Turn the company that makes it over to the UAW.
I’ve had my Jeep since 1994. In fact, it’s the first car I ever bought myself — a Limited Edition Wrangler Sahara, green, with sand-colored interior and green trim. I love it. And it pains me to no end to know that, going forward, Jeep will be the emblem of government overreach and quid pro quo between Democrat politicians and their Union clients / enablers.
Is there nothing this horrific regime won’t fuck up? I mean, the least they could do is add a pic of, say, Mussolini, to the tire cover. For full disclosure…
unions are now more similar to cheesy gangsta American Indian casino tribes than to for reals Americans
I haven’t made any distinction between Chrysler and Government Motors since the bailout, so the claim that most people thought it was owned by Fiat actually surprises me.
As for the fact it’s actually owned by the UAW, I don’t really see a distinction between that and government ownership, as long as Democrats, a wholly owned subsidiary of Big Labor, control both elected branches of the federal government.
I have a 94 Dodge Ram I love. If I were to buy a truck now it would be a Ford. Or a Toyota. ‘Cuz of the commies.
Ford is just a marginally more successful UAW life support system.
Although I’ve preferred Ford for a number of years, both GM and Chrysler have had vehicles I would have been happy to own. But now, in the increasingly unlikely event I ever buy a car or truck new, it’ll be another Ford, or it’ll be from a Japanese company.
I just bought myself my first real car (as in, not a hand-me-down). I got a Volkswagen, because of the Nazi irony.
I’m still driving my 1998 Saturn SL2. Back when they were the pace car of Gen X.
Side note, Toyota is the GM of Japan – government subsidized and protected. The Japanese government actually ordered Honda not to expand from motorcycles into automobiles, back in the day, because they didn’t want the competition. Honda (and later Mazda) told the government to go screw themselves and opened up shop.
I had a girlfriend who worked for MITI back in the day when policymakers here were thinking the Japanese had a handle on the best approaches. Fortunately, at the time, that argument lost in the US. China seems to have been paying some attention to it though.
China seems to have been paying some attention…
Good. Then we’ll have their lost decade(s) to look forward to, assuming we’ve unlearned what we’ve learned by then.
What or how will the divestment of Government from GovernmentMotors look like when or if it comes? Will the Republicans take the lead? Or will they wait for the Dems to commit to a Nixon to China moment?
I think they divest in an IPO, no? It will look like a failed IPO I think.
No one will forget the ass-raping inflicted on the previous shareholders I don’t think.
I had a Honda Accord hybrid that I loved not solely because it was paid off and in great shape. This spring would have been time to pay six hundo to swap out the batteries for fresh ones, but Mrs. Darth totaled it. I was saddened.
I am driving Japanese, specifically Lexus, from now until the end of time. I am willing to entertain overtures from German freuleins though.
Many moons ago, unhappy with the non-predictive output from some sector analysts, I had the idea that maybe you could better understand a company by trying to figure out which group was really in charge and that you could tell this by seeing which metrics they were doing the best in.
So, vastly simplified, if their inventories were streamlined and purely just-in-time, then the MIS guys held the upper hand. If some financial ratios were perfectly tailored the CFO was in control. If sales were strong but less profitable, the CEO came from the sales department or that VP held sway. Etc. Etc. Etc.
For a variety of reasons — mainly that the analysis was essentially too complicated and variably intertwined — the project was ultimately fruitless.
One thing was very clear in a few manufacturing areas though: when something didn’t make sense from any rational standpoint, it was always a union rule.
Are y’all getting the impression I’m getting of a unity of theme in these three first posts today? It’s hard to sum well, but distinctly present, I think. Heck, include the newest on Steele’s party apparat for that matter, whichever way I turn it seems as though the same lack is at work.
I think my comment at #1 would have worked just as well on the education reform post
There’s a nice tracing in the Meno.
Picture of Mussolini / Picture of Obama; you say tomato / I say tomahto…
I bought a Chevy Silverado just months before GM prostituted itself to the federal government. Bleah.
I drive the same vehicle bought in 87. No reason to replace it, damn thing unfailingly performs as intended. One caveat, tho-the maintenance performed is meticulous (done by me) and in accord with the severe driving criteria.
Plus which it has adequate room for the decoys and other hunting accouterments.
We’ve owned Jeeps since 1994. We are on our third one, bought brand new in 2000. It’s been so dependable, I’ve seen no reason to replace it. We bought our daughter a new(er) car recently, a 2007 Impala. So daughter drives a newer car than mom. Hubby drives a 2010 Ford Fusion and loves it. I do, too, but rarely get a chance to get behind the wheel.
Keith Hennessey wants to get in a word here, just as a timely reminder.
Every GM dealership will look like Detroit, no matter how upscale the location.
…and it will be “divestment” in much the same way dumping one’s trash beside the road is “divestment.”
I have no problem with union ownership of private companies per se.
It is when union ownership leads to gross mismanagement, then gross mismanagement combines with too-big-to-fail setting the stage for government-funded-bailouts-for-politically-connected-cronies.
So long as Ford makes a product that people want and can continue to turn an honest profit more power to them. That was supposed to be the point of employee ownership – giving employees a long term stake in a valuable private enterprise – that being the parent company.
Instead the union has been allow to use GM and Chrysler to stake their claim on a different valuable private enterprise – the greater US economy, via the IRS and the Federal government.
Or when Union ownership is handed over by government Fiat, while investors are told to get fucked.
Some more good reading on GM here.
This commenter expands on that.
Shit-> Fan-> Taxpayers.
My wife drives the 1999 Jeep Wrangler, and I drive the Ford Fusion. She refuses to part with her Jeep and thinks the newer models are worthless “plastic.” She handed her vehicle over the the 4 wheel drive customizers and got a sporty rag top, jacked up suspension, big mag wheels, and fog lights. It’s an odd thing for a 56 year old woman to be driving, but I know better than to complain!
I like the old CJ5 and CJ7’s with the huge engines.
My vehicular adventures are here. I’m driving a new Camry these days, as are a lot of people hereabouts. Great deals on ’em, because of Toyota’s image woes. Later on, I hope to see about getting the new turbo version of the Hyundai Sonata, if it gets good reviews.
A turbo-powered Sonata. Ten years ago, that would have sounded downright ungrammatical. But now rice rockets like this have got the U.S. competish holding their breath.
that’s so sick how our thug government is treating Toyota
my new motto: $200.00/day plus expensives
No shame in buying a vehicle Made in the USA, TSI. In fact, that sort of thing used to be encouraged.
My new motto: $200.00/day plus explosives.
Pablo,
It’s not so simple anymore. Should I buy an American car that was built in Canada? Or a Japanese car that was built in Kentucky?
There are crappy foreign cars, of course. They just tend not to crack the U.S. market, at least not for long.
Serendipitously enough, I just caught an ad on my TeeVee. Lease a Hyundai Sonata for $200.00 a month! I can make that in a day!
Which would be a Korean car made in Alabama.
rockford price
Hyundai Genesis – A friend bought one, and loves loves loves it.
I think I’ve said it here before, but I got T-boned by a one-ton Dodge dually with a heavy welded bumper — at very low speed, fortunately, and right outside my driveway; the ribs are healed now — and had to get another car. What I came up with was a 1989 Reatta. For those not familiar with the name, it’s what you get if you’re growing Rivieras and pick one green — a two-seater half the size, but with all the bells and whistles of the grownup version.
All of the computers — I’ve found five, so far — are stark raving insane; I eventually had to pull the fuse on the security controller. It gets around 15 MPG; fortunately I don’t go far any more. Most of the secondary functions like AC and the radio are controlled by a touchscreen over a monochrome CRT; mine failed, and I replaced it with one from a Riviera, which has different labels on the buttons. It’s always on full-bore, which blinds the driver at night. The dimming function snootily informs me that “DARKNESS IS REQUIRED FOR THIS ADJUSTMENT” at midnight, one mile from the nearest electricity.
It cost $500, and came with four Toyo Spectrum tires so new the little mold-relief “whiskers” were still on the sidewalls. I’ve now paid another $1K or so, mostly to get the air conditioner working — this is Texas, it’s summertime, and the car is black. I confidently expect that the products of Government Motors will hold their value equally well.
Regards,
Ric
oof, Ric. We’ll have a 2004 PT Cruiser on the market here before too long. at first RTO was all, nah, let’s keep it, but it seems silly for it to sit in the garage for a year. So now he’s thinking he’d like a Ford F150 when he gets back. we’ll see.
I cannot picture RTO or Senor Locke in a PT Cruiser.
That’s what RTO picked when he got back from Afghanistan. It holds a lot of his military shtuff.
thanks 4 xmas card/ will take ur dog/ seriously
You people who think you have a 1994 Jeep, I’m sorry, but Jeeps have round headlights.
I have an inline 6 engine. No V. Makes up for the headlight shape.
46.Comment by frankly on 8/4 @ 6:28 pm #
You people who think you have a 1994 Jeep, I’m sorry, but Jeeps have round headlights.
47.Comment by Jeff G. on 8/4 @ 6:31 pm #
I have an inline 6 engine. No V. Makes up for the headlight shape.
Gets them every time.
My next car will get around 15 mpg, too.
Unless someone talks me out of it.