Steve Russell

UAW Still Made No Sacrifices to Make General Motors Competitive

I do not understand the whining about CAFE standards.

Japan, Europe, and EVEN CHINA require more mpg (or klicks per liter) than the US will require after Obama's standards kick in.

Safety requirements? They apply to foreign cars sold in the US. As that great capitalist Lombardi used to say, it rains on both sides of the football field.

Lemme tell you a story from the other side, since capitalists seem to prefer anecdotes to statistics.

In 1992, I tried to order a Ford Explorer with California emission controls.

The dealer would not take the order in Texas.

After many hissy fits on my part and threats to just not buy, Ford finally gave me a reason. They did not wish to sell California equipped vehicles outside of California because that would create the "false" impression that people were willing to pay more for cleaner cars. This they told the guy who was offering to pay more for a cleaner car....Sheesh.

GM Finally Dies - Does the U.S. Have Similar Symptoms?

What I don't understand about you knuckledraggers is that you keep saying things are impossible to do that have been handily accomplished by Western Europe and Scandinavia.

You have no shortage of horror story anecdotes about all those national health systems, starting with Canada, but you never explain the overall numbers that show the US paying more for inferior results by objective measures of morbidity and mortality. Are they smarter than us?

You say entitlements don't work, but they have been working in most of these countries since the end of WWII. Are they smarter than us?

I'm not arguing about what policies would be "good" but rather pointing out that your views of the possible are manifestly incorrect.

Yes, we would have to start paying taxes. Sounds OK to me. I've never joined the whiners. I would gladly double my tax bill for Canada's health system.

Reasons to Bail Out GM

They told us car manufaturing went to Mexico over wages.

Not true. It went to Canada over health care. Wages in Canada are UAW and pretty similar to the US.

Wages are not the problem. Health care is.

Hello? If the government does health care, problem solved, a problem that would not have existed if the US had taken the path Western Europe did after WWII.

German unions get representation on corporate boards by law, and VW is still doing well.

Wanna blame unions for something? British unions did indeed kill their car exports. US unions are wimpy by comparison.

Anyway, no bailout without a turn to green vehicles.

As a GM shareholder, I'll say I would rather see my stock flushed than GM propped up to do the same crap it's been doing.

If the Big Three (or 2 and 1/2) won't do green cars, take the same money and dangle it in front of some of the green car startups that have been struggling. Not as clear freebies, but guaranteed loan and government committments to buy green fleets.

We need to save jobs and we need green cars. If we can do both at the same time, right on.