Heads you win, Tails I lose: Moore on the Financial Crisis

Beware. American car makers are not what they seem to be. Nothing is what it seems to be.

The world is trapped in an end-game financial meltdown, a suffocating glass box from which there is no obvious escape route. But in truth it is a glass box of the world's own making. We could have avoided it if FunkyPix2's liberal advice over many years had been followed (eg, here, here , or here). Instead, the Rich continue to devise ways by which to get even richer, always at the expense of the Poor. No better example could be found than the recent decision not to bail out the US car-makers.

Michael Moore is right on the money (pun intended) in his latest newsletter where he slams the recent rejection of the US rescue package for the car makers. Moore is sometimes regarded by right-wingers as an over-zealous liberal leftie, so I'm sometimes hesitant to be seen as a mouthpiece for him. However, this time he could not have put it more succinctly when he wrote:

They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers start building only cars and mass transit that reduce our dependency on oil.

They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers build cars that reduce global warming.

They could have given the loan on the condition that the automakers withdraw their many lawsuits against state governments in their attempts to not comply with our environmental laws.

They could have given the loan on the condition that the management team which drove these once-great manufacturers into the ground resign and be replaced with a team who understands the transportation needs of the 21st century.

Yes, they could have given the loan for any of these reasons because, in the end, to lose our manufacturing infrastructure and throw 3 million people out of work would be a catastrophe.

But instead, the Senate said, we'll give you the loan only if the factory workers take a $20 an hour cut in wages, pension and health care. That's right. After giving BILLIONS to Wall Street hucksters and criminal investment bankers -- billions with no strings attached and, as we have since learned, no oversight whatsoever -- the Senate decided it is more important to break a union, more important to throw middle class wage earners into the ranks of the working poor than to prevent the total collapse of industrial America.

................ An impoverished CEO does it tough on Main St.

The recent riots in Greece are symptomatic of the public's view of the way wealthy elites are screwing the world. Make no mistake, the death of the 15 year-old boy in Athens was merely the trigger for the riots. The real cause was a much deeper disaffection with imbalances in society... and unless these unfairnesses are soon sorted out more equitably, trouble will certainly spread further afield, and crime rates will soar. People without jobs still have to eat, as they already know in Zimbabwe. The wealthy corporate Status Quo will scornfully label it "Revolution" and call out the riot squad and the media (which they control). And they will get away with it again and again unless ordinary people lose their apathy:

Unless everyday people like you, me, and Dilbert take a principled stand against Globalisation, nothing will improve. To rich people, the profit motive and immediate gratification override everything else. Laboratory rats, given a choice between nutritious food or white sugar, will persist in eating the white sugar until they die of malnutrition.

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With all this in mind, let FunkyPix2 cynically offer some novel car-making ideas to the Big Three...

If you're seeking to stimulate new markets, why not colonize oceans?
After all, water covers 2/3 of the world's surface,
so cooling the engine will no longer be a big deal.

...and likewise outer space. No need to worry about CO2 emmissions
as space is full of the stuff anyway.
Aw heck, if all else fails, resort to pure sex-appeal to boost slumping sales.
Here's my prototype for the new Ford SXE:

See another FunkyPix2 photo gallery of truly quirky vehicles here (opens in a new window).