Saturday, December 20, 2008

More on the GM Bailout Program - - INTERESTING!

I received most of this in an e-mail from my good friend, Doug Smith. My efforts to verify authenticity are detailed below.

Can we elect this guy president? He seems to have a clue. [Mr. Knox, that is -- the person who wrote the open letter reply, below.] He seems to have a clue. Truly the first sane voice I've heard in a very long time. Too bad logic like this is completely lost on liberal democrats (unfortunately their are a lot of POLITICIANS of all stripes in that group!!). I hear now that the
SIPC is expected to pay out up to $500K each to the morons that lost their money in the Madoff ponzi scheme. How come no one wants to bail me out??? [I added the links to Doug’s e-mail.]

Abridged letter from Troy Clarke, President of General Motors. Please - - read through it and then carefully consider the response from Gregory Knox.

Dear Employee, next week, Congress and the current Administration will determine whether to provide immediate support to the domestic auto industry to help it through one of the most difficult economic times in our nation's history. Your elected officials must hear from all of us now on why this support is critical to our continuing the progress we began prior to the global financial crisis. As an employee, you have a lot at stake and continue to be one of our most effective and passionate voices. I know GM can count on you to have your voice heard.

Thank you for your urgent action and ongoing support.

Troy Clarke
President
General Motors North America


This open letter of reply is from Gregory Knox, President of Knox Machinery, a manufacturer of precision machine tools which supplies the auto industry.

In response to your request to call legislators and ask for a bailout for
the United States automakers please consider the following and please also pass this onto Troy Clark, the president of General Motors North America for me.

You are both infected with the same entitlement mentality that has bred like cancerous germs in UAW halls for the last countless decades and whose plague is now sweeping the nation, awaiting our new "messiah" to wave his magical wand and make all our problems go away, while at the same time allowing our once great nation to keep "living the dream."

The dream is over!

The dream that we can ignore the consumer for years while management myopically focuses on its personal rewards packages at the same time that our factories have been filled with the worlds most overpaid, arrogant, ignorant and laziest entitlement minded "laborers" without paying the price for these atrocities, and that still the masses will line up to buy our products.

Don't tell me I'm wrong. Don't accuse me of not knowing of what I speak. I have called on Ford, GM , Chrysler, TRW, Delphi, Kelsey Hayes, American Axle and countless other automotive OEM's and Tier ones for 3 decades now throughout the Midwest and what I've seen over the years in these union shops can only be described as disgusting.

Mr. Clark, the president of General Motors, states:
"There is widespread sentiment in this country, our government and especially in the media that the current crisis is completely the result of bad management. It is not."

You're right - it's not JUST management. How about the electricians who walk around the plants like lords in feudal times, making people wait on them for countless hours while they drag Ass, so they can come in on the weekend and make double and triple time -- for a job they easily could have done within their normal 40 hour week.

How about the line workers who threaten newbies with all kinds of scare
tactics for putting out too many parts on a shift...and for being too productive (mustn't expose the lazy bums who have been getting overpaid for decades for their horrific underproduction, must we?!?) Do you really not know about this stuff?!?

How about this great sentiment abridged from Mr. Clarke's sad plea:
“ . . . over the last few years we have closed the quality and efficiency gaps with our competitors.”

What the hell has Detroit been doing for the last 40 years?!?

Did we really JUST wake up to the gaps in quality and efficiency between us and them?

The K car vs. the Accord?

The Pinto vs. the Civic?!?

Do I need to go on?

We are living through the inevitable outcome of the actions of the United States auto industry for decades.

Time to pay for your sins, Detroit.

I attended an economic summit last week where a brilliant economist, Alan Beaulieu, surprised the crowd when he said he would not have given the banks a penny of "bailout money." Yes, he said, this would cause short term problems, but despite what people like George Bush and Troy Clark would have us believe, the sun would in fact rise the next day and something else would happen. Where there had been greedy and sloppy banks new efficient ones would pop up. That is how a free market system works. It does work, if we would let it work.

But for some reason we are now deciding that the rest of the world is right and that capitalism doesn't work - that we need the government to step in and "save us." Save us, hell! We're nationalizing and unfortunately too many of this once fine nations citizens don't even have a clue that this is what's really happening ... but they sure can tell you the stats on their favorite sports teams. Yeah, THAT'S important!

Does it occur to ANYONE that the "competition" has been producing vehicles, EXTREMELY PROFITABLY, for decades now in this country?

How can that be???

Let's see. . .

Fuel efficient . . .

Listening to customers. . .

Investing in the proper tooling and automation for the long haul . . .

Not being too complacent or arrogant to listen to Dr. W. Edwards Deming, four decades ago . . .

Ever increased productivity through quality, lean and six sigma plans . . .

Treating vendors like strategic partners, rather than like "the enemy" . . .

Efficient front and back offices . . .

Non union environment!

Again, I could go on and on, but I really wouldn't be telling anyone anything they really don't already know in their hearts.

I have six children, so I am not unfamiliar with the concept of wanting someone to bail you out of a mess that you have gotten yourself into. My children do this on a weekly, if not daily basis, as I did at their age. I do for them what my parents did for me (one of their greatest gifts, by the way,) I
make them stand on their own two feet and accept the consequences of their actions and work them through.

Radical concept, huh?

Am I there for them in the wings? Of course - but only until such time as they need to be fully on their own as adults.

I don't want to oversimplify a complex situation, but there certainly are unmistakable parallels here between the proper role of parenting and government.

Detroit and the United States need to pay for their sins.

Bad news people - it's coming whether we like it or not.

The newly elected Messiah really doesn't have a magic wand big enough to "make it all go away" I laughed as I heard Obama "reeling it back in" almost immediately after the vote count was tallied. "We might not do it in a year or in four." Where was that kind of talk when he was RUNNING for the office?

Stop trying to put off the inevitable.

That house in Florida really isn't worth $750,000.

People who jump across a border really don't deserve free health care benefits.

That job driving that forklift for the big 3 really isn't worth $85,000 a year.

We really shouldn't allow Wal-Mart to stock their shelves with products acquired from a country that unfairly manipulates their currency and has the most atrocious human rights infractions on the face of the globe.

That couple whose combined income is less than $50,000 really shouldn't be living in that $485,000 home.

Let the market correct itself people - it will. Yes it will be painful, but it's gonna be painful either way, and the bright side of my proposal is that on the other side of it is a nation that appreciates what is has and doesn't live beyond its means. Gets back to basics, and redevelops the work ethic that made it the greatest nation in the history of the world and probably turns back to God.

Sorry - don't cut my head off, I'm just the messenger sharing with you the "bad news."

Gregory J Knox
President
Knox Machinery, Inc.
Franklin, Ohio 45005


Frankly, I’m usually a little leery of internet schtuph like this, with little or dubious attribution. A great majority of the writings that appear “too good to be true” are exactly that. In this case, however, when I ran a Google search on Gregory J. Knox, I found him: a real person, with a real company. Then I went to the Snopes.com Urban Legends page and found that the whole thing is properly attributed. There are even a couple of good quotes by Mr. Knox himself. Read it for yourownself. I know I enjoyed seeing it.

Hope everyone's enjoying the run up to the holidays.

JPG

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Greg's a great American. Greg seems to be saying we're teaching the youth of Ammerica thre things: 1) You don't have to accountable for your actions there is always someone there to bail you out. 2) Procrastination is OK. Put off your problems and someone else will pick up the tab down the road. 3) Every American is entitled to house, car and job. America is dying and morally bankrupt. Our nation allows people to kill unborn children. God Bless America? How can God snctify and approve of country that kills innocent lives and rewards greed and cruption by Wall Street, the government and special interest groups. This is Rome in 500 A.D.

SpeakerTweaker said...

It's nice to know that someone with some kind of pull is finally telling these folks how it really is. I saw alot of Congress' chastising the Big 3, and I was immediately embarrassed for my country, knowing that somewhere, other nations are watching this drivel and laughing their collectives arses off.

Course, I imagine that this letter will get the same amount of regard that perhaps you or I might get where one of us to write it to a Big 3 higher-up.

Or worse, they go for some sort of "if you aren't for us, you're against us" mentality. That'll go over like a lead balloon...



tweaker

KD5NRH said...

Can we at least get him into the Senate? I'd love to see the exchange between him and Teddy.

Borepatch said...

The reason so many people like the bailouts is understood by Qui Bono - who benefits.

It's the intellectual class, who are the regulators. More government involvement, more need for Blue Ribbon panels with Nobel economists. More government jobs for the output of the University system.

As someone who comes from an Intellectual background, I really think we'd be better off without most public education. It has gotten to the point that it's clearly damaging to the Republic.

Old NFO said...

Well said by Mr. Knox and the sad part is they will NOT change because the Dems cannot afford to alienate their base, so this will continue for at least the next four years.

Thanks for the post JPG

phlegmfatale said...

The whole bailout trend is troubling and boggling. tsk tsk


Hope you and Hols had a grand Christmas anyhoo, JPG. Thanks for the .38 cartridges-- you're a peach!

Anonymous said...

Spot on, Mr. Knox. I lived for 10 years in Detroit, and feared saying what you say here. I lived with a man who would go work 12 - 16 hours of overtime every weekend in a glass supply factory. He spent the time reading in the break room, but the union rules said he could do it. I watched as they replaced a glass machine with the worst possible choice... constant breakdowns and waste of material. Who cares? They were all making 6 figures, right on down the line. It's appalling. I agree that there should be no bailout. But what do I know?

Unknown said...

I would like to know where these peoples complaints were when Lockheed many years ago got a bail out. I like to know where these people were when GM helped ruin the Red Car in LA. This kind of news is not news. The SEC has not watched our backs for years, the senate, house and president has not watched our backs for years. The FED has not watched our backs for years. The first Bush's advisors did not watch our backs either there only concern was that they lost their job when Clinton was elected. That is a quote from one of them at Sue Salley Hales Polo Field in Moorpart when Clinton was elected. They watch their pocketbook, not our backs.

Anonymous said...

While bailouts are indeed hard to swallow, because we has the working middle aren't afforded the same luxury many times, they are part of the necessary evil that has come from no regulation. Mr Knox erroneously points out a couple of things....
The failed banks would have died off and others would have taken there places...sure...eventually, but in the mean time, with no regulation, the banks would have continued to do what they did until the last dollar was wrung out of the American wallet.
There is so much rhetoric in his letter that it is easy to forget something...This bailout was proposed not by President Obama, but by President Bush. And with the mockery of "Nobel Economists" that we see in this thread, it is hard to fathom how any one of us, understand economy better than they do.