Give Larry the Bird

Posted on 14/01/2009 by Grumpa Joe

The BirdThe latest joke in front of Congress is the request to bailout the porn industry. Larry Flynt, publisher of a dirt rag called Hustler is requesting money. He is making a claim that the people of the USA and the World need porn to soothe the woes caused by the economic downturn. Somehow with the population of the earth at 6.8 billion and growing, I just can’t beleive we need porn to make it happen.

I sincerely hope our representatives in government will be wise enough to send Larry home with the bird.

Filed under: Characters I knew, Funk, Government, politics, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Barney Frank to Head GM!

Posted on 05/12/2008 by Grumpa Joe

News Flash. “Barney Frank Takes Over the Reins of GM.” Why not? He did a great job with the housing market. He would probably work wonders for GM. The first thing he could do is to present legislation called the “Transportation Revitalization Act.” This law would force lending institutions to make subprime car loans to people who could not afford to own one.  It would be a social engineering program aimed at low income workers. Everyone is entitled to a car.  With the current recession headed toward a depression, the idea might fly. The caveat would be that in order to qualify for a loan, the buyer must purchase American. i.e. GM, Ford, or Chrysler.
The Transportation Revitaalization Act would serve several fronts. First, we give everyone in the country a car. Second, we get the country back on its feet. Think of all the jobs created by the demand for American made cars.
Barney is the perfect guy for the job. He did so well with the housing market that the country experienced economic growth like no other time in history.
I can just see Barney across the table with the UAW. There would be no adversarial relationship between manufacturer and the union. Barney would also be fair, and limit his salary to one half of what the current GM CEO’s make. He would also limit his parachute to a lifetime of service in the Senate.

Another great outcome from the Transportation Revitalization Act is the threat from Japanese, Korean, and Chinese car makers is over. Who would want to buy a foreign product and have to pay for it?  Most likely my kids, they would still insist on a car they wouldn’t have to take back to the dealer for an argument every month.

Write to your congressman today. Insist he initiate the Transportation Revitalization Act in the first session after the Christmas, er Holiday Break.

Filed under: family, Government, Manufacturing, Motivation, politics, Travel, Uncategorized, Writer | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Wealthy Middle Class

Posted on 04/12/2008 by Grumpa Joe
My Flag Flies Everyday

My Flag Flies Everyday

What a joke to watch the Big Three CEO’s squirm on Capital Hill today. They gave the Senate an earful. Basically, we would have gotten off with a bargain had we accepted the 25 billion bailout the carmakers asked for in November. Of all the jokers who spoke before the Senate, I thought the guy from the UAW was most off base. After listening to a proposal from GM which could save an estimated eight billion dollars a year, he proceeded to argue about how he didn’t really believe the numbers of the proposal. Of course not. The proposal meant the UAW would lose some jobs. These are jobs that should be lost. GM, Ford, and Chrysler all carry dead wood because of the UAW contract. In the meantime, their Japanese and Korean competitors are hiring people in this country who are only happy to have a job. They work for considerably lower wages than a UAW greed monger will.  The typical UAW response was one which was adversarial to the management of GM. Even in a hearing which held the life of the company in it’s hands, the UAW forgot why they were there and began to argue against the management. They were there to support the company. They could not. They are the problem, have been the problem and will be the problem for as long as they are in existence.

It has been my experience that everytime a UAW worker goes up against GM he takes the attitude that “I’d sooner see you go down and look for another job than lose this contract negotiation to you bastards.” Over the years, GM has caved in, time and time again in order to please the stock holders. In the meantime, the UAW has become the strongest union on the world. At least it thought it was strong. All it was doing was looking at the immediate bottom line for its workers. Never did they imagine that the mighty GM could crumble. Never did they imagine that the Japanese and the Koreans would steal their lunch.

My opinion of the GM management is not much higher. They were arrogant enough in the seventies, eighties and nineties to believe that the Japanese could not unseat them as the number one carmaker in the world. In the meantime the Japanese continued to do everything right. Little by little they chipped away at the GM market share which went from forty-five percent in the seventies to twenty percent today. They are lucky to have that. The management of GM today is finally waking up and making some good cars. Their quality rivals the Japanese. They have a way to go with overall reliability, but their quality has improved. Their styling sucks. Their current hot car, the Cadillac STS is a winner, but the Chevy Malibu, their work horse, is a dog. I can’t believe that with all the design talent in the USA and within GM that they continue to make cars that look shitty. I can only blame it on the management. Their designers are better than that.

In the meantime, the Japanese continue to work their fifty year strategic plan. Their car companies are in union with the government. They work together in thier industries for the good of the country. The car company employees work under a job for life program. This program keeps them from organizing. These employess are also retrained to work in many different areas in order to reamain employed. They do so. In the meantime our wonderful UAW is protecting jobs even when they are no longer needed.

Another famous UAW contract point is the pay for no work. When a US car company sees a downturn in business, and needs to cut back to save money, the UAW workers continue to get paid eighty percent of their normal wages for up to eight months. What a sweet seal that is. Get paid for nothing, bring on the layoff.

Henry Ford created the middle class when he began building cars. Over the years the UAW has created the “wealthy middle class.”  Thier workers are so well paid they rival the wages of our most educated college students. A UAW worker does not have to give up four or more years of his life to study either. He works the line doing some mundane job better served by a robot.

In the meantime, GM does a profitable business in other parts of the world. Why? Ask yourself that? Why can they compete in other countries but not the USA? The Japs sell the same car against them in other countries, so why do they do so poorly in the USA. Two reasons: The first is perceived quality. GM has sold us such crap for so many years we don’t believe that it is improved to that of the Japs. Second, GM costs are too high compared to their competitors, and they cheeze the car to make profit. That second point only hurts the first one.

If Congress gives them the money it should be with the following caveat: eliminate the UAW, or get major concessions from them. Another option, let GM build cars in another country and import them to the USA.

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Barack’s Self Fulfilled Prophecy

Posted on 26/11/2008 by Grumpa Joe
My Flag Flies Everyday

My Flag Flies Everyday

Today, I saw another interesting news bit. This time it was a map of the US showing the states that are asking for a bailout. Of course, my home state of Illinois is up there with its hand out too. We have good company though; New York, Ohio, California, Arizona, and a few others. All of these states share a common trait. Their political populations are Democratic.  What is it about Democrats? Why are they lined up with their hands out? Do they know any other way to live?

I can only speak for Illinois,  but I’m sure the other states have similar problems. The biggest problem in Illinois is that our leaders have never heard of the concept of a balanced budget. They do, however, know how to spend, raise taxes, and raid pension funds. Recently, Cook County President, Todd Stroger instituted a sales tax increase which makes the residents of Cook County among the highest tax payers in the country. The ink isn’t even dry on the law yet, and he is asking for a bailout. When is enough, enough?

Without a curb on spending and learning to live within our means, the deficit grows, and grows, and grows. Each of the states listed in the bailout demographic has a long time penchant for spending except Arizona. These states have never learned to say “no.” I was surprised to see Arizona included in this demographic, until I realized that they too have become democratic in recent years. At one time, Arizona was a very conservative state. They are now faced with shortfalls, and debt that is beyond their means to pay. Is this what appeals to Democrats? 

Our Federal  Government is no different, except it owns the printing press, and the plates for making money. Each Democratic government from Lyndon Johnson to Bill Clinton supported spending beyond the means to pay back. They invented social programs which caused the banking system to fail, and legislated laws governing everything from fuel mileage to drilling  for oil.

Democrat Bill Clinton brags about his balanced budget and a predicted budget surplus. It is my thinking that the government should have lowered taxes to give the surplus back before the temptation to spend it went into high gear. Our representatives in Washington only saw it as an opportunity to spend it all before we figured it out.

Along comes Barack Obama who for the past two years has been brainwashing the country into believing life is really bad. He created the concept of “failed economic policies,” and turned the idea into a “self fulfilling prophecy.” In very eloquent rhetoric he hypnotized the populace into believing the failure was real. Then, very cleverly, he blamed it on George Bush. I am not a big supporter of W, but give me a break. He is not the reason the banks failed. He did stretch us with the war, but not the subprime loan curse. Had he found WMD in Iraq, things might be different. We didn’t find them, so we have a huge expenditure we don’t need. 

Now, we are faced with a prophecy that is becoming reality. Barack was so good at brainwashing the country, he is being called upon to correct his largest problem, i.e. keeping the country from going into a full blown depression. The number of states lined up with a hand out is a glance into the near future of “Change We Can Believe In.” He never did define what the change would be, did he?.

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We May Indeed Be Nuts!

Posted on 12/11/2008 by Grumpa Joe
My Flag Flies Everyday

My Flag Flies Everyday

I am almost over the election. I haven’t blogged because the need to do so dried up when BO won. This week, however, I have to speak my piece on the latest of Uncle Sam’s idiotic moves. Why do we want to bail out GM? This car company has consistently thrown poor quality, and reliability at us in the name of “Made in the USA.” The same goes for the UAW. I tried my best to hold out by buying American for many years. I owned an Oldsmobile Intrigue for eight years. It was without a doubt, the best GM car I ever owned. I bragged about it’s reliability and performance. I tried in vane to get my kids to buy “American.” No amount of reason or guilt worked. Two of my kids  don’t even know that there are cars made in America that are not Honda or Toyota. They grew up on Honda, and Toyota. They are brand faithful. At the same time I was bragging about my Intrigue with 110,000 miles on it, my daughter bragged about her Honda with 180,000. All she ever did was change oil, and put brakes, tires and gas in it.  At 111,000 miles my Intrigue crapped out. It leaked fluid into the cyclinders and locked the engine tight. After I spent $1800 to replace a leaking intake manifold, I learned on the I-net that GM cars are notorious for this failure. They have had the problem for years, but have never taken any steps to fix it. 

The US car companies, management and the UAW, have let the Japs take them down. Now GM wants the tax payer to bail them out. The argument is that if they are allowed to go bankrupt, many thousands of jobs will be lost, thus fueling the recession.

The truth is that filing for bankruptcy will not be a loss of jobs. They can go on making crappy cars as is their usual business. The difference is that they won’t get any “free money,” from the taxpayer.

A few years ago, GM divested itself of a division called Delphi. Delphi makes electrical systems for GM and other car companies. GM gave Delphi as much pension debt as they could. Eventually, Delphi filed for chapter eleven. They couldn’t make a profit with all the baggage GM dumped on them. I know, because I am a stockholder. Want to know what happens to the stockholder when a company files for bankruptcy? The old shares become worthless, meaning the stockholder loses his investment. GM didn’t give a hoot about losing Delphi, it became Delphi’s problem.  Even though Delphi filed for bankruptcy, it has continued to operate for several years. They keep on shipping orders. They even entertained the purchase of another electronics company. How can a business that is in bankruptcy buy another company?

What GM is afraid of is all it’s incompetent managers losing their options and bonuses paid in stock.

The capitalistic system rewards companies that can design, make, and sell useful products that buyers want. GM does not do any of these things. They design cars that have a shorter life than their competitors, their designs are ugly, and they are made by the most unproductive union in the world, i.e. the UAW.

If we reward GM and the UAW with a government bailout, we are indeed nuts. Let the system work, we’ll all be better off for it. We won’t have to worry about BO turning the country socialist. WE will hand a socialist government to him on a silver platter.

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