And now a word to GM...
In every field of human endeavor, he that is first must perpetually live in the white light of publicity.
Whether the leadership be vested in a man or in a manufactured product, emulation and envy are ever at work.
In art, in literature, in music, in industry, the reward and the punishment are always the same.
The reward is widespread recognition; the punishment, fierce denial and detraction.
When a man's work becomes a standard for the whole world, it also becomes a target for the shafts of the envious few.
If his work be mediocre, he will be left severely alone - if he achieves a masterpiece, it will set a million tongues a -wagging.
Jealousy does not protrude its forked tongue at the artist who produces a commonplace painting.
Whatsoever you write, or paint, or play, or sing, or build, no one will strive to surpass or to slander you unless your work be stamped with the seal of genius.
Long, long after a great work or a good work has been done, those who are disappointed or envious, continue to cry out that it cannot be done.
Spiteful little voices in the domain of art were raised against our own Whistler as a mount back, long after the big would had acclaimed him its greatest artistic genius.
Multitudes flocked to Bayreuth to worship at the musical shrine of Wagner, while the little group of those whom he had dethroned and displaced argued angrily that he was no musician at all.
The little world continued to protest that Fulton could never build a steamboat, while the big world flocked to the river banks to see his boat steam by.
The leader is assailed because he is a leader, and the effort to equal him is merely added proof of that leadership.
Failing to equal or to excel, the follower seeks to depreciate and to destroy - but only confirms once more the superiority of that which he strives to supplant.
There is nothing new in this. It is as old as the world and as old as human passions - envy, fear, greed, ambition, and the desire to surpass.
And it all avails nothing.
If the leader truly leads, he remains - the leader. Master-poet, master-painter, master-workman, each in his turn is assailed, and each holds his laurels through the ages.
That which is good or great makes itself known, no matter how loud the clamor of denial.
That which deserves to live--lives.
These are not my words. They're the words of Theodore MacManus written for Cadillac, now owned by GM, in an ad from 1915.
I wonder if the folks at GM have looked this over recently.
Perhaps if they had, they might not be in the predicament they're in now.
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You had me going for a while there. 'What's with Bman using the term endeavor? Man, this blog thing might be going to his head. Or maybe he has a boner for anachronistic language.'
Anyhoo, I don't know what to do with GM. I would suggest change of some sort. Plus stop fucking flying in private jets, it's very Marie Antionette at this point. No bitch, why dont you eat cake!
So that means they made good cars back then? interesting
E, as i understand it Marie Antoinette didn't actually say that, it was one of the ladies from her entourage.
Thanks E, that's exactly the reason I put the spoiler at the end.
I no right that good, not never.
mostly,
anyone wanna nutshell this gm predicament for me? im a bit underinformed...
NJD2, I'll take a swing at it, (holla yall if I fuck it up)...
GM has like 180 billion in debt. It doesn't have the revenue to meet that. It says it's going to run out of cash soon. They and Ford and Chrysler are asking the US government for some sort of financial assistance to avoid bankruptcy.
NJD2, I don't know that I have seen 'nutshell' used as a verb before. I'm putting it in my bag o tricks like Paris Hilton and a chihuahua.
Etantao, you're probably correct, but I am not going to let some bullshit like the facts hold me back. I got some crusading to do!
BTW, I have a 1994 Saturn SL2. It's good. Small, fuel efficient (~24 mpg on my regular stop and go commute), supposedly safe, looks fine, non-descript, doesn't fucking die on me in the blizzards, starts all the time, etc. Granted Saturn is kind of a seperate thing, but they were able to make a good car for me, at one point anyway. The thing was really affordable too, cost me 1800 from some chic on Craigslist. I met her at her Yoga studio to make the transaction, maybe the thing had good Karma.
"I met her at a Yoga studio"....sounds like an entry for Penthouse Forum E.
I think Saturn's have held up but they're on the chopping block and will probably be bought by a foreign company.
Since I put up this story Citigroup has announced it needs a bailout. Washington soudns like it will aid the banks again, but not the Detroit. Sounds fishy to me.
Maybe we need to examine how many congressmen have current or former ties to the banks versus the auto industry. Board membership, personal loans/accounts/mortgages, family members who work in the industry, lobbyists who are servicing them, etc. Plus if they're driving around in German autos why would they care about American ones?
Of course the banking industry is the backbone of our nation whereas the domestic auto industry has been surpassed by the Japanese and Germans.
Correct me if I pegged this completely wrong...
E, glad to see the Saturn is still working for you...just don't give Baier the rest of the details of our day ;-)
Didn't know Saturns were part of GM. They seem nice but sadly you can't get 'em here, you can only import them since GM doesnt carry the brand on the island.
As i read some days ago Obama does want to bail out the US car industry but for some reason the current administration doesn't want to do it. I don't get why not cause this is a huge industry that if it were to go under the efects would be masive in terms of money and unemployment.
Savings the banks and saving the auto industry are not comparable. Completely different causes for their problems; different results for their demise.
Neither industry is in good shape. Neither can be completely saved; or even patched up without major changes.
The problem with letting the banks drop dead is that everyone else will suffer along with them cause o' the lack of credit.
Fukin assholes.
The whole financial mess is a lot more complicated than blaming the banks. It took the banks, the investment brokers, the mortgage lenders, Alan Greenspan and, most of all, the ratings agencies to screw this thing all to hell. Everyone believed everyone else's numbers, the whole thing was leveraged beyond believe and when one thing started crashing (housing), the whole house of cards began to crumble. When that happened, there wasn't enough cash or credit anywhere to save anyone. So, here comes the government ...
The auto industry's current cash management problems are a result of the current financial crisis, but that's just a short term issue in a long term nightmare. The whole industry needs a complete overhaul. BIG changes are coming to the American auto manufacturers. Goodbye Chrysler ...
There are alot of assholes in all this, true dat. I wish there was a way to make people suffer the consequences of buying and selling bad mortgages (and rating them as good), without fucking over everyone else. I mean really, people were getting mortgages with no money down, and no proof on income or assests. What did they think was gonna happen?
Least my Saturn actually runs.
Fuckers.
Yep. I am going to be one pissed off dude if all the people taking out big equity loans to buy Escalades get off the hook without losing some of their ass. The only people I wanna help are those that actually can show they were lied to ... I don't like people getting scammed.
Me neither unless I'm doing the scammin'
I'm sorry but I have a different view of this. As I see it, sometime in the not-to-distant past (late 70s and Voodoo Economics 80s) it became acceptable for Americans to acquire more stuff than they could pay for. Thus, the credit monster as it is now was spawned. The monster grew in size aided both by Republican (no regulation is always better) and Democrat (I don't give a shit) administrations to where it is now, and your entire adult life and your ability to have almost anything more than a used Gamecube is severely limited by a cloudy number known as your Credit Score. It has become so pervasive that if you do purchase things with cash (as I do) and you actually need to utilize some kind of forward lending (such as when I tried to get a mortgage 8 years ago) you are deemed unreliable by the very agencies who have not had a chance to screw you over with high interest rates for decades.
I tried to take out a $15,000 mortgage on a home in 2000. I was told that not only was my credit rating insufficient (because I have bought everything with cash since 1992) but they never write mortgages for such a minuscule amount. I had the option to take out $50,000 on a $15,000 house, if I placed my parents impeccable credit on the deed as cosigners. (Long story short, I saved the money and bought a handyman special house with cash.)
If the "greatest generation" in our nation's history was the one tempered in the fires of the Great Depression, maybe we need this economic renaissance in order to forge the next greatest generation. We are all too lazy, too fat, and too dependent on other countries to produce crappy goods that we can "have" but not "buy" until later.
Screw it, make it the last 3 minutes of Fight Club and blow up all the credit companies and have everyone start over for all I care. I think we will emerge better for it en the end. It will be tough, but we can survive it.
Even the small part when we have to see a quarter second of some dude's junk. That will be a but awkward, but we will get through.