White House and GOP to Detroit: Drop Dead
 

http://www.gminsidenews.com/forums/s...ad.php?t=36093

Top GOP leaders sending message to Big 3: Drop dead

Daniel Howes

Big-name Republicans are tramping around Michigan -- Karl Rove is expected at a fundraiser today in Grosse Pointe, Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman is campaigning for Senate hopeful Mike Bouchard and President Bush is rumored to be planning a campaign swing next month.
But meet with Detroit's automakers? Nah, why should the president care whether U.S.-owned automakers, burdened by fierce foreign competition and cumulative decisions that threaten to swamp them, are fighting for their collective lives? Instead, key Republicans and the White House are reprising President Ford's message to New York back in the mid-'70s: "Drop dead."
Such cynicism toward a bedrock industry -- let the Blue-Staters wither -- would be comical if it wasn't so misguided, even dumb.
Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., told the Washington Post that "there's a new definition of the American auto industry. Twenty-five years ago, it was the Big Three companies in Detroit. Now (it's) any company that makes a substantial number of cars and trucks in the U.S. and has a big payroll here, pays big taxes here and buys supplies here."
Nissan equals GM?
Meaning, evidently, that the Nissan operations in Tennessee and the new Hyundai plant in Alabama are indistinguishable from GM and Ford. Politically, perhaps, but not economically.
Added Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Alabama: "The way (Detroit automakers) do business has to change or they won't be around. The competition has been brought to our shores. There is a lot that our automobile manufacturers can learn in the world."
There's also a lot that Red State Republicans could learn about the Detroit automakers and their legacy commitments to retirees and active employees, namely that they're not easily shed this side of bankruptcy.
But it's easier to ignore context, demonize unions, embrace the new guys from overseas who don't carry the same baggage and then give Detroit a condescending geography lesson -- as if the No. 1 player in China, GM, doesn't know the business is global.
Different set of rules
In any other major auto-producing nation, politicians don't ignore the concerns of their auto industry. Not in France and Germany, where nationalism infuses economic policy. And not in Japan or South Korea, where manipulating currencies and erecting trade barriers is acceptable to help the home team -- and Detroit isn't asking for either one.
Here? The president won't meet with the bosses of General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and the Chrysler Group. But he'll sit astride a Harley, visit a Nissan truck plant, herald the Toyota engine that won the Indy 500, campaign for Republicans and then have his press secretary swear there's no snub of Detroit.
Rep. John Dingell ain't buying it. "Manufacturing is going to hell in this country, and the president just sits there fiddling while Rome burns," the Dearborn Democrat told me.


http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll...82/1148/AUTO01

nationalism can not be legislated, it has to come from the people. in this country we have no basis for such an upswell of pride. hell, no one will even allow us to have an official language because it may offend someone.
the politicians are finally saying to the auto iundustry what the foreign competition has been telling them for years, it is more about jobs and economics than national pride.
with more and more "domestic" brands building overseas and then importing the cars into the US, who do you think the politicians will side with? the automakers that are taking jobs out of the country, or the companies that are building new facilities and hiring americans to work in them.

i woudl also like to know what the news papers would like the government to do to foreign brands that build in the us. you can't tax them extra for doing the same thing an "american" company is doing, you can't legal limit them from producing and selling because no single brandcan be singled out as a monopoly, and the foreign companies also hire so many people that trying to control their business would jsut put some politicians constituants out of work and we all know they aren't gonna do anything to stop themselves from being re-elected.

Exactly, GM and Ford can't afford to pay these pensions and retirements and expect to survive. It's basically a balancing of the field. I couldn't care less for the offerings out of any company right now but when I'm ready to buy something new(which may be never) it will be GM!

i think my next vehicle will be used Gm fbody platform, and then a cheap 80's toyota 4 banger with a stick.


Then as soon as either a trans am or a formula is realeased again that will be my first new car


GO AMERICAN AUTOMAKERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its amazing how the goverment can turn its back on the big three. Yeah, great Toyota has 10 plants in the US...GM has 10 plants too...in Ohio.
The Japanese goverment has help prop up its own auto companies for years now, its sad to see our goverment turning its back to the Big 3 after all that they have done for this nation.

The unions have been in bed with the dem party for years...payback is a bitch.

except when I lived in Japan, I've basically only bought Ameican cars (I owned 1 BMW for all of 4 weeks) and can't see myself doing anything different...I support my countrymen by buying their products, I just wish more people in this country felt the same way. I can't jump on the imort bandwagon, I haven't seen anything that really impressed me so much, that I had to turn my back on domestics...

the government could care less about Detroit, or any American businesses for that matter. I agree with everything you guys said...

it is simply about jobs. the big 3 don't feel any particular responsibility to work on keeping jobs in the US, so why should the government feel any particular passion towards them.
the US owned car companies have been slowly producing fewer and fewer cars in america since the 70's. since the mid 80's the imports, mainly the japs, have been building plants at nearly the same rate that the companies from here are leaving.
at teh end of the day the government has to worry about americans being empolyed than helping out some mega company that is in the process of leaving anyway.
please stop trying to make this into some tear jerker of a drama about national pride. the companies you are trying to win support for have been bailing out on that same pride you now want to envoke for decades!!!

What are you talking about? GM has 54 plants!! And the people that are "out of work" are still getting paid, plus getting full benifts!
Toyota and the other foriegn automakers have no such deal, and do not have to suffer the massive hit that The Big 3 do with healthcare.

so what you are saying is that the big3 didn't bother to fight the unions for a better deal like the jap companies did and now they get to suffer from it?
gee, you can't imagine how bad i feel for them :roll:

And all along i thought the Big 3 were so pomp-us they did nothing to improve quality of their product --- and most who needed a high quality car with great fuel ecom and good price lasted 200,000 miles and still was worth something -- and they still did nothing the big 3 --- now they want tax payer money for a bail out and this time not like the K CARS of old --- will default on all the loans and i know its bushes fault i can see it coming -- jz

The Asian plants in the US are non-union. The Big 3 cant live without the unions, so what the unions say, goes. They made deals with these plants years ago, and now the union workers dont feel like giving up what they feel is theres. Unless GM just wants production to stop, and have the UAW go on strike, then they are gunna have to keep taking it in the ass.

Nationaized HC woudl be a big help to most union manufacturing in the US. But the republicans do not care if manufacturing jobs leave the US. This is bigger than a car thing.

how would they not survive without the unions? people need jobs man. union or not, there will be people lined up to get good paying jobs.

and the democrats in charge of tax payer millions they cant account for already in new Orleans do i guess ( THE POT IS BLACK ON BOTH SIDES ) YA THINK --JZ

nationalized health care would be an amazing help to the american working class. but it would also meet with a firestorm of resistance because you would basically be taking money out of the pockets of commercial healthcare systems that are worth billions of dollars.
the people who are making all the money from healthcare have the influence to prevent something that would be taht helpful to the rest of us. there is no way they are going to freely give up the ability to sell you an asprin for $10 just because you are in a hospital.
there are many doctors who would go for it, but there would also have to be provisions to help them pay off their college loans since it would be a huge cut into their salaries as well. to become a practicing physician in this country costs easily half a mill, even more if it is a highly prestigious school.
it really isn't a republican or democrat that prevents it from happening. you will note that the republicans campaign against it, while the democrats campaign for it. in the end of the day neither side has ever proposed anything to move this idea forward.