Pick Yourself Up or Just Go Away

Okay, answer this for me if you can; When did it become our collective responsibility to keep failing businesses going in this country?

Now I can't be, sure because my elementary education came from the public school system (in another state), so I don't always trust what I think I know, but don't we have, if not officially, then at least accepted, a capitalist economy? And isn't part of being in a capitalist economy that if you can't cut it in your particular market, and somebody else is building better mouse traps, you either refit and regain the lead or you go the way of the Zhejiangosaurus? (That's the new species of dinosaur recently found in China-see, I know stuff.)

Seriously, where does this so-called government we have get off asking us, not telling us, we are going to have to watch our tax dollars go to bail-out the auto companies? And where do these companies get off asking for what boils down to mega-welfare?

Look, if you start a business in this country and it fails, then it fails. File bankruptcy, close the doors and hold an auction, whatever, just suck it up and deal with it.

But not these guys. No sir. These guys, "The Big Three," go up to D.C. and whine and cry that "if you don't save us we will fail and a zillion people will be out of work. The trickle down of businesses that depend on us and who will fail if we go down would be catastrophic to the country's employment numbers."

Well, they should have diversified.

You know why these companies are in trouble? Too many concessions to the unions have led to sub-standard employees building sub-standard and overpriced products.

I'm sorry, but it's true. If the "American made" cars were better, or as good, as the "Imports" then they would not be in this situation, the competition found a way to build a better product for a better price and people chose to buy them.

Once upon a time there was an EDSEL Division of Ford Motors, and who can ever forget the American Motor Company and the Delorean (that's the Back to the Future car for those who don't know).

Just because these companies have been around for so many years does not mean that the government has a right to take my money to keep them going past their natural lives.

Not to mention the fact that I'm not so sure it is legal.

I heard a discussion on the radio this week, and one of the 'legal experts' was saying that under the constitution there is something called equal protection. Using the concept of equal protection, if the government helps one business, be it Fannie Mae or Ford, they have to help all businesses that ask. Consequently, if they turn even one down then they have to turn them all down. If this is true, it could open a flood of businesses that are just as deserving as the auto makers. You know, businesses like Leviton and Catawissa.

Why shouldn't the companies that have folded up their tents and left Ashe County get the same bail-out that these guys are going to get?

Because they don't have an 8,000 pound gorilla behind them that intimidates politicians into emptying out the coffers, 8,000 pound gorillas like the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the United Auto Workers.

Look, I know that you have had enough politics for a while and a good many of you think that all the problems are over because President-designate Obama is just a little more than a month away from taking the wheel. But we had better start calling our representatives and let them know that this just won't fly, or before you know it the state is going to be running these businesses, backed with our money.

This country is built on people and companies standing on their own and succeeding or failing based on merit.
All this country promises is the opportunity to succeed, not the right.

If these old companies fail, they fail. There is no one to blame but themselves and their union labor force.

Hey, relax, someone will still build cars, and companies who now make tires and spark plugs for Fords can refit and make them for Nissans.

And if you want American-made products, Toyota builds cars in Kentucky and Honda builds cars in Ohio.

That's as "American made" as mini-vans built under U.S. names out of parts manufactured in Asia.

"We are the world. . . . ."