The Death Of Detroit Avenue Car Dealerships

[Bill Call]

The condo and jail suggestions were in jest. The last thing Lakewood needs in this economy is more over priced housing and I don't want a bigger new jail in the residential part of Lakewood. I'd go for the brewery

I think there is a market for up scale apartments and $200,000 condo's along Clifton and Detroit. I think your jest implied that having some government agency or citizens group decide what is best for the community is not always the smart thing to do.

California and New York will get the lions share. Those ‘lucky’ residents can thank Pelosi and Hillary for that.

California and New York will only get the lions share if the other 96 senators let it happen. Midwest, Western and Southern senators should filabuster any bailout unless they get a really big piece of the action.

Don't think about reasoned debate, that's the old senate. When you think of the new senate think of a pack of wild dogs fighting over a ham bone.

A trillion dollars divided by the US population of roughly 300 million is $3,333/person. Multiply this by Lakewood’s 54,000 residents and you have $180 million. This is our fair share but is this really the right thing to do? This is sickens me to think about bailout after bailout followed by binge spending all in the name of kickstarting the economy.

It sickens me as well.

However, the trillions of dollars are going to be spent no matter what we do. I fear our elected representatives will feel the obligation to talk about fiscal responsibiity. That is a dead end. The old rules are overthrown.

Printing money to pay the bills is no longer the fantasy of some street corner rabble rouser. It is official government policy.

Anyone in this town who votes for any kind of tax increase is a damm fool. The feds will print all the money we need. We might wish it weren't so but so it is.

Franklin said it best, "When the people find they can vote themselves money that is the end of the Republic".

http://www.famous-quote.net/quotes-economics.shtml

[Stephen Eisel]

A trillion dollars divided by the US population of roughly 300 million is $3,333/person

How about Trillion dollar just among us taxpayers

[Charlie Page]

A trillion dollars divided by the US population of roughly 300 million is $3,333/person

How about Trillion dollar just among us taxpayers

gotta get with the new way of thinking. It's 2009, we're sharing the wealth. It goes to everyone.

[Stephen Eisel]

A trillion dollars divided by the US population of roughly 300 million is $3,333/person

How about Trillion dollar just among us taxpayers

gotta get with the new way of thinking. It's 2009, we're sharing the wealth. It goes to everyone.

There goes that plan

[Ivor Karabatkovic]

yawn

[Bill Call]

President Obama will issue his proclamation today announcing which car dealerships will be closed. If the closing of the Twinsburg stamping plant told us anything it told us that these decisions are not economic decisions but political decisions.

In an environment where the political class in Washington picks the winners and the losers it behooves our elected representative to halt ANY funding for GM and Chrysler unless car dealerships in our neighborhoods are saved. Our elected representatives should unite with Democrats and Republicans across the country to make sure NOTHING gets done unless these dealerships receive the subsidies they need to continue to operate.

The Obama administration is printing trillions of dollars, creating money out of thin air. The president’s economic policy consists of him asking everyone one in the country to take out a magic marker and add three zeros to all the paper money in their wallet.

In that economic environment the actual cost of saving car dealerships is irrelevant.

Does anyone out there know how to play this game?

[Matt Jones]

Looks like it's official....

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index ... 25_fr.html

[Bret Callentine]

reading the cnn list, it looks like Ganley Lakewood will be closed, but Spitzer Lakewood is safe (for now).

I'm not sure I understand this move. Why would you pick the dealerships to close? why not just re-structure the agreements so that dealers are essentially the retailers that they should be. Then it's up to each dealer to decide which cars it will or will not sell.

Manufacturers wouldn't have any additional costs, and Dealers wouldn't be restricted in sales. Both sides just worry about making money however they can.

Seems logical to me. I must be WAAAAAAAAAY off.

[Bill Call]

reading the cnn list, it looks like Ganley Lakewood will be closed, but Spitzer Lakewood is safe (for now).

The official list shows Spitzer-Lakewood as being closed but the address given is in Lorain County. The PD lists Lakewood Spitzer as being closed. The official list shows Ganley in Lakewood as being closed. It's likely that most smaller dealerships not adjacent to freeways will be closed. That means Barry Buick.

Don't look for economic reasons for the closings. These are political decisions and can be reversed in the political arena.

[Bill Call]

I actually have a lot of sympathy for the people who work in the auto industry. Like most of us they were just cogs in the machine.

However, I chuckled a bit when an employee at the Twinsburg stamping plant complained that they had a contract agreement that was protected by the law. I nearly laughed out loud when I heard Governor Strickland say Ohio has franchise laws that should protect Ohio's small dealerships.

I'll bet neither had any objections when the Obama administration ignored decades of legal precedent, the constitution and national bankruptcy law. I'll bet neither had any objections to the various threats made against bond holders and their attorney's.

Which brings to mind a quote that will fall on the deaf ears of the Obomites:

Sir Thomas More
-- There's no law against that.

William Roper

-- God's law!

Sir Thomas More

-- Then God can arrest him.

William Roper

-- While you talk, he's gone!

Sir Thomas More

-- Go he should, if he were the Devil, until he broke the law.

William Roper

-- Now you give the Devil benefit of law!

Sir Thomas More

-- Yes, what would you do?

William Roper

-- Cut a road through the law to get after the Devil? Yes. I'd cut down every law in England to do that.

Sir Thomas More

-- And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned on you...

...where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?

This country is planted thick with laws from coast to coast...

...Man's laws, not God's, and if you cut them down...

...and you're just the man to do it...

...do you really think you could stand upright in the wind that would blow then?


I might add, "What will you do when Obama turns on you?

[Charlie Page]

Looks like it's official....

http://www.cleveland.com/business/index ... 25_fr.html

Nationwide, Chrysler asked the court to void 789 franchise agreements with its stores.

I think they meant to write that Obama asked the court to void 789 franchise agreements with its stores. Chrysler is Obama and the UAW now.

That translates into about 40,000 jobs lost at the closed dealerships. I guess that doesn't matter because they aren't union jobs.

[ryan costa]

the Kia rio is a popular car. the Toyota Scion xB is a well constructed automobile.

The downsized GM and Chrysler dealers will have to start selling new japanese cars and new korean cars.


Or they can sell used cars. the mainstreets of the Old Brooklyn neighborhood of Brooklyn are peppered with

If you want a new GM you'll have to take the interstate 20 miles out of town.

[Brian Pedaci]

I'd like to know how franchise cancellations in one of the most reliably Democratic areas of the country can be considered politically motivated.

I'd also like to know how these dealerships would have been better served had Chrysler gone bankrupt all on their own rather than under the guidance of the administration.

Can any of the skeptics here help me better understand this?

[Bill Call]

I'd like to know how franchise cancellations in one of the most reliably Democratic areas of the country can be considered politically motivated.

I'd also like to know how these dealerships would have been better served had Chrysler gone bankrupt all on their own rather than under the guidance of the administration.

Can any of the skeptics here help me better understand this?

It is not only a matter of voting patterns. Northeast Ohio is reliably democratic but our democratic governor will spend more stimulus money in sparsley populated areas of Southern Ohio than here. Why? Because he knows that his votes here are secure no matter what he does. The votes in Southern Ohio are up for sale and he is buying.

Obama chose to close the Twinsburg stamping plant while approving the expenditure of $2 billion to build a NEW plant in Michigan. Why? Not for economic reason for sure.

The same pattern will hold for the Tax and Trade system now working its way through congress. Utilities on the East and West coast will receive subsidies, utilitites in the Mid West will be heavily taxed. Refineries located in Democratic districts will receive free carbon credits, refineries in Rebulican districts will be heavily taxed.

Chysler would have been better off in a real bankruptcy because the goal of the bankruptcy court would have been to save the company as a continuing operation by:

Relieve the company of its unaffordable contract obligations
Relieve the company of its obligation to pay back loans

The goal of the Obama administration is to save the union. That means another $100 billion in tax dollars to pay benefits leaving nothing left for company operations.

If we had a congressional representative worth his salt he would be working to get Lakewood and other communities money to offset the economic impact of these closings. At least $100 million in Lakewood.

Don't hold your breath. Last I heard Kucinich was back in Hollywood with Shirley McLaine, channeling Chou En Lai.

[Bryan Schwegler]

Bill, glad to see your mistruths and hyperbole are alive and will in this thread.

So you are saying, Obama himself went through the thousands of dealers and hand picked who to close? Yeah, sounds reasonable.

And honestly, even if the government had as much control over the process as you like to claim they did, do you honestly think the government cares less about Chrysler or its employees and dealers than Cerberus Capital Management would have? (who btw is a major donor to the Republican party)

I can pretty much guarantee if it was up to Cerberus, they would have sold or liquidated that thing off as a "bad investment" taken a goodwill tax write off and left everyone out of work.

Bill you're gonna have a rough next 3 years buddy.