I don’t want to sound negative, but is anyone else getting
the idea that we’re starting to live in Clunker Nation?
Start with the actual clunker deal where we borrowed money
from China to buy Japanese cars in order to save Detroit.
Nuts!
All told, we spent $2.88 billion in money we didn’t have in
order to smash 690,114 cars, according to the final numbers from
the Department of Transportation.
What pulled up to be demolished were mainly American
cars.
What topped the list of new cars leaving the showroom
floors, initiating a new and novel form of foreign aid, were cars
produced primarily by manufacturers headquartered in Japan and
South Korea.
The top 10 Cash-for-Clunkers trade-ins: Ford Explorer
four-wheel drive, Ford F-150 Pickup two-wheel drive, Jeep Grand
Cherokee four-wheel drive, Ford Explorer two-wheel drive, Dodge
Caravan/Grand Caravan two-wheel drive, Jeep Cherokee four-wheel
drive, Chevrolet Blazer four-wheel drive, Chevrolet C1500 pickup
two-wheel drive, Ford F-150 pickup four-wheel drive, Ford
Windstar front-wheel drive van.
The 10 top-selling vehicles in the program: Toyota Corolla,
Honda Civic, Toyota Camry, Ford Focus front-wheel drive,
Hyundai Elantra, Nissan Versa, Toyota Prius, Honda Accord, Honda
Fit, Ford Escape front-wheel drive.
In addition to reducing the supply and raising the price of
used cars, on top of weakening the future income of car repair
and auto body businesses, the net result of the July-August
clunker program was that it ruined American car sales in
September while filling the coffers of foreign car producers so
they could come on even stronger against U.S. producers in the
next round of competition.
September was the second-worst month of the year for the
auto industry, with sales at General Motors falling 45 percent,
Chrysler down by 42 percent, and Ford off by 5 percent.
“It was a real post-clunker hangover,” said GM’s vice
president of United States sales, regarding
September.
Said Ken Czubay, Ford’s vice president of U.S. sales,
regarding September, “I’ve never seen a roller coaster like
this.” It’s simple — the government blows $2.88 billion creating
an artificial balloon on the upside of the dips and the ride down
becomes just that much steeper.
Worse than the above in terms of our very survival is the
Nobel clunker, Obama’s prize for pushing a program that promises
to send American nukes to the same junkyard crushers that
destroyed all those aforementioned Ford Explorers.
Agot Valle, a
Norwegian politician and member of the five-person committee that
chose this year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, said Obama won
primarily because of his “commitment to nuclear
disarmament.”
The committee last met on October 5, 11 days after Obama’s
told the UN’s General Assembly that the United States, pre-Obama,
was seen by the world as too cocky, too polluting, too
untrustworthy, and too armed.
America, he said, had “acted unilaterally, without regard
for others.” We were one of the “wealthy nations that did so much
damage to the environment in the 20th century.” We were viewed
internationally with “skepticism and distrust.”
And regarding our stash of nukes? Simple, per Obama:
“Nations with nuclear weapons have a responsibility to move
toward disarmament.”
So Israel’s nukes go to a clunker program, and then Israel
is safer, outnumbered 50-to-1 by hostile neighbors? That’s a
peace plan? Or is it more likely a war plan, with a de-nuked
Israel just inviting an attack?
The same with the United States. De-nuked, America is some
day going to successfully take on a billion or so Chinese,
door-to-door?
