I suspect this will make you mad.

And make you laugh.

Go figure.

http://tinyurl.com/6azzbg

It’s about Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme.

“Never trust people who make their living on the labor of others.”

I’d say you’re right in that we should “never trust” them. But their contribution to civilization is not without merit.

To go back to your old days as a CON, “BlueJay,” “Trust, but verify.” Remember that?

Some of my best professional experiences in life have been when entrepreneurs. They have an idea or a product and need capital to make it happen and sometimes the Investor Class is essential to make it happen. Imagine how Steve Jobs must have felt when he tried to raise cash to produce a personal computer for the masses.

And Jobs and Gates got where they are by realizing they had a vision and there are plenty people who aren’t visionary but are logisticians who can realize the vision.

Thomas Nast was a wage slave, but as a cartoonist he created some of the most indelible imagery of the United States. That’s important.

We have Republic Party partisans as elephants slowly lumbering toward reality; and they never forget. And we got Donkey’s from Nast: ornery, stubborn, never afraid to kick the oppressors.

And Thomas Nast also gave us Santa Claus.

He might have considered it ironic but Americans have never been good with irony.

Take a look at Thomas Nast’s model for Santa Claus –

http://www.sijmen.nl/photography/philosophers/marx

Ho! Ho! Ho Chi Mihn!

I only seek to…..help them.

I have met in person more posters than anyone else. I should think that those whose ID is in question would seek to be vetted.

I consider it charitable. Given their position.

Now that management has failed, THEY want to take back on the agreements they have made.

Never trust people who make their living on the labor of others.

I don’t think you should totally crush your WE Blog reputation by agreeing to a civil meet-up over lunch or coffee or a beer with individual CONs.

You should make them pick up the tab.

;^)

The auto execs most certainly have included retirees’ expenses in their equation. And for-profit health coverage they pay so their fellow CEOs in the insurance bidness can buy private jets. They hire lackeys to figure the per-employee cost of Post-It Notes.

And — just to keep your Wrong Streak Intact — the UAW agreed to salary concessions over a period of two years; the CONs agreed to that until they caucused and came back with a deal-killer: that the wage concessions hit by March 2009.

You can’t be so obsessed with organized labor to attribute every union’s historical tactics to every other union in the world. Otherwise, Walmart and Enron must be one and the same, shouldn’t it?

And everyone with a gun must be Tex Watson.

Deep down, you CONs are so shallow.

Well, that is right where YOU live aint it fleet?

No one here has ever met you.

SO, you do your “fap,fap,fap” thing with yourself.

It’s the Solstice season and a time to be charitable.

I offer you the chance to meet me “fleetwood”.

But I am thinking I have already met you.

Care to prove otherwise?

The union doesn’t seem to want to pitch in. Unions are the ones who fought to keep Michael Vick in the NFL. Plaxico Burris from being suspended.
Credibility = Zero
The list does go on and on.

Your story was nice, but what it has to do with the UAW workers and there cost to the company is tenuous to say the least. I don’t think the auto execs count paper pads and the other things you tried to show. They are paid too much for what they do. Period.

The little weasel head of the agency tried to hire me away from another agency and said, “You’re worth a hundred grand to me.”

Since I was making about $35,000 at the time — and it is the ad biz so my willingness to be a whore was long established — I said we’d talk.

So when we got down to talking about compensation, he pulls out this list of what the supposed “hundred grand” consisted of.

He itemized ever bit of overhead. Okay, legitimate things like salary, FICA, matching 401(k) contributions… but went on to include s#it like “We have free parking. If you had to rent a monthly parking place downtown, you’d pay $X-per-month (forget that my downtown job included free parking… and he added the figure he was not going to pay to the “hundred grand” I was supposedly worth to him. He listed the cost of the desk and chair, his utilities and rent pro-rated per employee….

And lo and behold he was right! He squeezed out the cost of every legal pad, every copier guy service call, the Christmas party… every nickel of business overhead and sure ‘nuf, I was worth “a hundred grand” to him.

But the salary he offered was something like $40 thousand. It would have been a nice bump but who would want to work with such an anal-retentive.

The whole “UAW workers cost General Motors $70 dollars an hour equation stinks of the weasel’s accounting. Only GM figures in the brake-assembly worker’s contribution to the fleet of hot-and-cold-running Learjets, the CEO’s condo in Aspen, a skybox at the Super Bowl and, y’know, the actual expense of building a car!

And then the CONs compare it with the average hourly rate at the Toyota factory in Mitch McConnell’s home state, and the Nissan plant in Corker’s home state, and the Kia assembly facility in Saxby’s home state, etc….

Torture the numbers long enough and they’ll confess to anything.

It’s pretty much always true when dealing with CONservative orthodoxy; if they couldn’t lie they’d have nothin’.

THEIR agenda is to kill a union.

Since the early days of Reagan, THIS has been THE con driving force. Killing unions and subjugating worker rights and protections.

Just how has that worked out for anyone outside the investor class?

BEFORE Reagan, we were the world’s biggest exporter of finished goods. NOW we are the world’s biggest importer of finished goods.

People like solie, they don’t care about their country, the planet, or anything much but themselves. And they HAVE just about managed to completely make America and the world the playground of their own selfishness and greed.

We can only HOPE it is not too late not to chase these vermin back into the dark where they belong.

You are a complete and total tardo. Did the workers make money, dipshit? Did they get benefits dumbass? Is a company developed to lose money fucktard? Were they forced to work there brain dead?

My Lord you are an imbecile.

Go blow Jay again. He’s calling for you.

Now I agree with Mike on the bashing on Auto workers and especially Aviation workers. I retired after 29 years as an Aviation worker and I deserve my pittance of a retirement every month. I can only dream that I got a total (including all benifits) of $70 per hour. It seems to me that there are a lot of very jealous people out there. We just hapened to be the ones that got the A & P License, degrees and jobs. Overall we did ok, but we also were the ones awaiting the layoff notice (if it came), wondering if what we did would be accepted by the customer, etc., We were also the ones gettting high blood pressure and such other neat things like that.

“”Its funny how they are getting raked over the coals about the bailout amount they are asking for, but no one said boo to the banks and financial institutions that raped the tax payer……..and the government just wrote the a blank check…”

I said, “booo!” along with a few other million Americans. I told my representatives to NOT bail out the fat cat evil rich bankers. But they were overruled by the majority votes in Congress. The democrats (and many republicans) rushed the bill through BEFORE the public could shout “BOOO!”

And it’s nothing personal against you, your union, or the auto industry.

I just prefer to spend my money on a a Honda Civic because it has proven reliable, and has the best gas MPG on the market (well right behind the Toyota Prius).

I like spending my money on what I think is best.

I don’t like the government spending MY money on what it feels is best. Especially when it ain’t.

The big three are doomed, despite any handout.

Dear Employee,
Next week, Congress and the current Administration will determine
whether to provide immediate support to the domestic auto industry to help
it through one of the most difficult economic times in our nation’s history.
Your elected officials must hear from all of us now on why this support is
critical to our continuing the progress we began prior to the global
financial crisis………………….As an employee, you have a lot at
stake and continue to be one of our most effective and passionate voices. I
know GM can count on you to have your voice heard.

Thank you for your urgent action and ongoing support.

Troy Clarke
President
General Motors North America

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From Gregory Knox,

In response to your request to call legislators and ask for a
bailout for the United States automakers please consider the following, and
please also pass this onto Troy Clark, the president of General Motors North
America for me.

You are both infected with the same entitlement mentality that has
bred like cancerous germs in UAW halls for the last countless decades, and
whose plague is now sweeping the nation, awaiting our new “messiah” to wave
his magical wand and make all our problems go away, while at the same time
allowing our once great nation to keep “living the dream”.

The dream is over!

The dream that we can ignore the consumer for years while
management myopically focuses on its personal rewards packages at the same
time that our factories have been filled with the worlds most overpaid,
arrogant, ignorant and laziest entitlement minded “laborers” without paying
the price for these atrocities.and that still the masses will line up to buy
our products

Don’t tell me I’m wrong. Don’t accuse me of not knowing of what I
speak. I have called on Ford,GM ,Chrysler,TRW,Delphi,Kelsey Hayes, American
Axle and countless other automotive OEM’s and Tier ones for 3 decades now
throughout the Midwest and what I’ve seen over the years in these union
shops can only be described as disgusting.

Mr Clark, the president of General Motors, states:

There is widespread sentiment in this country, our government and
especially in the media that the current crisis is completely the result of
bad management. It is not.

You’re right – it’s not JUST management.how about the electricians
who walk around the plants like lords in feudal times, making people wait on
them for countless hours while they drag ass.so they can come in on the
weekend and make double and triple time.for a job they easily could have
done within their normal 40 hour week

How about the line workers who threaten newbies with all kinds of
scare tactics.for putting out too many parts on a shift.and for being too
productive (mustn’t expose the lazy bums who have been getting overpaid for
decades for their horrific underproduction, must we?!?) Do you really not
know about this stuff?!?

How about this great sentiment abridged from Mr. Clarke’s sad plea:

over the last few years .we have closed the quality and efficiency
gaps with our competitors.

What the hell has Detroit been doing for the last 40 years?!?

Did we really JUST wake up to the gaps in quality and efficiency
between us and them?

The K car vs. the Accord?

The Pinto vs. the Civic?!?

Do I need to go on?

We are living through the inevitable outcome of the actions of the
United States auto industry for decades.

Time to pay for your sins, Detroit.

I attended an economic summit last week where a brilliant
economist, Alan Beaulieu surprised the crowd when he said he would not have
given the banks a penny of “bailout money”. Yes, he said, this would cause
short term problems, but despite what people like George Bush and Troy Clark
would have us believe, the sun would in fact rise the next day. and
something else would happen.where there had been greedy and sloppy banks new
efficient ones would pop up. that is how a free market system works.it does
work.if we would let it work.

But for some reason we are now deciding that the rest of the world
is right and that capitalism doesn’t work – that we need the government to
step in and “save us”.save us, hell – we’re nationalizing.and unfortunately
too many of this once fine nations citizens don’t even have a clue that this
is what’s really happening.but they sure can tell you the stats on their
favorite sports teams.yeah – THAT’S important.

Does it occur to ANYONE that the “competition” has been producing
vehicles, EXTREMELY PROFITABLY, for decades now in this country?…

How can that be???

Let’s see.

Fuel efficient.

Listening to customers.

Investing in the proper tooling and automation for the long haul.

Not being too complacent or arrogant to listen to Dr W Edwards
Deming 4 decades ago

Ever increased productivity through quality, lean and six sigma
plans.

Treating vendors like strategic partners, rather than like “the
enemy”.

Efficient front and back offices.

Non union environment.

Again, I could go on and on, but I really wouldn’t be telling
anyone anything they really don’t already know in their hearts

I have six children, so I am not unfamiliar with the concept of
wanting someone to bail you out of a mess that you have gotten yourself into
- my children do this on a weekly, if not daily basis, as I did at their
age. I do for them what my parents did for me (one of their greatest gifts,
by the way) – I make them stand on their own two feet and accept the
consequences of their actions and work them through.

Radical concept, huh.

Am I there for them in the wings? Of course – but only until such
time as they need to be fully on their own as adults

I don’t want to oversimplify a complex situation, but there
certainly are unmistakable parallels here between the proper role of
parenting and government.

Detroit and the United States need to pay for their sins.

Bad news people – it’s coming whether we like it or not

The newly elected Messiah really doesn’t have a magic wand big
enough to “make it all go away” I laughed as I heard Obama “reeling it back
in” almost immediately after the vote count was tallied.”we might not do it
in a year.or in four.” where was that kind of talk when he was RUNNING for
the office

Stop trying to put off the inevitable .

That house in Florida really isn’t worth $750,000.

People who jump across a border really don’t deserve free health
care benefits.

That job driving that forklift for the big 3 really isn’t worth
$85,000 a year.

We really shouldn’t allow Wal-Mart to stock their shelves with
products acquired from a country that unfairly manipulates their currency
and has the most atrocious human rights infractions on the face of the
globe.

That couple whose combined income is less than $50,000 really
shouldn’t be living in that $485,000 home.

Let the market correct itself people – it will. Yes it will be
painful, but it’s gonna be painful either way, and the bright side of my
proposal is that on the other side of it is a nation that appreciates what
is has.and doesn’t live beyond its means.and gets back to basics.and
redevelops the work ethic that made it the greatest nation in the history of
the world.and probably turns back to God.

Sorry – don’t cut my head off, I’m just the messenger sharing with
you the “bad news”

GM abandoned the small car market; now they whine about the result.

Those companies and their boards and shareholders wanted those workers on the job making cars and making THEM money. It is not the fault of the workers that the companies design and market crap that does not sell. It is also not the workers fault that the companies were as usual, shortsighted to profits today in balance to obligations going forward.

If the workers have to give up what they have earned in fair negotiation, the damned shareholders need to take a hit as well.

We all deserve it.

Your UAW: Safety is job one