Even if the unions were not superfluous, and venal to the core, they are totally without self restraint, even when their constant need for more and more concessions from their company has historically resulted in the death of the company and the loss of the membership’s jobs.
Remember International Harvester and the Scout? Gone and all the jobs that vehicle represented.

Union leadership cannot succeed (that is to say, be re-elected) unless they deliver stuff to their members, real or imagined. It is not in their charter to partner with management, it is their function to act as a labor gatekeeper to keep other, equally unskilled workers out of the union shop, while maintaining the artificial labor pricing scheme that the closed shop provides. This system they will maintain and pursue, right up until the factory doors are locked for good, because labor costs price their product out of the market.

What we are seeing here is Stalin light. Government takeover of private enterprise by proxy, in this case the same organized labor that made these companies non-competitive to start with. Stalin was willing to kill millions of Russians and non-slavs to make his system work, and still it failed. Not much chance for the presidential hopey-changey agent, then.

Are you busy developing a strawman or are you that dense? I said nothing about using wind energy farms to power the grid. I said that the best use of wind energy is produce hydrogen for fuel cells. That can be done off the grid. Wind farms would be the analog to an oil refinery that produces gasoline. The power would be used locally and wouldn’t reguire a connection to the grid for transport elsewhere. The reason that the Obama adminstration will not consider a hydrogen based transport sector based on wind power is that it will alow the US to retain its unique characteristic of a mobile society independent of the government. Battery powered cars are just what the big governmnet ordererd. It will allow urban dwellers the ability to drive locally but will keep them penned up in their urban zones.

“Dems express ‘growing concern/By AMIE PARNES/ 06/06/09

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer and Reps. Chris Van Hollen and Daniel Maffei have circulated this letter today [...] to Obama expressing “growing concern” with the closures of GM and Chrysler dealerships across the country. The lawmakers say they’re asking for a “compelling justification as to how closing healthy dealerships will make the automakers more financially sound”. The lawmakers are asking for lawmakers to sign this letter by 5p.m. today.

Dear President Obama:
We are writing to express our concerns about General Motors’ and Chrysler’s decision to close profitable automobile dealerships across the country, and urge you to ask GM and Chrysler to delay final action on proposed closures pending further review of the decision to consolidate dealerships and the process by which Chrysler and GM selected the dealerships to close.

Closing these dealerships will put over 100,000 jobs at risk at a time when our country is shedding jobs at an alarming rate. We also question the criteria being used to determine which dealerships should be closed and the fundamental fairness involved in this effort. It is our view that the market rather than leaving it up to the manufacturers whose poor leadership contributed to their demise. Furthermore, we believe car dealers will be key players in any effort to revive the American auto industry.

We believe the dealerships are one of the auto industry’s key sources of strength and the manufacturers should continue to honor their agreements and contracts. The dealerships, and their more than 1 million employees, form personal relationships with customers that often contribute to brand loyalty and will be key to General Motors’ and Chrysler’s recovery following this economic downturn. While we understand the desire to reduce the number of unprofitable dealerships, no one has yet sufficiently explained the need to close profitable dealerships.

We recognize that efforts by your Auto Task Force prevented the total liquidation of General Motors and Chrysler, as well as their dealership networks. We commend your efforts to help these businesses survive these challenging economic times.

However, we are concerned that manufacturers are closing profitable dealerships to circumvent current contracts which could require expensive buy-outs under normal conditions. We are also concerned about allegations that dealers that have previously stood up for their rights against the manufacturers are being targeted by these closures. We believe that the forced closures of profitable dealerships needs to be scrutinized by the Task Force to prevent additional future financial loses to General Motors and Chrysler and job loses across the United States

We may consider legislative proposals to ensure that dealers and their employees are treated fairly, and we look forward to your timely response. [...]

—————-*——————-

Mugabeconomics: Bernake printed so far more than 1 trillion (TRILLION, yeah, you read it right, no typo here, more than $ 1 TRILLION), and it appears that the WH is completely unwilling to allow him stop this paper deluge – and whatever you think about the idea of pulling ourselves by commercial paper out of this recession (I personally I find it kind of acceptable if truly & responsibly controlled), the relentlessness of the current process makes me believe that we assist at:

a) either an act of economical sedition/warfare,
b) the extension of presidential campaign financing effort,

And I think that a+ b is the right answer here.

I tried looking up lithium abundance and came up with 29 million tons. That would seem like enough to get started. (http://www.evworld.com/library/KEvans_LithiumAbunance_pt2.pdf)
But let’s drop back and look at the bigger picture.

1. The advantages of regenerative braking are too good to pass up, so we’re going to be able to buy it if we want to, we can now in some form. It’s success commercially is probably tied to fuel price.

2. I’m old enough to have participated in several major shifts in technological paradigm. At the onset, you can’t tell how they’re going to turn out. By the time it’s over, maybe we’ll use lithium ion batteries, maybe something else we haven’t invented yet. We don’t know yet, but it’s begun, that’s clear.

3. The marketplace is the best mechanism for sorting out what works best. Having some technocrat in Washington picking winners is pretty much a surefire road to disaster. Ask the French about the Minitel. It was their surefire winner for networking, conceived by the best and the brightest, and anointed by the government and the top industrial concerns. Poof, gone with the wind! Larry Roberts, Jon Postel, Tim Berners-Lee and their buddies blew it away, so now it’s a footnote. You can’t tell where these revolutions are going while they’re underway, but with the marketplace as a guide, you can reliably get to someplace nice.

4. I’m afraid that the land use question will make wind and solar impossible to implement on a large scale, but I could be wrong if there are technological surprises out there. What is true is that something which isn’t cost effective can’t succeed.

Regards…

There is not enough Lithium in the world to produce more then 10% of the batteries required for cars like the Tesla. Battery powered vehicles always have been and always will be a loser in the mass automotive market. They are at best useful in city driving because you can’t spend 3 hours or more to charge your car on a cross country trip.

Given that the United States has the lion’s share of the world’s liquid producing hydrocarbon resources, which can get us to the “Star Trek” era, let’s do something smart. Instead of wasting our time producing base load energy with wind power, something that the European’s have shown to be another green pipe dream, we can take the time to develop wind power to produce the electricity needed to convert the transportation sector from hydrocarbon fuels to hydrogen. That is where the phsyics supports electric powered vehicles not batteries and power stations.

10. Bohemond:
I bet you are right. They have to try and bring Ford to its knees somehow. When the inevitable happens I hope Ford either shuts the doors or does a chapter 11 the right way. As for me, I will not be buying a GM or Chrysler product.

4. Osprey1:
I’m with you. Buy something made by a company that doesn’t give a lick about quality or buy something from a company known for quality. Choice is easy.

Best part about a hybrid design is regenerative breaking. Conventional breaks turn the car’s kinetic energy into heat, but an electric motor can be run in reverse as a generator and used to slow the car down, storing the energy in the batteries.

So the Mini cooper electric runs 2 hours and takes 6 hours to charge. None of us have a week to drive to D.C. to see the one and spend most of the time on a charger.

I suspect he will tell banks to not approve loans for cars he doesn’t sell.