[Armageddon]

A little history behind the big 3



http://www.rense.com/general84/if.htm

[Nickel]

This guy is a nut. What difference does it make who actually owns GM, Ford, or Chrysler? Honda, Toyota, Hyundai, and Kia are all over North America, but we don't own them. And yet, they employ us, they buy from North American suppliers, and they contribute hugely to our economy. Why was it "good" for GM to own plants in foreign countries and employ workers there, but it'll be "bad" if the ownership switches and suddenly we're the "foreign countries" GM is working in? Okay, the Big Three dropped the ball (and dropped the ball and dropped the ball and...), and now someone smarter might run them. And? To me, that's a good thing.

As for the "barefoot" thing, hey... there'd be a lot less littering and pollution out there if that kind of thing did come back into vogue, at least in the months without R's in them. I'm okay with that...

[Gazzatrone]

I've never understood this phony patriotism as to who owns what. More to the point does anyone really care. Bottom line is, if you're All Umaircan employers can't afford to pay you but the Japanese can. Who are you going to prefer?

[idiom]

That is the weird thing about the big three being the 'American manufactuers'. Do all the other American auto workers in 'foreign' factories fly home to Japan every night?

[TommyJefferson]

I've never understood this phony patriotism as to who owns what.

It's based upon fear. I'm seeing this patriotic argument for the Big 3 bailout more and more. The kernel of it is that we must preserve American manufacturing capacity because that's what allowed us to win WWII.

Patriots fear that if we lack this manufacturing capacity, we might lose some future war.

The argument has merit. I haven't seen any practical arguments against it.

I believe war is evil because it's merely a brutal leftist wealth and power transfer mechanism from individuals to governments, but patriots don't care about that argument. They were taught as children to love being slaves to the Big Daddy in the Sky or the Big Daddy in Washington D.C.

[ROCKMAN]

Just a few facts to spice up the chat. Chrysler is not a public corporation. It is a private company owned by a fund which does not identify its owners. For all we know this fund is owned by the Saudis, the Russian gov't or Bill Gates. This fund also has $23 billion in assets that, so far, they haven't had interest in using tp support Chrysler's future. Another interesting tidbit I read a year or so ago: there is (was) a single model that GM sells which accounts for more prifit then all there other models combined: it's a small 4 cylinder wagon they build and sell in China.

Nothing earth shattering there but it does make one wonder what an "American company" really is.

[Ludi]

I believe war is evil because it's merely a brutal leftist wealth and power transfer mechanism from individuals to governments

Oh those wacky Leftists!

[mos6507]

The thing is, we've let american manufacturing go overseas without much complaint over the past 40 years or so and the Big 3 have been kind of kept going by the lobbyists as living museums of our postwar industrial might. Now that they can't be propped up anymore we start whining about being nothing but a service economy?? Um, a little late for that.

[TommyJefferson]

Oh those wacky Leftists!

They are generally good-hearted rubes, but rubes nonetheless.

[3aidlillahi]

I've never understood this phony patriotism as to who owns what.

That's certainly true for every country. For the US, it holds true even more so. Because apart from just being a land with a people, America is an idea - an idea of freedom. If we lose that freedom to be employed by whomever we want or buy from whom we want, then we're not longer American. We simply live in the land passed on to us by our forefathers.

Buying from someone or investing in a company that isn't from this land simply based off of that fact is wholly "un-American" if anything is.

[dinopello]

I've never understood this phony patriotism as to who owns what.

That's certainly true for every country. For the US, it holds true even more so.

I think it is particularly true for cars in the U.S., at least for many. When the textile, shoe, cookware, furniture etc industries up and left it wasn't such a big deal.

[Tyler_JC]

Why do we care if foreigners own our unprofitable companies?

If GM is losing money, wouldn't America be better off if a Japanese company bought them?

Then we could keep the wages and benefits that GM would still offer but Japan would have to take the losses.

The patriot thing is to let the "evil foreigners" buy our failing companies and then go bankrupt trying to keep them afloat.

Look at Chrysler!

Perfect example of this strategy:

Daimler (German company) buys the entire company for $36 Billion in 1998.

Talk about the deal of the century.

I'm not sure what the Germans were thinking. No American would ever buy a car from Chrysler, let alone the company.

Nine years and billions of dollars in losses later, the company is sold back to an American private equity company for under $8 billion.

America basically got $18 billion from Germany for doing absolutely nothing.

[mos6507]

Why do we care if foreigners own our unprofitable companies?

We should be more concerned that our companies can't compete on the world stage rather than what happens to them when they fail.

[ReverseEngineer]

I believe war is evil because it's merely a brutal leftist wealth and power transfer mechanism from individuals to governments, but patriots don't care about that argument. They were taught as children to love being slaves to the Big Daddy in the Sky or the Big Daddy in Washington D.C.

Yah, that Lefty Commie Pinko George Bush was a real problem.

What about the War against King George for Independence? Was that a fight by brutal left wingers? Thomas Jefferson was a closet Communist? What?

Reverse Engineer

[ColossalContrarian]

If the US loses ownership of the big three hopefully it will be the end of the stupid pickup commercials that come on during football games.

How many people here drive their monster trucks through explosions with lesser trucks swinging like pendulums?

And then the big three want to be bailed out!!! LOL, [s]Amerikan life is like an action movie!!![/s] Amerikan life will be an action movie?

[idiom]

I believe war is evil because it's merely a brutal leftist wealth and power transfer mechanism from individuals to governments, but patriots don't care about that argument. They were taught as children to love being slaves to the Big Daddy in the Sky or the Big Daddy in Washington D.C.

Yah, that Lefty Commie Pinko George Bush was a real problem.

What about the War against King George for Independence? Was that a fight by brutal left wingers? Thomas Jefferson was a closet Communist? What?

Reverse Engineer

Bush has had incredibly expansionary policies, he has used war for 'doing good', and is now overseeing the nationalisation of pretty much everything. Which part is not left wing? Oh right the bit where he Doesn't ban abortion.

And the revolutionaries were pretty much by definiton not conservatives.