An Example Of An Obama Crony: Brian Deese, Butcher Of General Motors

How did Brian Deese become such an influential voice in the Obama administration and how did he get put in charge of dismantling General Motors?

Let's look at his resume. According to Glenn Beck at Fox News:

Deese grew up in a Boston suburb, the son of a political science professor at Boston College. He moved to Vermont and attended Middlebury College, where he studied political science and also took time to host a campus radio show called "Bedknobs and Beatniks," described in one write-up as "a format of music, news, discussion and banter." He graduated college in 2000 and then it was onto a pair of non-profit think tanks: the Center for Global Development and the Center for American Progress. Eventually Deese went to Yale for a law degree, but a few credits short of graduating, he went "on leave" to work on Senator Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, quickly becoming her top economic policy staffer.

Did you see anything in there that would even remotely qualify this guy to work in the auto industry? Neither did I. So, how did he get to where he is?

Read on:

Last summer, Deese moved to the Obama campaign as a deputy economic policy director and, just before this current gig, he served on Obama's transition team as an economic adviser.

There it is. That's it. No other reason. This is an example of pure cronyism on the part of a president who promised that such things would not happen in his administration.

Also, you should note that this same president promised to fix the auto industry in Detroit. But since he took the reigns, the auto industry has been going bankrupt faster and faster. That's why GM is being sold off by pieces and a deal to merge Chrysler with Fiat is being pushed through.

If I were the CEO of Fiat, I would be very concerned at how much influence an inept and bumbling Obama administration wields with Chrysler. So much so that I would call off the deal unless I could get a guarantee in writing that the U.S. government would stay out of my business.

You can access the complete column on-line here:

Meet Brian Deese
Glenn Beck
Fox News
June 2, 2009

Great News! Automaker Bailout Dies In The Senate!

This is good news for America. The proposed bailout for the Big Three in Detroit has died and for very good reasons. The remaining GOP Senators demanded that the United Auto Workers scale back their demands to be more on par with the compensation given to auto workers employed by Toyota and Honda.

That was a more than reasonable request given the current economic conditions, but the UAW wouldn't budge and the Dems couldn't do anything about it.

Associated Press has this to say via MSNBC:

Republicans, breaking sharply with President George W. Bush as his term draws to a close, refused to back federal aid for Detroit’s beleaguered Big Three without a guarantee that the United Auto Workers would agree by the end of next year to wage cuts to bring their pay into line with U.S. plants of Japanese carmakers. The UAW refused to do so before its current contract with the automakers expires in 2011.

Why is such a request meaningful? Because of this:

Congressional Republicans have been in open revolt against Bush over the auto bailout. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky joined other GOP lawmakers Thursday in announcing his opposition to the White House-backed bill, which passed the House on Wednesday. He and other Republicans insisted that the carmakers restructure their debt and bring wages and benefits in line with those paid by Toyota, Honda and Nissan in the United States. Hourly wages for UAW workers at GM factories are about equal to those paid by Toyota Motor Corp. at its older U.S. factories, according to the companies. GM says the average UAW laborer makes $29.78 per hour, while Toyota says it pays about $30 per hour. But the unionized factories have far higher benefit costs. GM says its total hourly labor costs are now $69, including wages, pensions and health care for active workers, plus the pension and health care costs of more than 432,000 retirees and spouses. Toyota says its total costs are around $48. The Japanese automaker has far fewer retirees and its pension and health care benefits are not as rich as those paid to UAW workers.

If the Japanese carmakers can produce cars for only three-quarters of the cost that American carmakers incur, then there is absolutely no reason why American carmakers can't bring themselves in line with the lower costs.

But the unions are against this, mostly because it reduces their power and because the union bosses will no longer have any justification for their own high salaries nor for the massive donations they routinely make to the Democrat Party.

The GOP was absolutely right to make sure this deal is killed. It will be a day of reckoning for the UAW and for the Dems who have failed to pay them back for their support. Plus, it aims the spotlight exactly where it needs to be pointing.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Auto Industry Bailout Plan Dies In The Senate
Associated Press via MSNBC
December 12, 2008

House Approves Automaker Bailout, Sends Measure To Senate. Time To Tell The Senate "No!"

Well, the House has approved the ill-fated bailout of Detroit, mostly along party lines. It is clear that the Dems are serious about paying back the big unions for their support in the election and that they want the American taxpayer to foot the bill for it.

The only good thing I can say about this is that my own Representative, Frank Wolf (R-VA) actually voted against this bill. Maybe because of the letters he recieved from people like me or maybe because he has looked back at the dismal failure of the Wall Street bailout and thought better of doing the same thing again.

Now, we have to stop the measure from passing in the Senate. According to Bloomberg:

The House approved a $14 billion loan package intended to prevent a collapse of domestic automakers that would threaten millions of U.S. jobs. The 237-170 vote sends the measure to the Senate, where opposition is growing. ... Some Republicans said the measure would waste taxpayer money without saving the companies from collapse. The bailout “won’t save a single job,” said Representative David Dreier, a California Republican. ... In the Senate, Republicans said the bill lacked the 60 votes needed to overcome delaying tactics threatened by some members. Democrats have a 50-49 edge in the Senate.

It's time to get going and write your Senators. Ask them to vote "Nay" on the automaker bailout. It is destined to fail as surely as the Wall Street bailout failed.

Besides, given that Congress has been running massive deficits and cannot balance a budget, can we really trust them to prevent the Big Three from going into bankruptcy? I am not the smartest man in the world, but even I know better than that.

You can access Congressional email directories on-line here:

Congressional Email Directory

Just click on your state and you will be taken a page with contact links for your Congressional delegation.

Here is a sample of what you can email to your Senator. Feel free to copy and paste it:

Dear Senator, I am writing this email to ask you to vote "Nay" on the automaker bailout bill which recently passed the House of Representatives (H.R. 7321). This bill is destined to be a dismal failure just as the $700 billion Wall Street bailout was a failure and huge waste of taxpayers money. It is already bad enough that our children and grandchildren are going to have to pay for these bailout failures. We need to stop this foolishness now before we begin saddling a debt on our great-grandchildren as well. The best thing to do for Detroit is to let them go into Chapter 11. That way, they can reorganize and retool. This will allow them to modernize as the foreign carmakers have done and Detroit can become competitive again. Right now, the Big Three have manpower costs such that they must pay over $70 an hour to build a car whereas other automakers can do the same job for $35 to $45 an hour. Bailing out Detroit will only prolong the inevitable and waste billions of taxpayer dollars in the process. As a final note, you should realize that hundreds of thousands of small businesses across the United States are in danger of failing, but no one is proposing to bail any of them out. Please apply that same standard to Detroit. Thank you.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

House Approves Automaker Bailout, Sends It To Senate
John Hughes
Bloomberg.com
December 10, 2008

Big Surprise: Unions Want A Bailout Deal For Detroit

And now, the shoe is on the other foot. It should come as no surprise that the UAW is now putting pressure on Congressional Democrats to support a bailout of Detroit. After all, if the Big Three go into Chapter 11, all of those union contracts will be torn up and would have to be renegotiated, assuming whomever comes in to replace the Big Three want to negotiate at all.

Thus, the union bosses like Ron Gettelfinger would lose their large salaries and would have to come up with really good explanations about things like why the new owners have to pay workers for not working.

David Goldman at CNN notes:

The UAW called on Congress to provide a low-interest bridge loan to get the companies through the end of the Bush administration until President-elect Barack Obama can put in place a bigger bailout package that will help restore General Motors, Ford and Chrysler to solvency.

But the UAW is a major reason why Detroit is in such bad shape. The unions have bled so much capital away from the companies that there is no money left for modernizing or improving the productions lines. Further, the union negotiated contracts have artificially inflated the prices of American autos to the point that now foreign carmakers have the majority of the market share.

If the unions are for a bailout of Detroit, then those of us living on Main Street U.S.A. should be against it.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

UAW To Congress: Get A Deal Done
David Goldman
CNN.com
November 20, 2008