Anyone Else Feel the Urge to Scream ENOUGH !

There is more going on than I can or really even dare to attempt to keep up with. Listening , watching, reading of the goings on in Washington is like watching a house burn down and wondering when the fire department will arrive to extinguish the inferno that is enveloping this entire country. We have watched the predicted inevitable occur when the Detroit auto loans (spelled bail out) occurred. Most intelligent thinking people predicted that the car makers would be back within 90 days asking for more. Well, the time line might be a day or two off but here they are again with hat in hand and begging for more dollars to throw down a rat hole. Don’t get me wrong, I would like to see the automakers come out of this deal and start making a viable product once again but they have three strikes against them already.

One, they have the Unions with their “life time benefits” built into every contract and they are not willing to concede one bit. Guess they will wonder what happened to the “life time” benefits when the plant closes and as we use to say on the farm the cow goes dry.

Second, the federal government’s regulations on the automakers give them really no incentive to produce beyond the level that they have been doing.

Thirdly they are now being saddled with more regulations on how and what kind of engines can be produced all based on one State, California. It is not profitable to have to make a dozen or more different engines just to suit the eco-kooks in certain states and now resting in cabinet positions in DC.

The only way I see to get from under all this mess is to just go ahead and say, we are broke and here it is. We declare bankruptcy and we are closing the doors until we can come up with a plan to make us viable again. Just what does this accomplish?

First of all it rids the auto makers of the Unions and the cost related issues there. I have heard it put at around $1500 per vehicle just for Union heath care and pension plan . That does not include the hyper inflated wages these folks have been drawing for years. Of course they claim these wages are needed to live in areas like Detroit. I have news for these folks. It is the inflated wages that keep the inflated prices going in the area you live in. Cut wages, the prices will drop accordingly.

I use to live in coal mining country (UMWA world). My former father-in-law was a coal miner and had been a union member since he went to work in the mines but he saw the handwriting on the wall long before most did. He claimed the Union was a dinosaur whose time had come to disappear from the face of the earth. When it came contract time, he and many of the older miners would go to the Union meeting and say, look, we need to plan for tomorrow and our health care because right now it is good but when we retire it won’t be good enough for us to afford the medical help we will need due to Black Lung. Yes, the majority of the miner have Black Lung issues and many die early from complications of such. Did the Union listen? No, it was we want more on the hour wage increases! The younger guys, according to my father-in –law, only wanted to make enough money to afford them a big pick up truck with a gun rack in the back, a double wide and time off to go deer hunting each year. If they were lucky they’d have enough for a 12 pack on Friday. They actually made enough to afford more but his was as far as their vision went. Each year at contract time, they got their raise and the grocery store raised its prices accordingly as well as the local bars, the truck dealers and the sporting goods store.

So with that example I will say, auto makers rid yourself of the mill stone around your neck first.

Next go back to work making good vehicles but at the same time be retooling for a newer more efficient vehicle. The unions have made this impossible with the restraints placed on the individual trades within the auto industry. There will be no cross over according to union officials. Sorry, but cross over skills are exactly what is needed to bring down cost and prices and make the auto industry viable again.

Next, don’t ask for money, ask for , no demand a moratorium on the ridiculous regulations that are now placed on the industry and build a car that people want and that people can afford. Sorry but $30K plus is not an affordable family car. While you are at it put the same tariff on foreign automakers as is placed on US auto’s entering their countries. That will put a dent in their fender! All the talk about a level playing field, well that is the way to do it. Forget the infusion of money into a broke system.

Well that’s got the auto makers problem solved.

You can be assured that next will be the bankers and Wall Street wanting more money to fix the unfixable. Of course anyone with the sense God gave a goose knew that Wall Street and the banks would be crawling back begging for more money. That was this administrations plan. Naturally they have the solution. We will give you more money but we will own you as well. That folks is called Nationalization of the banks and given the manner in which the government runs anything this is a disaster before it even starts. Best solution. Allow the weak to close up or be blended in with a stronger bank in order to give both a chance to survive. If they do, fine, if they don’t, so be it. The strong will survive and be better for the experience without the government interference. People will not lose their life savings if these weak banks close but to hear the doom and gloomer’s talk that is exactly what is happening today. I have yet to hear of anyone losing their savings due to a bank closing. I am hearing of people loosing their retirement savings due to government interference and the gloom and doom talk being blown about by the occupier in chief and his cabinet of know nothings. Every time this pretender opens his mouth or passes another budget the market falls and people can watch their IRA’s , the 401K’s and other retirement tools vanish at an astounding rate. The young will survive because this administration will end, sooner than later because folks are waking up, but the older folks such as myself will have to just make do on what we have left over after this administration finishes all their “fixes”. People in my age group watch as their few stocks drop like rocks each and every day. Those who tried to invest in clean energy such as gas and wind see their investments being blown away in the hurricane of hurry up and “fix it” ideology of this administration. We won’ have time to recover even if the “stimulus” should happen to work only 12%. Joe, foot in the mouth, Biden, says maybe 30% but listening to Joe we know to cut his predictions in half and then some.

That doesn’t worry this group for they have their excuses already in line for failure that they knew would come. Will we get apologies from the Pretender and the stimulus advocates in Congress? Not a chance. Their excuse is already prepared: The stimulus was too small. On the day the Pretender signed the bill, his aides put out the word that another may be needed. The blame will not be put on the folly of stimulus, only on the meagerness of the spending. Heads -- big government wins. Tails -- free people lose.

Well as you can see Washington does not have solutions, the fire department is not going to arrive and it will do you no good to attempt to extinguish the conflagration by peeing on it. That’s the truth but at least you will feel better and the need to keep your legs crossed tightly will have passed.