My Plan for GM and the Cadillac Sixteen

[Porter 21919]

That is what we love, that is what we want, what we grew up with. Granted, GM and Ford are global and have been for many decades, they lead global auto sales, not on the run like today, losing market share every year.

Americans need to wake up and see what is happening to OUR automotive manufacturing economy. If they need to be subsidized like the foreign competitors that are taking over our markets then so be it. Im not advocating Americans buying inferior domestic American cars, just fair trade, not free trade, whatever that is supposed to be or mean. Apples to apples, not apples to oranges, the foreign companies build plants here and have no labor unions.

GM and Ford are overburdened by massive pension and health care costs from the past system, are we so supposed to just sit here and let the German,Japanese and Korean manufacturers take over our automotive manufacturing industry, once the proud "standard of the world" ?

GM is my first choice, I would begrudgingly and proudly own a Ford before I would own any foreign make. Im hard pressed to consider a Chrysler product American at this point.

Porter

[Lou 19058]

Heres a list of so called American built cars and trucks.If you buy a Chevy truck with a diesel it is built in the USA but the engine is made by Isuzu.The big three buy their supplies from all over the world. My Kentucky built Ford truck has parts that are stamped "Made in Mexico" and this is nothing new,GM has been buying parts and building cars in other countries for over 30 years.  http://www.uaw.org/uawmade/cartruck2005.cfm TARGET=_blank>http://www.uaw.org/uawmade/cartruck2005.cfm

[Porter 21919]

"Oy vey, Ethel! These loser leftists are so crazy with Bush hate theyve even taken to ranting and raving on car sites with that same old scare stuff they said about Reagan!"

Ed,

You totally lost me on this one. I havent seen the leftist loser here or the Bush hater, nor the Reagan scare stuff.

What we are concerned about is the survival of GM and Cadillac autos, the downfall of GM is symbolic of the downfall of America and our once proud industrial base, "The Standard of the World".

If the die has been cast and the foreign countries and corporations will now own America with all of our debt they are holding then perhaps it is too late to salvage our future, our independence and former greatness, not to mention our freedom.

If this subject is too hot to handle for some people here then we will drop it like a hot potato. I tend to think most of us here have above average intelligence and that is why we prefer autos like Cadillac, that were engineered by the best the American automotive industry had to offer.

It is our preferred brand and that is why we belong to the CLC and want our marquee to be acknowledged as the finest in the world.

Porter

[Jeff Maltby 4194]

Oy Vey Hey Porter.

Maybe this is the reason the "Minutemen" are amassing on our southern border come Monday, as George Bush Jr turns us into a 3rd world country without blinking an eye= very strange indeed.

49 fastbacks rule

:<)

[Porter 21919]

"Oy Vey Hey Porter. Maybe this is the reason the "Minutemen" are amassing on our southern border come Monday, as George Bush Jr turns us into a 3rd world country without blinking an eye= very strange indeed. 49 fastbacks rule :<) "

Jeff,

They would be American citizens with courage, sick and tired of what the ruling class has done to and is letting happen to America.

I applaud their effort to put a stop to the illegal migration of foreigners into America to steal our jobs and our money from us, the benefits that we paid for and were promised to us by the politicians, which are slowly being taken away or given away to foreigners.

It is high time for Americans to wake up and see that the crooked politicians have sold us out, before it is too late.

Porter

[Ed Dougher]

I STRONGLY have to disagree.  Competition is the cure, not the disease.  

Lets face it... GM and Ford have made their beds and now they have to lie in them.  For many years, they were content to make bigger and bigger Bubba trucks that sold like hotcakes while their competitors continued honing their entire product lines.  Now the chickens are coming home to roost.

The last thing I believe we should do is give them subsidies (which the government has no business doing anyway) to continue to be fat, complacent, and too lazy to help themselves.

[Ed Dougher]

Wow, this thread really brought back some memories!  I dont know what age you are, or if you remember just how bad American cars got during the 70s.  

I remember my father buying a brand new 76 Plymouth Volare - Motor Trends "Car of the Year"!  A loyal UAW member, he worked for Chrysler for 30 years, and always drove Chrysler products.  One of the first things I noticed was that the paint was too orange-peeled to reflect the misaimed light from the ill-fitting, cracked parking lights that glowed two different shades of amber.  One day, while on a fishing trip, with six hundred miles on the odometer of this brand new "Car of the Year", the front crossmember broke and the front wheels pointed in opposite directions.  Luckily, the car was at a stop when this happened, and it just spun its tires in the grass.

Things with that car only got worse from there, and it was followed by some other doozies of varying American brands.

After being stuck with junk after junk after junk after junk, even my father started buying Mazdas and parking a few blocks away from his UAW meetings!

[George]

Take a look at the UK. We used to have Austin, Morris, Rover,Triumph,Hillman,Rolls Royce, yes and English Ford and GM Vauxall.
 The whole British car industry was sold down the river by British politicians. The people who worked in the UK car factories, all unemployed. Heed what Porter is saying, it will happen to you.

[Bruce Reynolds # 18992]

Ah, yes, each country had their own Auto and Shipping industries so that they had a "war-ready" industry enable the manufacture of fighting machines.

Now that wars are mostly fought from the air with planes and rockets, there isnt the big necessity for controlled automobile production.

In the 1800s and 1900s, each Passenger Liner that was constructed, had a second set of blueprints that enabled it to be easily converted to wartime use.   The gun mounts were actually built into the structures and were easily accessable.   That is why the shipbuilding industry was so heavily protected by Governments

Bruce,
The Tassie Devil(le),
60 CDV