Anyone promote or post any of his sifts, then add them to this thread ok?

http://www.videosift.com/video/Ricardo-Montalban-1975-Chrysler-Cordoba

promoted:
http://www.videosift.com/video/Kirk-fights-Khan-pro-wrestling-style

>> ^NetRunner:
>> ^dag:
If you take national pride out of the equation - the truth is that Nissan, Toyota and Honda have been making better cars on US soil for many years.

And GM and Ford have been making better cars in Australia and Europe for years.
The question here isn't about whether you like every car in a particular company's stable. What's Honda got that competes with the 'Vette? Why can't Toyota take the lead in pickup sales? What class is Nissan the sales leader in? Anything?
The big three need to restructure, and massively change their model mix in this country. The former is part of the bailout, and the latter was already part of their business plans.
I don't feel a lot of national pride about the way GM, Ford, and Chrysler have focused on gas guzzlers, and lobbied congress to reduce emissions standards.
However, I don't see why letting them fail would be a good thing for the country, either, and I don't see why people are more up in arms about $15bn than anyone seemed to be over the $700bn bank bailout, and those companies were grossly mismanaged on a scale that makes the big three look like paragons of wisdom.


Dude, for once dag said something intelligent...and you just had to try and mess it up. The big 3 failed miserably by flying in the face of common sense, they deserve to die EIA style. They were the manifestation of American foolish spending and over-consumption. Just stop.

>> ^dag:
If you take national pride out of the equation - the truth is that Nissan, Toyota and Honda have been making better cars on US soil for many years.


And GM and Ford have been making better cars in Australia and Europe for years.

The question here isn't about whether you like every car in a particular company's stable. What's Honda got that competes with the 'Vette? Why can't Toyota take the lead in pickup sales? What class is Nissan the sales leader in? Anything?

The big three need to restructure, and massively change their model mix in this country. The former is part of the bailout, and the latter was already part of their business plans.

I don't feel a lot of national pride about the way GM, Ford, and Chrysler have focused on gas guzzlers, and lobbied congress to reduce emissions standards.

However, I don't see why letting them fail would be a good thing for the country, either. I don't see why people are more up in arms about a $15bn loan for them than anyone seemed to be over the $700bn bank giveaway, and those companies were grossly mismanaged on a scale that makes the big three look like paragons of wisdom.

>> ^blankfist:
Still, what would a bailout prove? I remember experiencing a lot of fellow industry people in the tech-industry losing everything after the dot-com bubble popped, and Congress didn't raise a finger to bail us out. And why should they? The market was unsustainable because people were throwing too much money at it without a system of monetizing it. Those who could work through that collapse, did. The industry survived even though a lot of the major companies did not.

Difference is, with the dot bomb crash, the industry wasn't a monolithic triopoly, there were thousands upon thousands of fresh upstarts that turned to dust as quickly as they rose up. If we were talking about a similar situation with the auto industry, where most of the companies/products were new and non-essential, I don't think there'd be any talk of a bailout...or a union.

Conservatives (or at least people in Republican jersies, and self-identified conservative Democrats) helped them get too big by never exercising the FTC and having them actually stave off companies from getting "too big to fail" as GM, Ford and Chrysler have.

The same group also prevented government helping these companies take a long view of the global situation -- yes Virginia, I mean environmental issues, fuel efficiency standards, and alternative fuels.

GM, Chrysler and Ford are not sustainable. I'm sorry, but let's try not to make this a party issue. This is about private companies not being able to sustain themselves, and I'm sorry if those of us against the bailout oppose your party position for labor, but that doesn't make those of us against it "republicans". That makes us against nationalizing private debt. And, if you were smart, you'd be against that too.
Economy be damned when industries are falsely propped up.


Why are Ford, GM and Chrysler not sustainable? Could it be that we have bad trade agreements, allowing companies like Hyundai to sell 500,000 cars in the US, while limiting us to 5000 in Korea?

Could it be that every other country with an auto industry gives their companies government support, including both national healthcare as well as protectionist trade policies, and government subsidies?

Could it be that in pursuit of the conservative ideal of "free trade", we're forcing our employees to try to compete with countries with no worker safety or labor laws?

Then there's this little matter about the banks not being willing to give anyone loans for anything, including cars, which makes it a tiny bit hard for these guys to sell anything.

I know you'd rather it not be a "party issue", and that's fine. I just figured I'd lay the blame at the Republican party's feet, rather than saying "conservative ideology" where it probably rightfully belongs, because I always hear that Republicans aren't conservative, and they've been the ones pushing these failed government practices since the 1980's.

But hey, if you want to take the blame for making the environment impossible for the big three to operate as a non-sweatshop employer, who am I to stop you.

If you were smart, you'd be on the side of this argument that's looking to keep people employed, and fix the big three, rather than clinging to the same ideology that got us into this mess in the first place.

You've got a good point about propping up failing businesses, and I think that there should be serious, serious strings attached to any money we loan these guys, and that we ensure these are loans to be paid back with interest, not a big gift basket, like TARP is. Problem is those pesky conservatives (or Republicans as they call themselves) have fought to keep Democrats from adding environmental restrictions and management paycuts/restructuring, while at the same time trying to insert legislation that requires the unions to agree to salaries and benefits below the foreign auto makers. I suppose that's because under their reading of the conservative ideology, telling businesses how to operate is okay if it's to put the screws to unions, but not when management is being made accountable.

These are going to be party issues, and generally speaking, blankfist, I categorize you as being a 3rd party -- neither progressive nor "Republican", the former because it's accurate, and the second because you're as frustrated with that group of howler monkeys as I am.

However, don't try to tell me that Republicans are now high-minded conservatives, because it's a little suspect that they seemed to only remember those principles on Nov 5th, 2008, and they just so happen to lead them to the conclusion that the right course of action is to filibuster everything the Democrats try to do.

Huh? Top 15 for this ideologue?

The entire conservative philosophy is as sound as a "philosophy" of medicine based on the principle that since organs sometimes fail, people will be healthier if we just removed all of them before anything goes wrong.

Fighting for reduction of government spending in a recession is like applying leeches to a patient with anemia -- not just backward and misguided, but the exact wrong action to take.

Even so, while Paul was against the bailout for ideological reasons, most of his fellow Republicans were against this for more pedestrian reasons. This was, as Gettelfinger put it, about piercing the heart of the labor movement in the US, while also sticking up for the foreign automakers who they do business with in their states.

The deal fell apart, not because conservatives were sticking to their conservative principles, but because they demanded that unions cut their pay to below the levels of the foreign automakers in 2009 instead of 2011 (the latter had been offered by the UAW). Isn't that a case of government trying to tell business how it should operate? I seem to remember Republicans saying so when it was talking about limiting executive salaries for the TARP ($700bn) program. Guess they were just blowing smoke. Reminds me a bit about how tax cuts for the middle class were socialism, but tax cuts for the rich is good conservative governance.

Oh, and the bill failed in a vote of 52 for, 35 against. Obstructionist filibuster much?

From a purely political POV, I couldn't be happier with how this turned out. The word "Neo-Hooverite" is getting some play, and there's no doubt at all about which party will be responsible if either GM or Chrysler end up collapsing, or having major layoffs.

On the other hand, from the perspective of someone who cares about our country, I'm disappointed, and hope there won't be too many more chances for the Republicans to successfully implement their childish, misguided, hypocritical corrupt class warfare bullshit.

I will agree with volumptuous that without bailing out this industry we could experience a major loss for unions in this country. I, personally, am a fan of right to work instead of unions, but I would hate to see A) such a large number of workers without employment and B) the deterioration of the auto industry in the country that invented it.

Still, what would a bailout prove? I remember experiencing a lot of fellow industry people in the tech-industry losing everything after the dot-com bubble popped, and Congress didn't raise a finger to bail us out. And why should they? The market was unsustainable because people were throwing too much money at it without a system of monetizing it. Those who could work through that collapse, did. The industry survived even though a lot of the major companies did not.

GM, Chrysler and Ford are not sustainable. I'm sorry, but let's try not to make this a party issue. This is about private companies not being able to sustain themselves, and I'm sorry if those of us against the bailout oppose your party position for labor, but that doesn't make those of us against it "republicans". That makes us against nationalizing private debt. And, if you were smart, you'd be against that too.

Economy be damned when industries are falsely propped up.

I'm with Kucinich on this bailout. I'm also in full agreement with the idea that the American auto companies need a huge wake-up call -- but if it's all the same to you, I'd rather not watch the big three unravel right when the economy is as unhealthy as I've ever seen it.

I don't think the Wall Street one was a good idea. I think something needed done, and something big, I just think the form it took, and the way it was handled was typically Bushian -- cling to ideology first, political maneuvering second, paying off friends in the industry third, and if there's time and money left over after servicing those, let's see if we can make a dent in the actual problem we're supposed to be solving.

From what I've read, Dems basically submitted to every one of Bush's demands in order to get him to not veto the bailout bill. That means this one is likely to be filled with bullshit landmines entirely designed to a) prevent the plan from working b) set back environmental and labor issues Democrats care about, and c) give congressional Republicans a chance to stand in opposition to a plan that Bush and Democrats agree on.

If I were just as evil as the average Republican representative, for political purposes I'd pray the Republicans block the damn thing, despite Bush ineffectually trying to convince them to vote for it. Then I'd have the Democrats say "call us when you grow up", and put the House and Senate on recess until Jan 20th. Then have them hit the talk show circuit to loudly gripe about how they tried their best to save the auto industry, but the Republicans stopped them from acting, and that they'll try again when they have more votes and a responsible President.

Part of me hopes that's how it'll play out...but I'd be really uncomfortable leaving things at an impasse like that, because I don't know that GM and Chrysler would make it, and I know their dying would not be good for the country.

I don't get the sense that Republicans give a shit about what's good for the country. If anything, they seem to actively want the American auto companies to die, and the Democrat-supporting UAW with it, impact on regular people and the economy be damned.

^ Europe also has much higher gas prices helping them think they need smaller vehicles. Not to mention far better mass-transit, and a smaller overall terrain...

But yeah, the non-US branches of GM and Ford are pretty good from what I've heard. I'm not sure Chrysler has a presence to speak of overseas, though.

>> ^nadabu:
Please note that Jack & Suzy Welch (who just might know a bit about this stuff) recommend letting them go into bankruptcy as the best path forward.
http://www.businessweek.com
/magazine/content/08_48/b4110000545461.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index+-+temp_top+story


Oddly enough, they're suggesting the same thing I was: a government-financed Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Not so sure I like the idea of GM and Chrysler merging, but they may as well start figuring out what to do with Chrysler, since I bet they're in some pretty bad shape too (worse cars than GM, and very low international sales).

I'm still up in the air about the bailout. I'm well aware that this one is dividing down party lines, and that's always what makes me suspicious about things like this.

The bailout for the Financial industry was called the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). It was intended to buy, well, Troubled Assets from financial institutions, and now Paulson and the Bushies are saying, $350 billion already spent, "oops, let's try buying stock instead"...which liberals like Paul Krugman had been saying from the beginning.

What pissed me off about that whole mess was that Democrats didn't even try to push Krugman's plan, they just acquiesced to the Bushian demands for $700bn, no strings attached.

What Paulson seems to have done is handed the cash over to his friends on Wall Street, and placed no conditions on the use of the money, or the management structure of the recipients.

It's the same old Bush strategy -- execute Big Govermnent intervention as poorly as possible to try to sour people on the very concept, in the hopes that it drives people into the waiting arms of the "conservative" Republican party, and their radical socialist agendas to redistribute wealth from the middle class to the top .5%. Joe the Plumber^TM is a poster-boy for what "success" looks like for these asshats.

So here's my deal. GM sucks, the Escalade wasn't really offensive to me, what was offensive was that GM's first foray into Hybrids was to add 2-3mpg to their SUV's, not to try up the mpg of their small cars into a Prius-like 45mpg. They had a working electric car, and they killed it, and now they want to make a hybrid for $40,000 called the Volt and say "see, we're modern".

That said, they employ 3 million people directly, and countless millions more via their suppliers. I don't want those people unemployed. I want GM to survive, even if it takes taxpayer support -- but I want Wagoner and Lutz's heads on lances. Failing that, I want them fired without benefit, and stocks & options confiscated. Same goes for anyone whose fingerprints are on the killing of the electric cars.

So here's what I want Democrats to do: force GM into Chapter 11-style restructuring, but use taxpayer money to make sure they keep operating throughout and don't let them slip into outright liquidation. No golden parachutes, no shareholder dividends, no bonuses and no retention at the executive level.

Then, we take the other $350 billion and do across-the-board single-payer universal healthcare, so GM, Ford and Chrysler don't have to worry about healthcare benefits for their employees anymore.

If the Republicans go into a froth, and fillibuster it, let 'em. We'll just pass it in January to the loving applause of the entire Great Lakes region, and Indiana and Ohio will both stay blue states for the forseeable future.

The numbers in this video are not impressive anyway. The Big 3 have been assembling garbage automobiles for decades, and people finally realized they were getting ripped off. Their deadline to move towards quality is long overdue (the gas crisis was the straw that broke.... the...gas guzzler's tow hitch?). This is supported by the fact that Chrysler, the least affected by escalating fuel prices, was the first to run into trouble - because of their long-standing tradition of poor quality. Same thing happened with Jaguar and Land Rover: poor quality - I don't mean initial quality (they ARE comfy at first)... I'm talking about holding value - overall longterm quality (ie, answering "No" to the question: "Will I be embarrassed to drive this car in 10 years?").

They need to learn how to design and assemble the damn thing correctly the first time, so the consumer isn't pissed off every time they need to replace something, even if it's the small shit: window motor, radiator fan, dashboard backlight and/or the gauges it illuminates, water pump, fuel pump, or some $300 A/C flap thingamajigger that controls air flow between vents which remains working yet makes a terribly irritating noise lasting 32 seconds every time you start or stop the engine.
Clearly, I have digressed, and have absolutely no experience with such matters anyway.

And so it was that with the rise of globalization (and fall of the dollar), foreign companies opened up shop here...
Take for example BMW's impact in Greenville, South Carolina: 23,050 jobs paying $1.2 billion, etc. (source) from one such plant. Where's BMW's whining video?? Where's BMW's bailout?? They don't fucking need one because they do quality work - much like Honda, Nissan, Toyota and all other brands who are devouring Big 3's piece of the pie - and rightfully so.

I recently enjoyed an article about how American car companies can't lease cars anymore because they don't hold their value - when people turned their leases in, the company was stuck with a depreciated piece of shit and lost money by the truckload (no pun intended). So now they only sell them (or lack thereof), sticking the consumer with the piece of shit in 3-5 years, who subsequently will purchase a different brand the next time around - one that will not only run forever (provided they keep the oil changed), but the A/C and power windows will too.

Imagine that: Bush actually got it right when he told them to learn how to compete.
In short, we are witnessing the evolution of an industry in the face of capitalism, the excitement and effectiveness of which will be ruined by a bailout. Sorry for ranting.


And remember - if you see a car approaching with a foglight out, it's made by GM.

>> ^shuac:
You international folks aren't privy to our stupid commercials, so let me share one with you. It's for GM or Chrysler, and it features voice-over by Jeff Bridges. In it, we see a mid-sized SUV and Jeff is talking about how green the thing is and at the end, they reveal the big gun: 27 mpg.

LOL! Ford always uses Kiefer Sutherland.

Give them $25 billion or cost $156 billion later? So where's the capital behind this $25 billion? Or are we talking about just printing it out based on nothing, as usual? And I agree that the U.S. auto industry doesn't need to be bailed out just to give us more gas guzzlers.

You international folks aren't privy to our stupid commercials, so let me share one with you. It's for GM or Chrysler, and it features voice-over by Jeff Bridges. In it, we see a mid-sized SUV and Jeff is talking about how green the thing is and at the end, they reveal the big gun: 27 mpg.

I swear, they were bragging about 27 mpg.

Fuck that! Let them fail. Sure, it may be tough but it'll teach them in a way that a bailout never will.

I love this movie. Here's the trivia section from IMDB:

* Charlotte Rampling had a role as a hitchhiker whom Kowalski met while en route, but her scenes were deleted before the US release. The scenes were re-inserted for the UK release. The DVD release includes both the US and UK versions.

* The car featured in the film is a 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T, with a 440 cubic-inch V-8, and not a 426 Hemi V-8 (as is often believed). Five white Challengers loaned from the Chrysler Corporation were used during the filming.

* The Challenger had Colorado plates: OA-5599

* There were actually four 440 Challenger R/Ts and one 383 Challenger R/T, which was an automatic with green interior. This one was used for some exterior shots and it pulled the 1967 Camaro up to speed so the Camaro could hit the bulldozers. As confirmed by property master Dennis J. Parrish, all of the cars were NOT originally white. They were just painted white for the film. During the scene where Kowalski has a flat tire, you can see green paint in the dents.

* Cameo: [David Gates] The singer/songwriter (of Bread fame) played the piano during the rousing revival in the desert with the J. Hovah singers.

* The city names on the California Highway Patrol tracking board (where Kowalski never made it) were Stockton, Oakland, Berkeley and San Francisco.

* Director Richard C. Sarafian's original choice for the role of Kowalski was Gene Hackman, but the studio, 20th Century Fox, insisted on using Barry Newman if the movie was going to be made.

* The color white was chosen for the car simply so the car would stand out against the background scenery in the movie. White was not symbolic in any way. The director says this in the DVD commentary.

* A 1967 Camaro shell (no engine) loaded with explosives was used for the final crash. You can see the "Camaro" fender nameplate upside-down in the lower left corner of the screen after the crash.

"Jesus Chrysler Drives a Dodge"
- The Screaming Blue Messiahs.

just putting it out there....