GM IPO: WILL "GOVERNMENT MOTORS" BECOME THE "PEOPLES' REPUBLIC OF GM?"

By Cammie

Stock market wonks and bargain-hunting investors are anticipating the "initial public offering" for the new stock in "Government Motors" (nee General Motors). And according to one report, one of the most interested potential investors is another "government motors" outfit -- China's SAIC.

So now we've "saved" GM just so a cadre of "godless communists" can get their mitts on what's left. We're a long way from the days of "Better dead than Red!"

To be fair, GM and SAIC have been "fellow travelers" for a while now.

And undoubtedly every one of GM's revolving chain of recent bosses, from Rick Wagoner to "Dial Tone" Ed to boastful IPO wonk Dan Akerson, realizes that the Peoples' Republic of China is the growth market for the future, as well as America's main financier these days. (What was that quote about "capitalists selling the commies the rope they'll hang us with?" Apparently the capitalists will make that rope on "red" credit.)

So, the "Government Motors" bureaucrats likely see an equity tie-in with a Red Chinese government carmaker as a "win/win." And neither they, nor our CINC are going to miss a tee time worrying about any negative implications.

What a mess! Isn't globalization (a/k/a the looting of America) fun?

And it just keeps getting worse and worse. Autoextremist is reporting that Chip Ganassi has blown off Ford's courtship in favor of a deal with "Government Motors" that will include a GM-badged twin-turbo V6 for Indy Car racing.

Oh joy. The Indianapolis 500 is about to become a contest between Japanese and Sino-American carmakers, fought with the horrible noise of "buzzin' half-dozen" engines.

Oh for the days when the hallowed confines of the Brickyard reverberated with the sound of turbocharged Ford V8s! How the mighty have fallen!

At least Ford will have its utter domination of NASCAR (losing) to console itself.

THE FORD IN SHORTEST SUPPLY IS LINCOLN'S TOWN CAR

By Cammie.

According to Forbes.com America's Hardest-to-Get Ford is a Panther on death row: Lincoln's RWD Town Car The average day supply of Town Cars in inventory is 26.

While I find it hard to believe that the Town Car is in shorter supply than SVT's Raptor and Shelby GT500, I'm not surprised that there's still life left in the last of the "real" Lincolns. To many, there is simply no substitute for a properly-refined, anvil-tough RWD, body-on-frame (BOF) vehicle. Lincoln Town Car has long been the preferred vehicle for the urban "black car" commercial trade, as well as the only choice for fans of traditional "American" luxury cars.

Alan Mulally and Billy Ford's CAFE-driven "green" makeover of Ford has been hard to take for lovers of traditional cars. Mulally and Ford have denied Lincoln's "Townie" any advertising. They've refused to offer Marauder DOHC or Coyote engines. They've kept the same styling for what seems like eons. And after starving it, they've slated it for extinction.

Ford seems to have learned nothing from GM's mid-1980s debacle. Back in the Reagan years, GM decided to kill off almost all of its RWD BOF cruisers in search of profits and CAFE efficiencies. This myopic mistake drove thousands of customers to Lincoln-Mercury.

Ford's mismanagement of the Panther is soon to pay analogous dividends. The irony is that the Volvo-derived six-cylinder D3s that are replacing the storied Panther really don't yield much better economy or performance than could be achieved with a properly set-up RWD BOF. The Taurus-derived replacements are too heavy, too complex, and much more diffcult to repair. Even as RWD remains the preferred standard in the luxury class and among many fleet buyers, Ford is moving head-over-heels away from it. That's just stupid.

The last of the "real" V8 Lincolns is in short supply. Get one while you still can.

HOW TRUTH WITH SPEEDZZTER "CELEBRATES" MICHAEL MOORE’S 56TH BIRTHDAY
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Massive millionaire socialist propaganda film maker Michael Moore is 56 years old today. Moore shot to infame and liberal superstardom through his sophomoric 1989 "mockumentary" "Roger & Me."

"Roger & Me" attacks General Motors plant closings Smith’s hometown of Flint, Michigan, mostly through selectively documenting Moore's ridiculous, self-promoting efforts to interview GM head honcho Roger Smith on camera.

But the film ignores most of the real structural problems at the heart of Detroit’s problems in the 1980s. Detroit was hammered by huge unfunded mandates from Washington, D.C. 1930s labor laws allowed unions to score vastly above-market compensation and benefits in "pattern bargaining" extortion, as well as hugely expensive work rules (none of which the foreign invader "transplant" assembly plants had to bear). Inflation and interest rate problems in the late 1970s and early 1980s demanded Detroit to slash costs, which ultimately hurt product quality. Unfair trade policies allowed Asian automakers to protect their home markets and dump exports in the U.S.A.

In short, Smith’s analytical skills are superficial at best. Yet he used "Roger & Me" as a springboard for a highly lucrative career shilling for extreme leftist "social justice" causes (redistribution of wealth, reductions in personal liberty, abdication of personal responsibility) in slick, sometimes witty propaganda films. He is a slouchy, plus-sized Leni Riefenstahl of the left. Only in America . . . .

So in denigration of Mr. Moore’s 56th birthday, Truth With Speedzzter looked for a video that might be the polar opposite (at least in an automotive sense) of the barren, central-government-controlled World Moore apparently pines for:

ROMNEY VERSUS LUTZ: CATCHING MITT IN A MATERIAL MISREPRESENTATION?

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The Magnetic Mormon, Mitt Romney is engaged in a never-ending presidential campaign. One feature of the Vain Bain Capitalist's quest to buy the presidency in 2012 has been a series of campaign events thinly veiled as a "book tour" in support of Romney's self-promoting tome No Apology: The Case for American Greatness.

Romney apparently fancies himself as an automotive business guru, mostly on the strength of Papa George Romney's controversial time at American Motors (before George shuffled off this mortal coil in vain hope of his own Mormon planet to populate and rule as a procreative "god")

One problem is that Mitt and his handlers continue to play fast and loose with the truth.

AOL Autos recently interviewed "Maximum Bob" Lutz on a variety of topics as Lutz prepares to retire from his brilliant career. When asked about one of Mitt Romney's assertions about the "car czars" running "Government Motors," Lutz fired back with both barrels:

AOL: In his recently-published book, former Massachusetts Governor and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney claimed that an anonymous auto executive told him that the Obama administration’s task force was essentially running the show at GM and making the major decisions. Shortly after that was reported, GM flatly refuted Romney’s claim; the company said that was just not true. What are your insights into that?

BOB LUTZ: Well, as a condition of the loans and bankruptcy, the president’s task force initially did have certain goals, like to reduce number of dealers, and they did insist on certain restructuring steps we had to take as we were working our way out of bankruptcy. But in terms of them having the slightest influence on things like strategy and product decisions, that’s not true. The task force has long since been abandoned, and all of those folks have gone back to their former lives, and we haven’t heard word one from them since.

TAKE THAT, MITTINS!

Clearly, Romney has ample ammo against the Constitution-trashing Obama Administration by sticking to actual facts. Yet something in Romney's makeup apparently impels him to overstatement, oversimplification, and misrepresentation.

Mitt's well-paid "Mormon Mafia" of sycophants will undoubtedly defend their infallible hero, both by taking issue with Lutz and explaining that Romney was merely repeating rumor and innuendo. But the bottom line is that Romney has once again discredited himself with another material misrepresentation. And expect "No Apology."

WAR ON V8s: WILL THE TAURUS-BASED POLICE INTERCEPTOR "COLLAPSE" FORD'S COP CAR HEGEMONY?

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Truth with Speedzzter isn't the only voice expressing skepticism that the announced V8-less Taurus/Police Interceptor will crater Ford Motor Company's domination of the police car market. John Rosevear at "The Motley Fool" investment website argues in a post entitled "Ford's Looming Market Share Collapse":

GM and Chrysler, like Smith & Wesson (Nasdaq: SWHC), L-1 Identity Solutions (NYSE: ID), TASER International (Nasdaq: TASR), and other companies that sell to the police market, know that many police departments want the tried-and-true. Both are sticking with the traditional formula -- while Chrysler's revised Dodge Charger, due later this year, is expected to address officer complaints about the relatively small trunk and limited visibility in the current model, it will still be a large rear-wheel-drive sedan with (lots of) V8 power available.

Likewise the new fleet-only Chevrolet Caprice, which will be built on an extended version of the same rear-wheel-drive platform that underpins the Camaro. GM has said that the Caprice will be available with a high-horsepower V8 and cop-friendly features like special seats and an oversized trunk.

Of course neither the unibody Charger or the Australian immigrant formerly known as Pontiac G8 have the rock-solid durability and cheap repair costs of the anvil-tough, body-on-frame Panther-based Crown Victoria/Police Interceptor. But both will be closer to "tried-and-true" than the Volvo-derived Taurus Police Interceptor. Thus, many expect the mostly unloved Taurus to lose much of the Panther's loyal following.

FORD FALLS BEHIND TOYOTA & NEW GM IN “C4C” WELFARE RACE

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William Clay Ford, Jr.’s freeloading plan to cash in on the bailout bonanza through the awful “Cash for Clunkers” welfare plan hasn’t worked out so well.

According to the latest National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data, the EVIL EMPIRE (Toyota) and the New Obama Motors (the New GM) have both passed FoMoCo in the battle to sell taxpayer-subsidized wimpmobiles to welfare-guzzling appliance motorists.

The Financial Times (linked from the Drudge Report) provides the details:

Toyota has an 18.9 per cent share of vehicles bought so far, putting it ahead of General Motors with 17.6 per cent and Ford with 15.4 per cent. Chrysler is in fifth place, after Honda.

Three of the top five welfare whips are hideous FWD Toyotas.

So how’s that “hope and change” working out for you, Li’l Billy?

Meanwhile, “C4C” welfare pimp Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa. wrote a complaint letter to President Obama’s hapless NHTSA, griping that the deficit-bloating, borrowed/printed welfare handouts to dealers aren’t flowing fast enough.

“Welfare Joe” Sestak is challenging former RINO Arlen Specter (Disloyal Turncoat-Pa.) for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in 2010, so his noisy whining is undoubtedly a grandstanding ploy.

Bailout Booster Sestak alleged that the federal government had only paid out 2 percent of the welfare moocher claims submitted by the free money-hungry Auto Vandals/Dealers, while four of every five applications had been "rejected for minor oversight."

Of course anyone who has ever spent any time around a “car jacket” (auto grifter-speak for a car dealer’s file on a sales transaction) knows that paperwork compliance is usually not the strong suit of most vehicle retailers.

And as the prescient "Turbo Regal" stated over at Bangshift.com "Imagine, a government program that lots of people sign up for because they think you can get something for nothing, but in the end, fails to deliver on its promises."

Spot on, Turbo Regal!

(Isn't the dealership business model outdated anyway?)

Too bad "Welfare Joe" didn't "reject" the Ca$h for Clunker$ scam because of the "minor oversight" that the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IS VIRTUALLY BANKRUPT AND IS BORROWING ALL OF THIS "TOYOTATHON"/"CAR ALLOWANCE REBATE SYSTEM" [sic] GIVEAWAY MONEY FROM OUR GRANDCHILDREN!

Joe Sestak is just another wild-spending welfare-monger seeking to buy his way up the political ziggurat by "spreading the [tax-funded]'graft' around." In other words, another typical Tammany Hall-inspired Democrat . . . .

As the ranks of the potentially collectible and donor vehicles slated for senseless extermination grows, more and more anecdotes of rare, unusual and irreplaceable milestone vehicles being destroyed for another Toyota Yaris welfare voucher are coming to light.

This sordid mess is an epic disaster. (Pretty much like the "Jac-the-Knife"/Li'l Billy era at FoMoCo . . .)

“LUTZ” MORE FOR FORD TO WORRY ABOUT

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Now that the government takeover and “for show” Section 363 sale of General Motors' "good stuff" is complete, the handwringing begins.

Idealistic pollyannas (sadly including “Truth With Speedzzter”) expect that political backlash will hold back “Government Motors” as many formerly loyal “buy American” customers punish the Democrats and the U.A.W. for destroying another pillar of the not-so-free market. These Ford-o-philes even dream of FoMoCo assuming the dominant position among the domestics in the U.S. light vehicle market.

On the other hand, Ford skeptics are crowing that Ford’s self-help restructuring and mortgaging for the “Way Forward” will get steamrolled by the bankruptcy-slimmed GM. They say that FoMoCo’s now at a material structural disadvantage to “Obama-U.A.W. Motors” because they didn’t join the deadbeats’ parade to bankruptcy. They also claim that GM has a better product mix coming on-line and will exploit their natural market share hegemony. They assert, however, that nothing is going to stand in the way of the “Asian Invasion” and that once the hyper-predatory Communist Chinese get their act together, it’s going to be “game over.”

Time will tell which of these predictions prove correct.

However, Obama Motors’ hand-picked beancounter-in-chief, Fritz Henderson, has thrown another wrinkle into the mix: “Maximum Bob” Lutz.

Lutz, one of the last of the “Car Guys” to make any impact in Detroit, is foregoing retirement to wrestle GM’s tattered, government-stained image out of the ditch as the New GM’s communications chief.

Few Detroiters can talk “car” with more heart and soul than Lutz.

You can bet that “Maximum Bob” won’t be jabbering on about “Zen” anything. Instead, he’ll probably make even the most pedestrian electric-vacuum-cleaner microcar sound like the Second Coming.

While those of us GM skeptics deep-down want to believe that nothing can rescue GM’s hapless “Roger Smithian” image, we know that if anyone can do it, “Maximum Bob” can.

Sure, he’s a wild card that will often make the “true belivers” in the Green movement and the GM boardroom squirm at times. But when Bob is allowed to be Bob, nearly magic things have often happened. In fact, nearly anything in the GM product line that’s not wholly forgettable has Lutz’s imprimatur on it.

Now the Glass House Gang has “Lutz” to worry about.

PROOF POSITIVE CLARENCE DITLOW IS EITHER A SOPHIST OR AN IDIOT

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Ralph Nader disciple Clarence Ditlow has long been a controversial figure in the automotive world. As head honcho of the hyper-regulatory activist group Center for Auto Safety (CAS), Ditlow has frequently turned his Naderesque fire on the Detroit 3. The CAS list of causes célèbre often reads like a contingency-fee trial lawyer pirates' wish list. (Plaintiffs trial lawyer shakedown artists often champion scores of regulations to bootstrap questionable negligence and products liability claims)

Now Ditlow wants General Motors and Chrysler to just "roll over" to the extreme, radical demands of the pirate lawyers and other liberals who want to regulate every aspect of motoring and vehicle production under the guise of "safety."

Given the government's ownership, the lobbyists are in essence working for the government," said Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a consumer group. "The government ought to be able to tell them, 'Do what we say because we are you.'"

This evidences either empty sophistry or a profound lack of understanding as to how government actually works. Even if "Government Motors" and "Fix It Again Tony Chrysler" were cabinet-level government agencies (and not just captives to the Obama-UAW-sponsored bailout madness) they would be urging the other components of government to formulate policies meeting their mutual interests (anyone who has ever spent any time around government at any level realizes this fact of intra-governmental "lobbying.").

Is it reasonable to for policy makers to make decisions without the input of those who will be affected? Clarence Ditlow apparently thinks so.

The fact that GM and Chrysler will still be required to have registered lobbyists adds a level of transparency to something that would inevitably occur.

As one lobbyist wrote:

Before we start casting stones, however, consider for a minute that the vast majority of these lobbyists are working on issues that you might actually care about! For example, are you a member of AARP? Do you contribute to the Sierra Club? Do you own a car and have an AAA membership? All of these organizations use funds from their members to hire "lobbyists" in Washington, DC. In fact, you, yes you, might actually be acting as a lobbyist in your daily life. Have you ever called up a city agency to express the need for a stop sign in your neighborhood? Have you signed on to a petition or letter from a professional organization that was then sent to elected officials at the state or federal level? That's lobbying, my friend, pure and simple

.

Perhaps in Ditlow's world, banning GM and Chrysler from any lobbying would lead to more hasty, anti-free market, bad deals, such as the Obama Administration's sudden hike in the Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirements (Which Jim DeMint attibutes to the Detroit 3 being reduced to "pawns," even without Ditlow's dream of a lobbying ban).

Or perhaps Ditlow and CAS just want the liberal Naderites and the GreeNazis to have completely unfettered control over the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Moreover, he likely does not want anyone at GM or Chrysler lobbying Congress to reign in the abuses of the Obama Administration. Perhaps CAS believes that getting rid of input from the experts at GM and Chrysler will make the road to government-approved Obamamobiles smoother.

Regardless, Ditlow's demand for no lobbying is classic overreaching.

But the real problem isn't lobbyists, but rather the NEED for lobbyists. Ford Motor Company CEO Alan Mulally candidly observes that "We've become so stymied with regulation" . . . . "We have to say enough is enough and get back to freeing people up."

Daniel J. Mitchell also put it succinctly back in 2004:

The real problem is that government is too big and has too much power -- and this attracts lobbyists for the same reason that rotten meat attracts flies.

In other words, lobbyists exist because many people cannot resist the temptation to try to redistribute resources in their direction -- while others seek representation because they don’t want to be the chumps footing the bill. . . . And don’t forget federal regulations. Rules and red tape cost the economy about $850 billion annually [in 2004]. Does anyone really think it odd that this costly regulatory maze encourages lobbying?

To paraphrase Professor Wigmore, the adversarial system is the greatest engine ever invented for the discovery of truth. Yet, if taken at face value, Clarence Ditlow apparently wants no debate and no opposition from those whom his comrades are seeking to regulate.

This view is either highly naive or completely disingenuous. Even fellow Naderite Joan Claybrook can't agree with Ditlow: "I do believe in the First Amendment and speaking your mind . . . If they don't have lobbyists expressing their point of view, who does it?"

THE CHRYSLER BANKRUPTCY SALE HEARING: DAY 3

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The hearing for the Section 363 sale of Chrysler's most valuable assets to FIAT has gone into a third day.

The Chrysler hearing is a major test of whether this is a nation of laws, administered impartially, or a nation of men.

If the Obama Administration is permitted to roll over the vested property rights of the Indiana Pensioners and ignore decades of bankruptcy law merely because of political expediency, our Nation will be traveling down a dangerous path.

The Indiana Pensioners are entitled to obtain in chapter 11 at least as much as they would in a chapter 7 liquidation. Moreover, the Chrysler dealers who are being forceably terminated have argued that approximately ONE BILLION DOLLARS in claims against Chrysler will be left virtually worthless if the Section 363 sale is approved.

Using a Section 363 sale to evade the “best interest of the creditors” test and to give the UAW’s unsecured claims a de facto superpriority is contrary to law. The Obama Administration’s actions in the Chrysler bankruptcy, if allowed to stand mock bankruptcy law and shread the Constitution.

The rush to sell Chrysler's assets is poltically motivated. The Obama Administration promised a surgical 30-60 day bankruptcy and apparently it intends to deliver, notwithstanding the property rights of Chrysler's creditors. The Chrysler bankruptcy has admittedy been a trial run for the impending "Government Motors" nee General Motors bankruptcy.

While none of us want to see Chrysler die (and Truth With Speedzzter has placed much of the fault of Chrysler's decline on the hands of the federal government), if the price of keeping it alive is disregarding bankruptcy law, property rights, and the Constitution, its temporary survival is too costly to our Republic.

WILL "OBAMA-UAW" MOTORS (GM) CREATE A TAXPAYER-FUNDED CHINESE BEACHHEAD?

[Get the latest “Truth With Speedzzter” here]

It was a screaming banner headline on the Drudge Report. “GOVERNMENT MOTORS: CHINESE-MADE CARS TO USA!"

At the same time that 3,000 hard-working American automobile dealers were about to get their pink-slips, General Motors advised that its federally-funded restructuring apparently includes importing thousands of small cars from poverty-wage developing countries, including the People’s Republic of China.

Predictably, the United Auto Workers union spokespersons went apoplectic.

The internationalist free-traders immediately rallied to “Government Motors” defense, as they are ideologically unable to ever see anything wrong with increasing Communist China’s predatory takeover of world manufacturing.

Wedging open the floodgates to the future dumping of Chinese cars in the U.S.A. may make short-tem sense to GM's green-eye-shade gang (who are desperately trying to figure someway a mess like "Government Motors" can earn a profit while complying with 35-40+ m.p.g. Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards, "Cap and Trade" carbon taxes, EPA, OSHA, greedy unions, trial lawyer pirates, platinum health care plans and other costs of doing business in 21st Century America)

However, from a strictly political standpoint, it's unbelievably tone-deaf.

Moreover, it's somewhat speculative that Americans will immediately rush in to buy Chinese-made "Buicks" and "Chevrolets."

It does, however, lay the foundations for Chinese domination of the U.S. light vehicle market in 15-20 years, as GM teaches the CHI-COMS all about U.S. regulatory compliance and breaks down nationalist/political resistance to Chinese vehicles. A collaborator makes that process much easier. Once that happens, the Chinese will take advantage of the grossly undervalued yuan (based on purchasing power parity analysis) and virtual slave labor to blow everyone else out of the low and low-middle ends of the market.

What was it that Vladmir Ilyich Lenin said? . . . "The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them." Apparently GM and the Democratic Obama Administration want to be in the "rope selling" business.

While U.A.W. complaining may extract a few concessions and some featherbedding, don’t look for anyone in the federal government to nip this threat in the bud. We’re simply too dependant upon CHI-COM purchases of U.S. debt and too beholden to multi- nationalist ideology.

Besides, if GM doesn’t do it, somebody else most assuredly will.

TOYOTA PRIUS: DEADLY OR JUST DEATHLY DULL?

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Real motoring enthusiasts stuck behind some lane-clogging appliance motorist/zealot in a Toyota Prius can be forgiven for wondering if any acceleration by it is "intentional."

However, an apparently increasing number of anecdotal reports are suggesting that the flagship for Toyota pretentiousness is sometimes an out-of-control potential death trap. Some of the Prius faithful are reporting wild events of "unintended acceleration."

More first-hand owner rips against the Prius are here.

Of course for some Prius owners, nearly any meaningful acceleration probably seems "wild."

Fans of real American cars are undoubtedly hoping that the "Evil Empire" will receive some of that good, old-fashioned "trial lawyer" love that the Detroit 3 have sometimes suffered from. Products liability suits know no borders and a few, good multi-million Dollar verdicts would be an excellent elixir for squelching some of the mindless veneration of Toyota.

Now that General Motors is nearly dead and in UAW/Government hands, the tort lawyer pirates are going to have to set their sights on a deeper set of pockets. Can they look past their Lexuses to bring the "Evil Empire" to "justice?" Toyota's got the yen, but do the trial lawyers and Detroit-hating investigative journalists have the yen for grabbing it?

Perhaps Toyota should assemble a all-pro driver task force of Darrell "Jaws" Waltrip, Michael Waltrip, Joe Gibbs, Kyle "The DOOD" Busch and a few other of the Evil Empire's tratorous American collaborators to road test these alleged Prius defects . . . .