By Patrick J. Buchanan
“GOP to Detroit: Drop Dead!”
So may have read the headline Friday, had not President Bush stepped in to save GM, Ford and Chrysler, which Senate Republicans had just voted to send to the knacker’s yard.
What are Republicans thinking of, pulling the plug, at Christmas, on GM, risking swift death for the greatest manufacturing company in American history, a strategic asset and pillar of the U.S. economy.
The $14 billion loan to the Big Three that Republican senators filibustered to death is just 2 percent of the $700 billion the Senate voted to bail out Wall Street. Having gone along with bailouts of Bear Stearns, AIG, Fannie, Freddie and CitiGroup, why refuse a reprieve to an industry upon which millions of the best blue-collar jobs in America depend?
In a good year, Americans buy 17 million cars. A more populous EU probably buys as many. Three billion people in India, Southeast Asia and China, four times as many people as there are in the EU and United States, are moving toward the middle class. They, too, will be wanting cars. And millions of them love American cars.
Is the Republican Party so fanatic in its ideology that, rather than sin against a commandment of Milton Friedman, it is willing to see America written forever out of this fantastic market, let millions of jobs vanish and write off the industrial Midwest?
So it would seem. “Companies fail every day, and others take their place,” said Sen. Richard Shelby on “Face the Nation.”
Presumably, the companies that will “take their place,” when GM, Ford and Chrysler die, are German, Japanese or Korean, like the ones lured into Shelby’s state of Alabama, with the bait of subsidies free-market Republicans are supposed to abhor.
In 1993, Alabama put together a $258 million package to bring a Mercedes plant in. In 1999, Honda was offered $158 million to build a plant there. In 2002, Alabama won a Hyundai plant by offering a $252 million subsidy.
“We have a number of profitable automakers in America, and they should not be disadvantaged for making wise business decisions while failure is rewarded,” says Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina.
DeMint is referring to “profitable automakers” like BMW, which sited a plant in Spartanburg, after South Carolina offered the Germans a $150 million subsidy and $80 million to expand.
Be it BMW, Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Mazda, Mitsubishi or Hyundai, the South has become a sanctuary for foreign assembly plants, for which Southern states have been paying subsidies.
Fine. But why this “Let-them-eat-cake!” coldness toward U.S. auto companies? General Motors employs more workers than all these foreign plants combined. And, unlike Mitsubishi, General Motors didn’t bomb Pearl Harbor.
Do these Southern senators understand why the foreign automakers suddenly up and decided to build plants in the United States?
It was the economic nationalism of Ronald Reagan.
When an icon of American industry, Harley-Davidson, was being run out of business by cutthroat Japanese dumping of big bikes to kill the “Harley Hog,” Reagan slapped 50 percent tariffs on their motorcycles and imposed quotas on imported Japanese cars. Message to Tokyo. If you folks want to keep selling cars here, start building them here.
Fear of Reaganism brought those foreign automakers, lickety-split, to America’s shores, not any love of Southern cooking.
Do the Republicans not yet understand how they lost the New Majority coalition that gave them three landslides and five victories in six presidential races from 1968 to 1988? Do they not know why the Reagan Democrats in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan are going home?
The Republican Party gave their jobs away!
How? By telling U.S. manufacturers they could shut plants here, get rid of their U.S. workers, build factories in Mexico, Asia or China, and ship their products back, free of charge.
Republican globalists gave U.S. manufacturers every incentive to go abroad and take their jobs with them, the jobs of Middle America.
And, for 30 years, that is what U.S. manufacturers have done, have been forced to do, as their competitors closed down and moved their plants abroad in search of low-wage Third World labor.
It’s Herbert Hoover time in here, Vice President Cheney is said to have told the Senate Republicans — as they prepared to march out onto the floor and turn thumbs down on any reprieve for General Motors.
In today’s world, America faces nationalistic trade rivals who manipulate currencies, employ nontariff barriers, subsidize their manufacturers, rebate value-added taxes on exports to us and impose value-added taxes on imports from us, all to capture our markets and kill our great companies. And we have a Republican Party blissfully ignorant that we live in a world of us or them. It doesn’t even know who “us” is.
We need a new team on the field and a new coach who believes with Vince Lombardi that “winning isn’t everything. It’s the only thing.”
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GM IN MEXICO-GRACIAS GRINGO.
GM Mexican Plants Expand as Carmaker Seeks Funds for Rescue
Email | Print | A A A
By Thomas Black
Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) — General Motors Corp., the biggest automaker in the U.S. and Mexico, increased production of $12,625 Chevrolet Aveos south of the border while seeking a bailout to keep domestic plants from closing.
The Detroit-based company and competitors such as Ford Motor Co. shifted more manufacturing to Mexico this year to capitalize on wages less than an eighth of those in the U.S. and factories that make fuel-efficient models. Through November, Mexican plants turned out 5 percent more vehicles than a year earlier, versus an estimated decline of 30 percent in the U.S.
Mexico is so far weathering the collapse of the global auto industry better than its North American neighbors. Even with a projected decrease in production of as much as 20 percent in 2009, the world’s 10th-largest maker of light vehicles will still suffer less than the U.S. or Canada, according to Eduardo Solis, president of the Mexican Automobile Industry Association.
“The type of vehicle that’s produced in Mexico for the cost that it’s produced and the proximity to the U.S. are factors helping us fare better than other countries,” said Emilio Mosso, a deputy director at the Mexican Economy Ministry.
Thanks to investments by most of the major producers, Mexico has developed a high quality, low-cost manufacturing base. Assembly-line technology is now sophisticated enough to let the nation expand into aerospace, with Bombardier Inc., Safran SA and Honeywell International Inc. investing in operations in recent months.
“The number of errors produced in Mexico is relatively lower than in other countries,” Adolfo Albo, an economist in Mexico City with Spain’s Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA said in a telephone interview. “Plants are newer and the training processes are more effective.”
Small-Car Production
Output there also favors small and mid-size vehicles, which make up almost three-quarters of those manufactured. Other models produced in Mexico include the Pontiac G3, Ford Fusion, Volkswagen Beetle and Dodge Journey, a new car-based, sport- utility vehicle.
The product mix positions the industry to grab market share in coming years as consumers seek out fuel efficiency, Mosso said. Through November, Mexico had gained a percentage point to 26 percent of U.S. imports this year, even though close to 30,000 fewer cars from there were sold in the states than in the same period of 2007.
That said, Mexico won’t be immune to the global drop-off in vehicle sales. More than 70 percent of its cars end up in the U.S. where sales in November fell to the lowest annual rate in 26 years, according to Autodata Corp.
Heimdall & Viper hit the nail on the head!
I was a product of the movement durng the 1950’s when factories in the North were booming and Southerers were transferred up North to keep their jobs. I have patiently sat back and watched what would happen next, what the reaction would be and whether the American people would recognize this for what it is – or let this become another force to draw each other apart and at each other’s throats.
Raised IN the South, I was taught from an early age to hold onto my pride, feel resentment towards the North and keep the walls up no matter what the cost. Something else sparked in me – a sense of pride in my fellow human being, no matter WHO they are or where they live – a sense of fairness, decency and common sense.
Let’s get real, maybe the Unions have gone overboard a little here or there but where would ANY of us be if it weren’t for those who fought, sacrificed and died for basic rights, health and safety on the job? Put things into perspective here – it’s not about Union wages or workers not giving in – what power do they have these days??
It’s about Politics PERIOD, people. The politics of the Southern States trying to keep their factories happy – getting back at the Unions and those who work in Union factories for voting against them during the last election.
What have these states given in ‘perks’ to the foreign companies they court, in order to keep them and have them continue to move into their states?? No doubt, were you to make a comparison, the general public may be suprised.
This is the 21st century but we always need a strong manufacturing base. What kept our Nation great was the fact we were #1 in the world. Welcome the world to us but not at the expsense of losing our idenity.
When we are “owned by the world” as puppets on a string, then maybe people will wake up… but by then, it may be too late!
(P.S. just finished a genealogy check… Mr. Buchanan…… our GG Grandfathers were brothers! Mine was William Benton.)
Pat………..I agree with you 99.9% of the time, and will try hard to see your perspective on this?
First, It ain’t just Southern Republicans but Southernors that have waited a long time for the Northern Industrial Complex to bring their “Prosperity” to our region? Some Steel Mills did, but the “Big 3″ continued to treat us poorly, as they accepted our “Downtroden Blacks” wonderful, that re-located to the Industry of the North. Last time we saw Northern Investers in the South was Carpetbaggers!…..After the “War of Northern Aggression” against our agricultural successes, we were nothing more than a “Winterhaven” for Yankees to pour our way in the winter months, loving our low cost of living and warm climate. The “Big 3″ even skipped us as they moved into Mexico prefering the allien national to our workers?…….But, the Japs said, “Great work ethic, good climate, and reasonable wage demands!”…..It worked for us and them. Meanwhile, the “Motown” worker was trying to turn his job into some kind of “Hybred Social Program”!
We owe the “Big 3″ and the North nothing! Actualy, we hope they keep their ass home this winter! Sucesion is still our goal, and the North can continue to allow the NYNY Elites to rule their lives, as we move on with ours. “Balkanization” is not a bad word for us and our Anglo/Celtic culture that has been fighting the “Culture War” sence before you were born!……..Only through BANKRUPTSY can the Big 3 get released from their “Twisted Labor Base”!…….Ford Sr. was a good man, and after writing his book “The International Jew”, he would have been wise to move his operation to the South……..We have no more patience for Political Correctness and Northern Gullability. (You won the war…..Enjoy it!)
Why pick on the Unions? The United mine Workers saved lives and livelihoods in the 1930’s and thereafter. The ALPA beginning after WWII, until the golden parachute crew (CEOs etc) subverted them in the last 10 -15 years, made the airlines safe and productive and efficient. 911 was just an excuse for the run on the airlines. Now I grant you the teamsters can be out and out klowns and crooked at the same time. Also, the Operating Engineers (heavy equipment) and heavy industrial construction trade unions priced themselves out of business at times; not always though. While they had clout in the 1950’s through the 1970’s they provided a high standard of professionalism. The UAW provided a standard of living that was important. I beg to differ with those who think the Unions – any of them, caused trade tariffs or barriers. I live in Southern California and instead of the old construction unions it is all labor from Latin America (Mexico, Caribbean, Central America and South America) now in Southern California and all the way up to and including the State of Washington. A lot of them aren’t legal. In addition, the outsourcing of the Oil Refining capability of the United States began in the early 1990’s at exactly the same time as GATT-NAFTA then (I wrote Pat an ink and paper letter about it then, to which he sent a very cordial and thoughtful reply). All of our production and manufacturing and factory work has been and is being stripped from this country. The reasons are several and interrelated. One – it causes us to be at the utter mercy of the bankster-gangsters. We have no real wealth, just land equity we now owe to the transnational banking cartel. Two – it provides for the infighting between conservatives and workers that stops any alliance for reclaiming American production. Three – the only to prop the economy up is to go to war, thus a pseudo-patriotism is injected as an excuse to pillage Iraq and who knows who else. NOBODY has yet been able to tell me, how in the hell, Osama bin Laden was able to quietly stay in Western Pakistan and still at the same time morph into Saddam Hussein, the fool who thought we were his friend. Damn, George, yer reel (sic) somethin’ else.
Trade tariffs actually were sane and simply kept countries from engaging in slave labor – at home and abroad.
The agenda is Global totalitarianism with a strange group of bedfellows at the center. The litany of their numbers is almost trite given the baseless speculation that sometimes abounds about them. But they do exist and include Transnational Banks, United Nations Socialist-Communist types (tear down the borders etc.), Zionists, Illuminati, EU type Napoleonic Juridical Code anti-U.S. Constitution legalists and here at home the part that Americans are INSISTING upon having a hard time getting their minds around: CROOKED AMERICAN POLITICIANS. These come in both Republicrat and Democan stripes. They are BOUGHT OFF with money!!! They are guilty of HIGH TREASON. As the Red Queen said in Alice….
The money that bought off the crooks in office comes from the elites who consider the U.S. expendable. Face it, they don’t care if we survive at all. They will be happy with a slave Eurasian Society and an Africa destroyed and the United States vanished and replaced by the North American Union. I saw meat in the Grocery store yesterday, a large amount, it all had tags on it which said “Product of U.S., Canada, Mexico” What country is “U.S., Canada, Mexico”? Is that south of Antarctica or something?
When economic times have been made very bad, so very often, there are those that step in to give us a false solution – that of hate some group or another in order to vent frustration. Don’t let us fall for it.
In the below, some very good writers warn us about falling prey to the mentality of paranoid mob hate.
James Petras warns us about:
Provocations as Pretexts for Imperial War: From Pearl Harbor to 9/11
by James Petras
http://globalresearch.ca/, May 25, 2008
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Petras_James/Imperial_War_Pretexts.html
______________________________________________
Michael Hoffman warns us about:
Judaic Columnist Urges: “Kill the Muslims”
http://revisionistreview.blogspot.com/
Republicans and Democrats alike have placed officials in government drawn from the cesspools of America’s citizens. Nothing good can be said for either Republican or Democrat representatives in Congress, unless they have stood up against the Federal Reserve, or against NAFTA, or against the Patriot Act. Those who have stood for these things are traitors. There can be no honest debate about the Big 3, unions, bailouts, or anything until these bankster lackeys are removed from the halls of government.
The U.S.A. will stand as a completely sovereign economic entity, or it will be flushed down the commode of history. We will see the end of transnational corporate operations, or we will suffer the throes of third world poverty.
It doesn’t matter whether management or labor, GREED better be wiped off the balance sheets and the profit and loss statements.
Someday I hope the people of this country wake up and see that we are slowly but surely letting other countries take over our country. We give them subsidies to build cars here, and guess where the profit goes? We incent manufacturing to move out of country, where they get cheap labor, and bring their goods back the to U.S. duty-free. We have it so good we just look the other way. However, our good-paying jobs in manuf. are all but gone and now people are forced to work in service industries for peanuts and poor benefits, if they have benefits. We look the other way on immigration, and illegals have the balls to protest in our country when they don’t like the direction immigration reform was going. These are foreign criminals, openly protesting in our country!!! They have no respect for us because we are stupid, and they know it.
Wow…… I’ve been working on genealogy for the past few hours and thought I’d check in before heading to bed. My goodness “Northern Agression, Japs, Culture war, and who won the war?” That was exactly my point earlier and it saddens me to no end.
My roots are embedded in the South/Anglo/Celtic culture – it’s blood flows through my veins – but I refuse to lower myself and play the ethno-rhetoric games of a embittered past. It is beyond the dignity of those who came before me.
It is work, pride in fairness and the dignity of the human spirit that keeps our country great; NOT divisive polarizine attitudes that spew hate and vengance from a past that should be long forgotten. One side or another has viewed their circumstances from a different looking glass throughout history. How long must we go on ‘tit for tat’ before we stop the madness, wake up and get it right…… for once?
We are living in a time that calls for people to use what God above gave us all – and use it wisely, with justice, common sense and the dignity it calls for.
Rodfish, Very good eye opening posts on GM’S recent investments in Mexico and China as they beg for american taxpayer money to survive. Oh my God, we should have put Ross Perot in office way back when, he might have been a slight bit nutty, but how many brilliant good hearted true americans arn’t a slight bit twisted? Does Pat come to mind???
Thank you Patrick for reminding us how much the U.S.Auto Industry and Labor gave to the American Economy and People.
With the destruction of the entire social fabric of American Family and Community life and now the destruction of the American Economy the answer that will be proposed is: WE NEED FEARLESS LEADER TO SAVE US!?!?!?!?
Guess what – that is a very ObaZioCommunismatic way of thinking.
ObaZioCommunismatic — new term I just coined from Obama Zionist Communism Charismatic.
Obama the Judaic Zionist, See: Prof. James Petras
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=9837
____________________________________________
Obama the Communist:
http://www.aim.org/aim-column/obamas-communist-mentor/
____________________________________________
Obama the Charismatic
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081218/ap_on_go_pr_wh/inauguration_minister
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52971
_____________________________________________
Obama is all things to all people and nothing to anyone.
“It’s an old story: one that has been repeated many times but the greater part of humanity still hasn’t learned. But the lesson is a simple one and until we learn it we will carry on repeating the same old mistakes.
For the Illuminati have a history of creating problems, or allowing them to develop to the stage where people demand, “something must be done”! At which point the Illuminati then step forward with an answer. A solution that formerly might have been unacceptable had it not been needed for a problem requiring remedy so urgently.
It’s the old Problem-reaction-solution ruse that has been used throughout history.”
By: Rixon Stewart – October 23, 2008
The Advent of the Antichrist
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=9564
Diocletian’s Problem-Reaction-Solution
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/diocletian.html
Sky,
Right on target buddy. We need a strong third party in this country along the lines of Teddy Roosevelt and the Bull Moose. Democrats and Republicans are just the same. I’m from Illinois as you know, and I am having a blast with the whole Blago vs. Madigan/Obama thing going-on in the national media now. Boy have I got some stories to tell about my days as a Democrat in Illinois! When I watched these blithering nincompoops on TV cry at the convention in Denver I just though, “boy if you idiots knew about Mr. Clean.” But, as you know I voted Democrat for union issues and when they sold-out on that, there was no reason to support them. It was under a Democrat President (Clinton) and a Democrat Senate, that all of our manufacturing jobs started to leave in the 1990’s. The GOP controlled the House and was 1/2 of an unholy alliance. Sorry I have not commented more Sky…2008 election took lots out of me. Cannot turn on the TV and see that fake-phony joke we have as a President. Can’t take it brother.
Pat is right on the Big 3 Loan request. Those who blame the union workers do not understand that labor costs are only 10% or less, of the price of a car. New workers start at $14 with very few benefits, Current workers earn about $26 per hour plus very good benefits. Is that too much? That calculates to about $60,000 per year. I get tired of hearing about the $74 per hour earned by the workers. That number is generated from all the retirees, widows, and all fringe benefits, divided by the active workers! That is not an accurate or honest number . It may be an actual hourly cost for the company but is not the hourly wage.
Now. About those legacy costs. Yes, there is a large number of retirees drawing pensions. (Those pensions were supposed to have been funded over the workers 30-40 years of work).
The men and women who retired did not have the option of a lump sum payment, like many salaried employees have. These retirees are totally dependent on the pension and possibly some savings. (by the way, the big 3 do not match 401K contributions by hourly employees)
The actual monthly pension is currently about $1600. The company supplements that with about $1600 per month until the retiree is eligible for social security benefits. At that time the supplement is eliminated. As you can see, a retiree earns about $38,400 per year plus benefits. The company paid health care, (which includes co-pays, deductibles, and co-insurance), continues into retirement until the retiree reaches medicare eligibility. At age 65, medicare becomes the primary insurer and the company health plan becomes the supplementary provider.
I will be among the first to say that the union employees have a pretty good retirement plan. I also must ask, “what is wrong with that!” These people spent their entire lives working for the company, with the promise of a pension and health care.
I Hear some commentary saying that they must do something about those legacy costs. My question is “What” ? Those benefits were “promised”. If you cut loose those retirees, the cost will fall to the taxpayers in the form of payments from the PBGC. If the health benefits are eliminated the cost will again fall on the public when the retire goes to the hospital with no insurance.
I have little patience for inaccurate or misleading information . A contributor on this site stated that the union assembly workers earned $150,000 per year. I have heard Rush Limbaugh state that union workers earn more on retirement than they did while working. Both are dishonest statements.
There certainly are some inefficiencies in the auto industry. However, I do not understand the grilling congress is giving the auto industry, compared to the very obvious lack of question or accountability for the financial institutions.
With regard to Bernie Madoff…who invented copper wire… two Jews fighting over a penny.
By the way, where has most of this 50 Billion gone, heh?
Probably Izrael.
What am I tripping on? It is not I who advocates nuking people who refuse to exchange Qurans for condoms.
Bernie, you may be on something but you are also right! The ‘War on Terror’ what a diversionary hoax!
The decadence and gutting of our Christian heritage from within, propagated by the elite chosen few, that’s the real problem as you stated in another post that I focused on.
regards
Pat, I have been watching MSNBC and you are right on with the understanding of the Detroit Issue.
1st. In 1954 the Us was concerned on losing the watch industry from imports from Switzerland see article in New York times
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0A15F73B5A107B93C6AB178CD85F408585F9&scp=5&sq=1954%20us%20watch&st=cse
WE have lost the manufacturing of watches. The concern then was we would lose a military advantage if we lost the watch industry. We were fortunate we did not have another war where we would need the US watch makers.
I am not here to defend the actions of the management of the US Auto industry the last 30 years. There decision making was goofy at best I am here to defend the need of the industry for the military strength of this nation.
Your analysis of us not allowed to sell cars in Japan. If we were allowed and the Japanesse did not buy we would have had to improve our quality t o sell in Japan. That issue goes back over 30 years. The biggest concern we should have if we lose the automotive manfacturing and if we have to go to war again will we be able to build military armanents in a Mercedes or Toyota factory? Will we have the brain power for the design of the armenents if we do not have the AMERICAN design engineers? How much of th Iraq war came from the tool and dye makers who als o work for the auto industry?
The strength of the US auto industry is not the labor who “assemble” (that can be done anywhere ask the Japanese) it is the design and engineering that sits in Detroit and Tokyo and Stuttgart. WE MUST HAVE THE TRAINED ENGR’S
to servive a war. My preferecne that we have a strong position in engineers in Detroit instead of hoping that we can get them from outside the country. That ain’t going to happen
We have already lost the a big chunk of the machine manufacturing in this country what is next.
If we had a war today I am not sure we have the capability to supply the manufacturers with the machines needed. During Iraq war we imported the needed machines are always going to be able to import the machines?
GM ,Ford and Chrysler are paying a hugh price for their last 30 years of decision making. GM stock is all but worthless Ford family has lost almost all of th value of there stock, and Chrysler God only knows.
Buy American we must support the American Auto industry. I just bought a new GM vehicle and I am very happy with it. I do not need to send my money to foreign country unless that is the only choice. I have to buy my watch from Switzerland.
Jerry Rosenfeld
Birmingham, MI
PS I do not work for the auto industry.
Actually, Jerry, the japanese citizens pay more for their toyotas then we do because they rebate their toyota exports, so this thing about “Even if there were no barriers to American automobile exports to japan, then the US wouldn’t compete cause GM is crap” is a line of bullcrap.
The Toyota Republicans have a conflict of interest, but this just further proves that politicians can’t be trusted to decide where bailout money should go. In the end, the free market will win out. Those who are left standing won’t be those companies which have been surviving on stale ideas and government handouts.
http://www.toyotarepublicans.com/