March 30. 2009 by Dick.

We got a chicken
in every pot from FDR.
We’ll get a moped with 110 year payback
in every garage from Obama.

General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner has been told to “resign” by Obama administration. Mr. Wagoner has served in that position for about eight years. The GM Board of Directors appointed him; GM shareholders like me accepted him.

NBC reports that a senior Obama administration official told the network that Wagoner was “asked to step down by the White House.” The Obama administration will announce the automaker’s request for additional government rescue loans, two people familiar with the matter said.

One of my correspondents has shouted that, “This…. is … an…. OUTRAGE!!!”

He’s right.

Apparently Mr. Wagoner is out because he failed to gain the concessions from the UAW that government officials had set as targets to justify further loans. Obviously, the administration has forgotten the UAW strikes that crippled GM just a year ago and the ongoing rancor the union projects.

Mr. Wagoner has a lot of faults — mostly that he is a bean counter, not a car guy — but this drive by the administration to take over GM is a backdoor attempt at eminent domain. They think by sneaking in the backdoor, they can nationalize the company without buying any land.

The legal doctrine of eminent domain allows a government to expropriate property within the law. Without the doctrine, taking property — whether your house or your farm or your business — is either a criminal or a revolutionary act.

Here’s my bottom line; if the Obamanation wants my GM stock, they can indeed buy it. Tanking the business then taking it over from behind is not just plain theft; it is cowardly theft.

Be warned.

If you own a small bank, or a farm, or a restaurant on Main Street, you could very well be next.

Oh, yeah. And rumor has it that the government-run GM new product line-up includes a license to build the Tata.

Posted in Government Motors, Business, Politics & News, Big Thoughts, Random Access | 5 Comments »

March 29. 2009 by Dick.

Did you do it? Did you join The Great Global Black Out to celebrate global warming today?

The World Wildlife Federation targeted Earth Hour 2009 on more than one billion people in 1,000 cities worldwide to send a “powerful global message” to the world leaders who will attend the Global Climate Change Conference in Copenhagenin December. Global landmarks including the Golden Gate Bridge, the Colosseum, the Sydney Opera House, and the Coca Cola billboard in Times Square all went dark in this monument to bad science.

I hope, in turning off your lights, you remembered the lights on the VCR and the microwave oven and most assuredly the light in the refrigerator. Opening the fridge for beer would definitely break the spell. After all, the Far Green (that would be the folks who dreamed up the Great Global Black Out) also want us to believe I can burn 167 KW-Hrs per month with the little LEDs and incandescent lights I have running in North Puffin.

We are safe, though. I turned all of my lights on to avoid the Pico Ice Age caused by the sudden cessation of heat-emitting filaments.

It is worth noting that the imagery for Earth Hour includes a person holding an open flame to bring light unto the darkness.

For more facts about “Global Warming” visit the Petition Project where more than 31,000 American scientists have stated unequivocally that no convincing scientific evidence ties human activity to the disruption of the Earth’s climate. Those scientists include the past president of the National Academy of Sciences.

Posted in Society, Science (not-so-real), Politics & News, Random Access | 1 Comment »

March 23. 2009 by Dick.

“Come writers and critics. Who prophesize with your pen. And keep your eyes wide. The chance won’t come again …” The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has dropped its print edition and become an Internet-only entity. The “P-I” is the largest American paper to do so.

OK, OK. This year it’s the “The Pee Eyes, They Are A Changin’.” It won’t be until next year that The Times gets to changin’. Sorry, Mr. Dylan.

There is good news and bad news in this story.

The bad news is quite simple.

P-I owner Hearst Newspapers has dumped about 145 employees (they all did get some kind of severance but they are out of work). The new P-I site won’t need them. See, they are out of the news business and into the opinion business.

Oh, they won’t fess up to that but let’s take a look at how the opinion pages work in a newspaper. Big national papers like the New York Times or Wall Street Journal invite major government officials, A-list actors, and Nobel Laureates to write op-ed columns for their pages. Medium sized regional papers like the Detroit Free Press or the Seattle Post-Intelligencer have to go to the second team for opinion writers. They get mayors and dog catchers and writers like me to opine.

The new P I dot com has recruited some current and former government officials, including a former mayor, a former police chief, and the (not-yet) former Seattle school superintendent, to write columns (we call them blogs in the trade). It will create pages for some of the print edition’s more popular columnists and bloggers. And it will also update its pages for the legion of (unpaid) local bloggers who already work for them for free.

Oops. Sorry. Former mayors and dog catchers and writers like me.

Nowhere in that list are any actual reporters. Nowhere in that list are any editors. Nowhere in that list are any fact checkers.

The bad news is this: American readers have a belief that “if it’s in the paper, it must be true.” Newspapers have polished that belief with staffs of reporters, editors, and fact checkers.

The “demise of the great American newspaper” isn’t looming as we lose advertising and move onto the Internet. That’s just a problem for the wood pulp industry. The demise of the great American newspaper came when newspaper management decided opinion was interchangeable with fact.

I said at the beginning that there would be good news and bad news in this story. Let me know when you find the good news.

Posted in Media, Random Access | 2 Comments »