More on the bailout

Just 14 dollars an hour? I now make more than that, but it took years.
And I work hard for it. I know a lot of people that work for less than
that, too.

There's no doubt in my mind that Rock Hardson is a UAW shill.

Sir Charles the Curmudgeon

 

It's too bad you are not half as smart as you are prolific. You can
certainly spout, but man, you make an ass of yourself every time you do.

 

Unfortunately the bigger problem is the pension owed retired workers.
Toyota and Honda don't have similar cost issues.

 

It is not my fault that GM has been stupid for decades and in a slow
death spiral.

And its not my fault that you were born, but what does that have to do with
it?


I am merely an observer and I have known for years what mistakes
management of GM is making.
By the same token it surely is not my doing nor wish coming true now
that GM is dead.

In looking at your post your propaganda goes back what seems like forever
for the hatred of the US industry.

GM has been making crappy products for ages and have been able to turn
the tide for years but now it is too late.
If anyone believes it has anything to do with my they give me more
credit than it is due to me.
I could have saved GM many times over a long time ago.
I still could given the means but I do not see anyone asking me to do
so.
I could not care less actually I just find it amusing to watch this
happening as predicted.
The stupid management of GM met the most stupid president in history
and got him to give out taxpayers money.
How stupid does that make the general public I am sure you have worked
out by now and that is why you are so angry.

Gosi in looking at your posts here many of your comments have no credibility
whatsover. It just amazes me how you claim you can see the future of
American industry failure, yet you can't see the repercussions. Yet you also
say it is amusing.

 

Sir Charles simply can't believe or understand that a regular American with
no relationship to the union whatsover simply has an interest in the common
Joe. Selfish lives can corrupt the mind.

 

That's up to the fickle and uneducated/behind the times consumer's
perceptions. Ford, right now, should be educating its consumers about its
current products and future plans versus the typical consumer perceptions of
that. Consumers won't go to the dealership until that changes more.
--
Dave

2008 Focus , 5 spd no frills coupe- to date per fillup - 33 mpg low - 39 mpg
high.

How much CO footprint to remove and transport basic materials for batteries
and to manufacture the batteries for the Ford Fusion and any other hybrid?

 

The Japanese may have embraced it 50 years ago, but they continued to
have horrible quality
(can you say 'Toyopet'?) for another 25 years. It's also a myth that
Japanese car makers universally have better quality because when
Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls to being
only par with ours.

What's been more important to Japanese success is the culture of
engineers versus our culture of business majors. This is especially
true because development of new products never makes sense from a
financial standpoint. Business majors understand this, but engineers
fortunately don't.

 

So why can't we honestly say all of them beat the foreign brands, as
was once could?

 

"...when Toyota, Honda, and Subaru are excluded, their quality falls
to being
only par with ours."

By your own admission Toyota and Honda's quality is superior to
Detroit's. Congratulations on finally coming around to that
conclusion, there is hope for you yet

 

I have seen the Consumer Reports Survey which shows that Toyota and
Honda are far more reliable than anything made by the "Big Three".
(Hard to call them the Big Three when Chrysler ranks fifth in sales.)

That's nice, if questionably true. But GM and Ford would already be
in liquidation if it had to rely on those cars. The only thing that
has kept them floating over the last decade has been the 10-12 mpg
dinosaurs that are on the brink of extinction.

GM just put a hold on the factory which was supposed to build the
vaporware Volt. What does that say?

 

Toyota is outselling Ford in the US.
Honda is outselling Chrysler in the US.
Toyota is outselling GM worldwide and threatening them in the US.
Honda is closing in on Ford.
At least two of the Big Three need a government handout or they will
be dead within a month or so.

If those SUVs were such success, why have the Big Three been steadily
losing market share for the past three decades?

 

But no SUV driver has ever been even slightly injured when he backed
over his kid in the driveway.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/AUTOS/tipsandadvice/11/03/backover/index.html

 

To my amazement and dismay, U.S. is intentionally printing 9 trillion
dollars. The purpose of which is to create counter deflation they say.
This may result in hyper-inflation. Making the U.S. dollar worthless.
Under that situation, anything imported will be prohibitively expensive,
and, our exports cheap.

In that same scenario locally, anyone who has accumulated any form of
savings or retirement funds will see it dwindle further in locally much
higher costs of inflation. Which also includes any form of oil and its
derivatives.

This will also increase the U.S. budget deficit significantly other than the
said money printed. It will help create a more significant share of world
export trade, but the cost will be significantly higher. Wages won't be
able to keep up. Its hard to digest, I know. But, it must be stopped as
the problems created far outweigh any anticipated results.

 

As you can tell, MH has the same kind of pig headed thinking that has
made GM the business success it is today.

 

Congrats on the bailout, now they can afford new deck chairs and
toilet seats for the Titanic. Hopefully your name will be on a toilet
seat "donated by" plaque.

 

Where did you get the idea that Subaru's are some model of reliability? In
the 2008 JD Power Vehicle Dependability Study, they rank well below the
industry average. (Just ahead of Chrysler and Dodge!) Of the Japanese
makes, only Toyota, Honda, and Mitsubishi are above the industry average.
US makes scoring exceptionally well on the same survey are Mercury,
Cadillac, Buick, and Lincoln. (Mercury and Cadillac are both scoring higher
than Toyota, Acura, and Honda!!!)

http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/news/releases/pressrelease.aspx?ID=2008115

Derek

 

You can talk all day long about the quality of American cars, but some US
American citizens are hell bent on seeing this whole country go down the
tubes beginning with the big industry and US auto manufactures. I can't
figure out where this self sabotage mentality comes from but it can be very
dangerous to our society.

 

They should have thought of that before NAFTA and lopsided import/export
trade agreements.

 

Dear Derek,

Maybe you should pay attention to your stepsister Casey. American citizens
vote with their dollars, every time they purchase something. They perceive
that the Detroit 3 do not really give a damn about them and have not for a
long time. Even their commercials still tend to sell the sizzle instead of
the steak, although some Toyota commercials tend to be headed that way, too.
But Toyota has established a fairly good reputaion for quality as far back
as 1965 (not 1975 as you seem to think) and Americans are tired of cars that
have to be in the shop as often as their 1930's counterparts for minor, non
scheduled repairs, and rust! I owned a 1995 Chevy S-10 and I had points of
rust on it in the first year, which the dealer refused to do anything about!
I currently own a 1995 Toyota Corolla that still doesn't have any rust on
it.

Wake up and smell the coffee. America LOSES when we do less than our best,
and we've been doing that since the 1960's. When you're number one and you
think that you can do no wrong, the next step is DOWN. Look at K-mart. #1
Discount Retailer in 1980. Who's number one now? Yep, a southern-based
retailer that K-mart didn't see as any kind of threat, because K-mart
thought #1 was theirs by some sort of divine right. Samething with GM, Ford
and Crapsler.

Sir Charles the Curmudgeon

 

Neither do the foreign owned companies. They are only concerned with
their own bottom line.

Gee, I own a 1997 Contour. It rarely needed non-scheduled repairs. And
those were expected wear and tear items. I haven't had any problems at
all with my new 2008 Focus - only thing needed was an oil change in
the first 6k. I haven't heard of rust problems on any cars for over 10
years.

Why didn't you contact the factory representative?

Actually, Ford has done a lot to improve quality and their lineup of
cars. I never knew there was a car called crapsler. Usually when one
has to do name-calling to make a point, the point is not worth
making.

Jeff