Obama nails it.

[Lukey]

The Obaman's rescue of the American auto industry was a historic and remarkable accomplishment for them, and for us. It was the sort of thing we'd all given up on in terms of American possibility, since clear back in the JFK days.

I can only pity the desperate likes of C-B and Lukey, who have so much of themselves wrapped up in Obama-hate, they can't allow themselves the slightest American pride and satisfaction in all this. Too bad for them....They're free to wallow in their their sacks-of-sorries, if they so choose.

LOL! Pride in the federal government bailing out a failed private company? And using the opportunity to prop up a union that is dedicated to pushing socialism? You'd have to be a commie to take pride in that...

 

[Lukey]

Are you denying the fact that he is our first black POTUS?

Where did I do that? I just denied my opposition to him is based on his race. I simply do not cotton to commies. And the proof is that I voted for an African American capitalist for governor of PA before you even knew who Barack Obama was!

 

[NightSwimmer]

So if Obama single handedly rescued the US auto industry, how is it that Ford, which took nothing, is doing so well?

Ford received their bailout indirectly, through the bank bailouts. Had Ford not borrowed massive amounts just prior to the financial collapse, they would have been bankrupt as well. It's not as if they were selling cars while Chrysler and GM weren't.

 

[Lukey]

Ford received their bailout indirectly, through the bank bailouts. Had Ford not borrowed massive amounts just prior to the financial collapse, they would have been bankrupt as well. It's not as if they were selling cars while Chrysler and GM weren't.

So that would indicate (and the quick recovery would confirm) that GM and Chrysler could have just been given some Treasury TARP money as loans. And that a managed bankruptcy that voided the UAW contracts and put these companies into more disciplined hands (like Kirk Kerkorian's for instance, who tried to buy Chrysler just 14 months before the bailouts) would have worked even better. As it is there is no guarantee that the taxpayer will ever get this money back...

 

[Woolleybugger]

Where did I do that? I just denied my opposition to him is based on his race. I simply do not cotton to commies. And the proof is that I voted for an African American capitalist for governor of PA before you even knew who Barack Obama was!

Commies everywhere eh? What a joke. I will continue to remind white conservatives that we have elected a black POTUS much to their chagrin. And to top it off, he is the smartest dude in the room. Must really get your goat...

 

[fairsheet]

So that would indicate (and the quick recovery would confirm) that GM and Chrysler could have just been given some Treasury TARP money as loans. And that a managed bankruptcy that voided the UAW contracts and put these companies into more disciplined hands (like Kirk Kerkorian's for instance, who tried to buy Chrysler just 14 months before the bailouts) would have worked even better. As it is there is no guarantee that the taxpayer will ever get this money back...

Your repeated references to Kerkorian, simply highlight the extent to which you seem oblivious to the specific and distinct realities of the auto market. Kerkorian is a vulture capitalist, just like Mitt. Vulture capitalism works in the case of say.....the redistribution of generic office supplies. Recent history proves that it does NOT work, in the case of auto manufacturing and marketing. Otherwise, how to explain why Kerkorian would succeed, where Cerberus failed?

Some were rendered uneasy around the fact of foreign Fiat involving itself in Chrysler. But, many of us welcomed the news. After all, Fiat is owned and run by car guys - experts in the field of manufacturing and marketing cars, as opposed to a buncha vulture capitalists who wouldn't know or care about the difference between cars, copiers, cocaine, or codpieces.

 

[Lukey]

Commies everywhere eh? What a joke. I will continue to remind white conservatives that we have elected a black POTUS much to their chagrin. And to top it off, he is the smartest dude in the room. Must really get your goat...

I suspect you aren't nearly as enamored of his race as you are of his Marxist tendencies (because if you were, YOU'D be the "racist")...

 

[Days]

You don't seem to understand the industry. The tsunami did nothing to destroy Japanese sales in America... all those cars are made in America. GM, Ford, and Chrysler turned it around in the market place; something they had not been able to do for 30 years.

When you guys argue your politics into the business arena, you really twist the business into a pretzel.

 

[Lukey]

You don't seem to understand the industry. The tsunami did nothing to destroy Japanese sales in America... all those cars are made in America. GM, Ford, and Chrysler turned it around in the market place; something they had not been able to do for 30 years.

When you guys argue your politics into the business arena, you really twist the business into a pretzel.

They are ASSEMBLED in America. Much of the parts come from the Far East (including some from Japan).

 

[fairsheet]

Cars are Americans most significant, and many would say, most personal consumer investment. 100+ years of automobile marketing prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when auto consumers smell blood in the water as it were, they flee.

They simply have too many alternative choices. Those who continue to suggest that GM and/or Chrysler could've survived by going through bankruptcy and/or cobbling together some sort of near term arrangement that would've allowed them to continue turning out something..anything, with their nameplate on it, aren't just wrong, they're idiots.

The ONLY chance GM and Chrysler had, was the assurance that they and their products were backed by the "full faith, credit, and committment" of the American government.

 

[OldGaffer]

Cars are Americans most significant, and many would say, most personal consumer investment. 100+ years of automobile marketing prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when auto consumers smell blood in the water as it were, they flee.

They simply have too many alternative choices. Those who continue to suggest that GM and/or Chrysler could've survived by going through bankruptcy and/or cobbling together some sort of near term arrangement that would've allowed them to continue turning out something..anything, with their nameplate on it, aren't just wrong, they're idiots.

The ONLY chance GM and Chrysler had, was the assurance that they and their products were backed by the "full faith, credit, and committment" of the American government.

This old timer with 40 plus years experience in the car business agrees, but what would I know...

 

[Lukey]

Cars are Americans most significant, and many would say, most personal consumer investment. 100+ years of automobile marketing prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when auto consumers smell blood in the water as it were, they flee.

They simply have too many alternative choices. Those who continue to suggest that GM and/or Chrysler could've survived by going through bankruptcy and/or cobbling together some sort of near term arrangement that would've allowed them to continue turning out something..anything, with their nameplate on it, aren't just wrong, they're idiots.

The ONLY chance GM and Chrysler had, was the assurance that they and their products were backed by the "full faith, credit, and committment" of the American government.

Then you really don't know Kirk Kerkorian's history. He tried to buy Chrysler (and bought into GM) in the mid '00's. His history says he'd have bought one of these companies, lock, stock and barrel, if the bond holders would have been given the assets (like the bankruptcy law mandates). Someone like him (or a private equity shop) would have bought the other. But it would have been the death knell for the UAW as they'd have been down to just Ford as a union shop and the Ford workers would have been forced to decertify the union or (eventually) lose their jobs. So actually, anyone who continues to suggest that this was anything other than a rescue of the UAW (so they could run 99 percenter demonstrations in support of Obama's Marxist agenda) aren't just wrong, they're fellow travelers.

 

[fairsheet]

Then you really don't know Kirk Kerkorian's history. He tried to buy Chrysler (and bought into GM) in the mid '00's. His history says he'd have bought one of these companies, lock, stock and barrel, if the bond holders would have been given the assets (like the bankruptcy law mandates). Someone like him (or a private equity shop) would have bought the other. But it would have been the death knell for the UAW as they'd have been down to just Ford as a union shop and the Ford workers would have been forced to decertify the union or (eventually) lose their jobs. So actually, anyone who continues to suggest that this was anything other than a rescue of the UAW (so they could run 99 percenter demonstrations in support of Obama's Marxist agenda) aren't just wrong, they're fellow travelers.

Nothing in your entire byte-dump, even HINTS at the actual bidness of successfully manufacturing and marketing cars. I have no doubt that Kerkorian may've been successful in busting the union, stripping Chrysler of its assests, and prancing off with tidy profit for the bondholders and him.

My gist was entirely different and it apparently flew straight over your head - which was exactly my point! You don't GET it!

 

[Lukey]

Your repeated references to Kerkorian, simply highlight the extent to which you seem oblivious to the specific and distinct realities of the auto market. Kerkorian is a vulture capitalist, just like Mitt. Vulture capitalism works in the case of say.....the redistribution of generic office supplies. Recent history proves that it does NOT work, in the case of auto manufacturing and marketing. Otherwise, how to explain why Kerkorian would succeed, where Cerberus failed?

Some were rendered uneasy around the fact of foreign Fiat involving itself in Chrysler. But, many of us welcomed the news. After all, Fiat is owned and run by car guys - experts in the field of manufacturing and marketing cars, as opposed to a buncha vulture capitalists who wouldn't know or care about the difference between cars, copiers, cocaine, or codpieces.

Look at Kerkorian's history. He has repeatedly succeeded where others have failed (and built a $20 billion fortune on an eighth grade education). He hires good people. He had Jerry York ready to take over Chrysler. And he was trying to get GM to partner with Nissan & Renault (you know, like Chrysler just did with Fiat?) to get access to the technology they needed to build the cars people wanted. The idea that we needed Obama involved with GM & Chrysler more than we did a true visionary entrepreneur like Kerkorian is absurd.

 

[Lukey]

Nothing in your entire byte-dump, even HINTS at the actual bidness of successfully manufacturing and marketing cars. I have no doubt that Kerkorian may've been successful in busting the union, stripping Chrysler of its assests, and prancing off with tidy profit for the bondholders and him.

My gist was entirely different and it apparently flew straight over your head - which was exactly my point! You don't GET it!

That would have been entirely out of character for Kerkorian. He's a builder, not a liquidator.

 

[Days]

Wow, that's a stretch. I think some replacement parts need to be imported, but new manufacture? I doubt that Nissan is making parts in Japan and then assembling them into new cars in Tennessee. Those parts all come onto the line in perfect order for the exact vehicle in an exact location on the line... that's done via shipping, so stretching the shipping half way across the world would make that process totally insane.

What i remember reading after the tsunami was that it put a six month kink into new car production in Japan, and as I recall, that was giving us a boost in the overseas market (like China, where GM is doing great guns)... not that it affected the American market. Toyota sales have dropped for the past five years, here, they are just losing market with the same models and a big drop off in quality.

 

[Woolleybugger]

I bet you chum a lot when you go fishing too...btw, do you know the Russian joke about Marx?

Everything Marx told us about communism was wrong but everything he said about capitalism was right.

Marx was a brilliant man and had a lot of very accurate things to say about 19th century industrialism. It is unfortunate that he tried to create a remedy for it. If he had just stuck with describing reality his reputation as an economist would be a lot better. Not everything he did was bad you know...

 

[Woolleybugger]

That is true to a certain extent. For instance, he built the new City Centre complex at the MGM grand in Vegas. You should have seen the contract he sent out to vendors. Scared the living daylights out of me and I had to no bid the deal.

 

[fairsheet]

Look at Kerkorian's history. He has repeatedly succeeded where others have failed (and built a $20 billion fortune on an eighth grade education). He hires good people. He had Jerry York ready to take over Chrysler. And he was trying to get GM to partner with Nissan & Renault (you know, like Chrysler just did with Fiat?) to get access to the technology they needed to build the cars people wanted. The idea that we needed Obama involved with GM & Chrysler more than we did a true visionary entrepreneur like Kerkorian is absurd.

Your revisionist historianism doesn't fit the actual timeline. I would be interested in your linking me to just one story about how Obama muscled Kerkorian aside, in order to take over Chrysler for himself.

 

[Lukey]

Your revisionist historianism doesn't fit the actual timeline. I would be interested in your linking me to just one story about how Obama muscled Kerkorian aside, in order to take over Chrysler for himself.

That, of course, didn't happen. Kerkorian is way too good a businessman than to get in a bidding war with the US Treasury. If it would have gone into bankruptcy he'd have more than likely have stepped up to buy these assets (based on his history). But that wouldn't have gone well for the UAW so Obama was not about to let that happen.