump-start the economy and to reduce the resulting deficits later. An attack on government waste, as necessary as that may be, cannot solve the problems he is helping to create."

Did you get that? "The president's rhetoric exceeds his results." That's like reporting "The Titanic received a complete and thorough cleaning in the North Atlantic". I just don't know what to say.

Maybe you can fool most of the people all of the time.

This video from Stop Spending Our Future presents the reality of our current situation with a great deal more clarity than our president would like you to understand. Keep away from open windows and hide sharp objects before viewing:



We are doomed.

ITEM: Happy belated birthday to me!
While we were away, the third anniversary of the DWSUWF blog passed without fanfare. DWSUWF was born on April 23, 2006 in the service of promoting a voting heuristic of divided government in order to secure better governance and more fiscal responsibility out of our leaders in Washington.

Our first anniversary was noted here as we celebrated the reestablishment of divided government in 2007, which began paying dividends immediately. In our second anniversary [linked here] we were looking forward - hoping against hope that the benefits of divided government could be maintained across the November election. Alas, our third anniversary was ignored, as I was instead golfing in a faraway land, and enjoying exotic food and drink. While I played, our country continued its headlong plunge into mind-numbing, ruinous levels of debt that can never be serviced, never be repayed, and with terrifying consequences we have yet to experience. The deadly effects of single party rule has once again taken its toll.

We are not really getting older, we are just getting more cynical, more pessimistic and borderline catatonic in the face of this economic horror.

"Eat drink and be merry my friends, for tomorrow we die".

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: libertarian , Barack Obama, Bailout nation, Insanity, Stimulus, Democratic, Ford, Divided Government.

The Arrogance of "Hope"

Image ripped from Barbeefish

Much has been written about what to expect from the Obama administration. Past presidents are often invoked as models for comparison. Will Obama be like FDR - leading the country out of the depression? Or is the big spending, big government, big deficit liberal icon LBJ a more apropos comparison? Or should we simply accept the comparison to the vision, vigor and youth of JFK as Obama has consciously and carefully cultivated throughout his campaign and early presidency?

DWSUWF has also indulged in this game, comparing candidate Obama to the ivory tower academic Jimmy Carter and also noting President Obama's embrace and defense of the Bush/Cheney expansive redefinition of unitary executive. Perhaps all of these comparisons are wrong, and the comparison that is most apt, is a comparison to Richard Nixon, as exemplified by the money quote in the Frost/Nixon interview -"When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal."

That seems to be the conclusion of Tom Laruia in this disturbing CNBC Maria Bartiroma interview aired yesterday. Lauria is a White & Case Financial Restructuring Attorney who represented the first lien Chrysler bond holders in the bankruptcy proceedings. He outlines how this administration abused their power to strong arm legitimate creditors into giving up their legal contract rights in order to hand a sweetheart deal to the Obama union contributors and constituents:

[CNBC Video No Longer Available]

Now Tom Lauria is not a dispassionate observer. He is an advocate and has an axe to grind. But what he says in this interview rings true, and is completely consistent with other reports of what this administration is really all about. The money quote:

"We all have the sense that what is on the table here is all about America and saving the concept of free enterprise in this country. Things that are baked into the Constitution, the founding fathers put the right of contract in the Constitution and there is a reason for that... You know what's interesting? The company (Chrysler) had no involvement in that negotiation whatsoever, which is another kind of shocking thing. We should ask ourselves under what Federal law is the US Government running Chrysler? TARP does not provide for the US government to run an auto company. We have not been able to find any other statuatory scheme. So if there is no legal authorization, is this kind of a separation of powers issue under the Constitution where the executive, a la President Nixon, is now doing what he thinks he should do, what he thinks is right, but is nevertheless not permitted under the law." - Tom Lauria

Obama is like Nixon? Lets see, abusing executive power in the service of political goals was the defining characteristic of the Nixon administration. Yup. Sounds about right for our current administration.

The defining characteristics of the Obama administration are just now coming into clear focus. This is what it looks like to DWSUWF:

1. Ruthlessly wield executive power to push political objectives - The willingness - no - eagerness of the Obama administration to aggressively use the power of the presidency to meet political goals regardless of whether there is any legal basis for that exercise of power is right there in plain sight for any who care to see. The strongarmed Chrysler bondholders are the most recent example.
2. What Obama says is wildly at variance with what he does - The gulf between what this President says and what this president actually does grows wider with every passing day. The more the MSM lets him get away with it, the bigger the gulf seems to get. Talk government transparency - do the opposite. Talk fiscal responsibility - spend recklessly. Talk gay rights, do nothing. Talk protection of civil liberties, defend the Bush/Cheney unitary executive. If he keeps this up, his credibility gap will look like the Grand Canyon.
3. Script the talking points, enforce message discipline, reward loyalty - The message discipline and efficiency of the Obama/Axelrod White House makes the Bush/Rove politburo look like rank amateurs. Even more astonishing - The ability for the Obama hard core faithful to put on the blinders, drink the kool-aid, and parrot whatever talking points are being pushed out of the oval office. DWSUWF has seen nothing like it - well - except for the hardcore faithful on the right during the GWB administration. The mindset is absolutely identical. Obama/Axelrod are just better than Bush/Rove at leading the acolytes around by the nose.
4. Drive an arrogant ideological agenda - The core conceit of this administration is the radical ideological view that a few really smart academics can manage the economy. Regardless of the lip service paid to the principles of free enterprise (see point number 2) this administration's core belief in central planning is clear. The administration intends to manage everything from executive pay to credit card interest rates and, as noted above, they have no problem ripping up contract law to steamroll bondholders and stamp their ideological vision on a bailed out and restructured automobile industry. This kind of central economic planning and top down industrial policy has never worked. But - since these guys are smarter than everyone else, no worries. I'm sure it'll all turn out fine this time.

Bringing this back to Chrysler and the auto industry - I'll wrap this up with the same conclusion I reached in an earlier post. Although I am a satisfied owner of a Jeep Grand Cherokee bought new 10 years ago - you could not give me a Chrysler or Fiat product today. I'll never own a Chrysler product again. The truly dangerous and flat out wrong behavior on the part of this administration should not be supported, and I won't support it with my discretionary dollars. Boycott Chrysler. If the same thing happens to GM, boycott GM.

In any case, it looks like we'll have some rich fodder for future posts as we slowly ramp this blog back up after our little hiatus.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

If they take the bailout - boycott GM and Chrysler. Buy a Ford.

UPDATED: 15-Dec-08
This is the 2009 Ford Shelby Mustang GT 500. I want this car. I've always wanted this car. When I was in high school I wanted the 1967 Shelby Cobra GT 500. Lunchroom debates raged over the merits of the Shelby Cobra vs. the Corvette Stingray. In my mind, it was no contest, even if Motor Trend was clearly in the bag for GM. I'd even be happy with the GT350 - then or now - '67 or '09. In the bailout debate, I keep hearing that Detroit does not build cars that people want to buy. I am here to bear witness that this is simply not true. I want this car. My wife won't let me have one, but I want it. I may still get one some day. Just sayin...

I've been hearing so much negative about the "Big 3" and the bailout, that I wanted to start this post by saying something positive. I'll have some more positive things to say about Ford later, but first - the bailout. Not much positive there. Last night, the House of Representatives voted 237 - 170 to pass the Federal Auto Loan Bill. As I write this, the Senate is debating the bill.

Stephen Green at Vodkapundit sums it up nicely:

The merits of a "Detroit 3" bailout has been debated at Donklephant ad nauseum. Since I cross post and already weighed in there, I won't repeat those arguments here. But there is one point that seems to get lost in all the discussion and is repeated in Stephen's otherwise brilliant ad spoof. The question is not about whether the "auto industry" or the "Big Three" should get taxpayer money. The point is that these three companies are not the "auto industry' and are not even the "domestic auto industry". Moreover, they are not monolithic, do not have the same operational structure, do not have the same financial needs, do not make the same cars, do not have the same competitive status and they should not be lumped together in this debate. These companies are competitors. So in the spirit of this blog, lets divide them up and treat them separately.

General Motors

GM is a basket case, plain and simple.

• In 2007, Toyota sold 9.37 million vehicles.
• In 2007, General Motors sold 9.37 million vehicles.
• In 2007, Toyota made $17.1 billion.
• In 2007, General Motors lost $38.7 billion.

Source:Mises Blog (H/T Crossing Wall Street)

GM has massive manufacturing overcapacity in workers and plants compared to to the number of cars they sold, are selling, or have any realistic expectation of selling. Nothing short of a meat axe restructuring can make them profitable. It is not the kind of cars they make. It is not their quality. It is their business model. It is their labor costs. It is their overcapacity. The only way they can accomplish the radical restructuring they need will be under the inevitable chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Every penny they get from the taxpayer between now and then is money thrown into the bottomless pit.

Chrysler

Chrysler was taken private by Cerberus, which is one of the richest and best connected private equity firms on the planet. Michael W at QandO blog has been beating the drum on the Cerberus issue for a couple of weeks, and the story is getting traction in mainstream media and other blogs. This from Forbes and the NYT:

"Buried on the business page of The New York Times Saturday were the details of Detroit's biggest snow job yet—literally as well as figuratively. Turns out that Cerberus CEO John Snow, who spent three-and-a-half lackluster, and some might say lap-doggish, years as President Bush's second Treasury secretary, is leading a who's who of crony capitalists in a lobbying campaign for a taxpayer bailout to "salvage Cerberus' investment in Chrysler."

That's right. Not to save the jobs of Chrysler employees or America's disappearing manufacturing base, mind you, but to prevent "one of the world's richest and most secretive private investment companies" from having to take a relatively modest financial hit and use some of its own capital to prop up the smallest of the major automakers."

This stinks to high heaven. As far as Chrysler is concerned, all the Kabuki theater in Washington has nothing to do with "saving Chrysler". Nothing. It has everything to do with asking taxpayers to bailout the Cerberus investors and seve them from extending any additional risk to support their own speculative investment.

Ford

That brings us to Ford, and a ray of hope. Don't get me wrong. Ford CEO Alan Mulally did not cover himself or his company in any more glory than the rest of the bozos in either of his two appearances before Congress. But this week, with the help of the great-grandson of the man who founded the company, Ford finally got it right:

"Chief Executive Alan Mulally and Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. told The Associated Press on Tuesday they are confident that the borrowing, coupled with restructuring and new product plans, will get them through the recession without relying on the government. Ford even said the century-old company that bears his family's name might be able to use the independence from loans to its advantage. I think if they see Ford as a company trying to pull itself up by its own bootstraps, and making it on its own and pulling the right levers, I think that could be a positive for us," Ford said."

Proponents of this bill make much of the argument that consumers will not buy a car from a company operating under Chapter 11 protection. Given the fact that this bridge loan will do nothing more than bridge the time until GM asks for much more money under the single party rule of Barack Obama in March, that argument is becoming moot. Who would you buy a car from? From a basket case of a company that refuses to take the strong medicine they need to survive? From a private equity firm without the balls to back their own investments? Or from a company that has already taken the right steps, has figured out a plan to weather the storm (and also BTW makes some really great cars)? A company like Ford.

If Ford declines the taxpayer money , Ford deserves the support of American car buyers. If GM and Chrysler take taxpayer money, they do not deserve the support of American car buyers.

Polls show that a majority of Americans oppose taxpayer dollars being used to support the Detroit 3 bailout. The bill is facing oppostion in the Senate, and it is not clear whether it will pass, even with administration support. In my dreams, Americans take matters into their own hands if this bill passes. In my dreams, Americans begin to apply the discipline that our representatives in Washington do not. In my dreams, Americans vote with their car buying dollars and stop buying products from any company that solicit government bailouts. This might be tough to do with the banking industry which has effectively been nationalized, leaving few choices. But it is certainly something that Americans can do when choosing to buy a car between Ford, Chrysler, and GM.

I drive a 1999 Jeep Cherokee that I purchased new from a Dodge/Chrysler/Jeep dealer ten years ago. I thought I would replace it next summer. With all the great deals being thrown around, I may move that purchase up. I love that Jeep, it has been a great car for me. But if Chrysler/Cerebrus takes Federal money - I won't buy another Jeep. If Ford declines the loan, I'll be a Ford man now.

I have no illusions about the limited reach of this blog, but for FWIW - in a small token of support for Ford doing the right thing - DWSUWF offers a little free advertising for a great American car company that builds great cars, is capable of making tough decisions in a tough market, and running an automotive business without picking the pockets of the American taxpayers.

Boycott Chrysler/Cerberus. Boycott GM.

Buy a Ford.

Want fast? Consider this ....
Ford Shelby Mustang GT 500

Need a truck? Consider the ....
Ford F150 Pickup Truck

Going off road? Consider the ...
Volvo XC70 SUV Crossover
I'm going to look at this one to replace my Jeep.


Going green? Consider the ...
Ford Escape Hybrid

The Ford Shelby Mustang kicked the GM Corvette's butt when I was in high school in 1967, and with the decision to decline government bailouts, Ford is still kicking GM butt today.

UPDATE 1:
As often happens on the intertubes, after posting this screed I find I am not the first thinking along these lines. Sphere informs me The Lonely Conservative beat me to it yesterday, as did Polipundit (by a few hours). There is even a website - "Boycott the Bailout".

UPDATE 2: 12-Dec-08
Nevermind. The bailout was defeated in the Senate.

UPDATE 3:
Oops. Stay tuned. The President and the Bailout Czar are apparently going to give them our money anyway, as James Joyner notes:

"President Bush may ignore Congress and give the Big 3 the money they want, anyway... That the bailout fund in question was designated for entirely different purposes and is blatantly unconstitutional doesn’t seem to bother the president. One wonders if Democrats will rail against this as an abuse of power or see it as an act of benevolence."

American car buying consumers can yet make the right decision that our representatives in Washington did not, by shunning the companies that take the funds and supporting the auto manufacturer that chooses to not take Federal bailout funds.

UPDATE 4: 15-Dec-08

Thanks to Bobo for linking this post in his fine weekly carnival compilation.

I also cross-posted this at Donklephant, and got the usual intelligent and provocative responses from the commentarium there. Well worth the read. Notable was one particular response from Scott Monty, a "Social Marketing" author, guru and blogger who -since June - has been the Global Digital Communications Social Marketing Director for Ford Motor Company. I responded on both his blog and the Donk. I'll be interested to see if it was just a drive by comment from a corporate flack, or if he actually engages in a dialog. In either case, just the fact that Ford has hired someone to interact with social media and bloggers says something about Ford "getting it" all by itself.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: Big 3, libertarian, Ford ,Bailout Nation, Shelby Mustang, Divided Government, GM, Chrysler, Cars