I'm right in thinking that the US Government still owns 61% of General Motors, right?
A lot of us, including me, were something just short of incensed that President Obama chose to champion oil drilling off our Eastern Seaboard. We were only "saved" from this by a catastrophe so huge that it beggars the imagination.
And we all know what the oil spill in the Gulf represents (except for what we don't know, about the harmful environmental impact, for example, since what we don't yet know could fill a library).
Can we now overhaul our entire conception of oil use? Can we push for electric cars in all our cities yet? Can we use our stewardship of GM to push them to bring back the electric car they killed? Or to make more hybrids, such as those that Toyota has eaten some niche lunch with?
Gee... we need to use less oil... we run a big country... and now the country we run has taken ownership of 61% of what was the biggest auto manufacturer in the world. Shall we not connect the dots?
Here's a view of the oil spill in the Gulf.
A monstrosity, an environmental disaster that we'll remember decades from now as a monumental event.
BIG hat-tip to Wade Norris for circulating this petition, to urge an Electric Car Credit initiative. That's a great idea.
Our President wants to make BIG changes. He has stated that he'd be happy to be a one-term president, if need be, to make those changes. He's made some changes already with which a lot of people are very unhappy; like most great Presidents, the best we can hope for is that he'll make some big, catastrophic miscalculations, and have some other, ringing successes, the repercussions of which will reverberate throughout American life, and inspire admiration and imitation, for decades, if not centuries, to come. This first year and a half of Obama's administration has been difficult for many of us. I still hope for some such big, positive changes.
Surely here is one Big Change, then, that deserves to top the list; besides, President Obama's speeches in the past, and money he's allocated, have demonstrated that he recognizes the need to reshape our transit system entirely. I was HUGELY disappointed that he made overtures to allowing oil drilling off the Atlantic coast; but greatly heartened that he spoke of allocating funds for high-speed trains, and other mass transit systems. European-style transit systems don't always translate perfectly to America, and our different topography alone can render things like Europe's wonderful subway systems impractical for SOME of our cities (though ALL of our cities for which they're appropriate should have these). But making an electric car and hybrid industry here in America, and changing our cities so that they support them, is NOT impossible. Our Congress is constantly mired. That doesn't mean our President must be as well, in all things.
President Obama has recently made statements indicating his commitment to pushing us away from oil. However, his Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, has stated alarmingly that "offshore development is a necessary part" of future energy plans. Thanks for making it plain that nothing is going to change, Mr. Salazar. Says the New York Times article on the subject:
There are limits to what the president can do unilaterally, and, as the president himself has acknowledged, getting 60 votes to pass a sweeping energy bill through the Senate will require significant concessions on nuclear power, coal and, yes, offshore drilling.
"This is a small but commendable step," said Michael Levi, an energy and climate change expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. "The president should indeed be using the moment to focus people on the need to reduce U.S. dependence on oil, foreign and domestic," he wrote in an e-mail message.
"Big political moves, though, will require more," Mr. Levi continued. "They will require sustained and focused advocacy from the president. People will not make any intuitive link between the tragedy in the gulf and legislation that raises electricity prices. For most Americans, the oil spill is tragic, but jobs and the economy are still the clear number one. The oil spill can help focus people’s attention, but it will take something else to close the deal."
Close the Deal, Mr. President--and the Drilling Program
Are there limits to what the president can do unilaterally? Yes. The sweeping energy bill requires compromise with the compromised people who call themselves our "representatives." Many are uncompromised by these industries and their contributions, but too many are. We know that these industries have the power to block bills.
But the GM stake is owned and managed by the Treasury, not by Congress. What, if I may ask, is to stop the President from taking the admittedly radical action of directing the Treasury to appoint a czar to oversee GM's management, with a focus on revamping our nation's city fleets to include hybrids and electrics? What is to stop him taking a hands-on approach? Radical? Yes. Impossible? Who says?
Let's urge President Obama and our Congress and Senate to make sure that one of his Big Changes is a redesign--a sensible, well thought-out one, for a change--of our transit systems.
Our government controls 61% of General Motors, still, correct? GM once created an electric car, and then killed it, correct? Toyota is having a resounding success with a hybrid, correct? Then let's urge the President to direct GM to make both. Not a huge number of models, just a few, and with quality control an essential focus.
Then, let the President and the legislature offer preferential terms for all cities and state governments, so that each city above a given size (say, 100,000, but YMMV--so neat to be able to use YMMV literally!) shall have an electric and/or hybrid car fleet, and that state governments shall use them as well.
"My God! It'll be a Socialist Government Takeover of a Private Corporation/Industry!"
"My God! It'll give Preferential Treatment to a Single Private Corporation, Above Others!"
Yes, what I'm saying is a market distortion. I am speaking this heresy in public. You know why?
Because, in the first place, there IS no "free market" (that is, free from political distortion to favor an elite). You know why? Because the minute any group of people prospers from a market, they immediately put some of that wealth to work influencing politicians, so as to distort the markets politically. And politicians do it for them. I don't want to get off-topic, but look at legislation concluded in recent months, and if you find no evidence that a particular sector or elite group benefited, in a market-distorting way, from such legislation, then consider me rebutted.
In the second place, as to government control of industries, capitalist countries have ALWAYS taken over industries during wartime. During World War II, British businessmen complained, even taking out a full-page ad in The Economist, about government allocation of raw materials and finished goods, as a distortion of the free market; but such government allocation had to be done. Hitler authorized Goering to allocate raw materials; Goering complained of a "hamster-psychose" among industrialists, a "hamster psychosis," whereby the industrialists would "stuff their cheeks," taking more of a certain material than they needed, because they were concerned lest they couldn't get more later, or that they'd need to barter it for scarcer materials, due to the government's consumption of raw materials for the preparations for war. This was distortion, but for them, it was necessary (if one planned war, that is, leaving out the fact that I do, of course, blame Germany for making aggressive war).
In wartime, it's a dam bursting. Your sandbag shop's business model gets put to the side; we need those sandbags.
But this isn't war, true. However, the environmental catastrophe in the Gulf, and potential catastrophes constantly looming due to our dependence upon oil, illustrate that the need is urgent. We need to redesign our entire transit model, nationwide, and in a comprehensive way. We Americans are better known for our innovation than for our efficiency, but we can do this efficiently.
Mr. President, take over GM, and I mean TRULY take it over. Co-ordinate with the cities to provide electric car facilities and charging centers, allocating funds from the billions that you'd said last year would be available for mass transit. Use your ownership of GM to push through just a few new car models, a hybrid or two and an electric or three, and make sure every city above 80,000 or 100,000 in population has a fleet of them. Offer terms to state governments as well. Appoint a czar--freak out thought the teabaggers will at the term--to ensure that this is coordinated properly with the cities, and that the terms GM offers for these governments to buy the cars are attractive enough to push the sale through, without breaking badly-stretched budgets. Call in the car rental agencies as well, and meet with them to find out what they need. Address the issues of creating a government monopoly, where possible, by engaging other alternative-fuel manufacturers, like Tesla, to make it as fair as possible. But make this change in our driving patterns happen.
I understand that staffing such a venture comes with a price. Appointing a czar, and making sure his or her office is staffed with maths whizzes to analyze the market dynamics and crunch the numbers, and coordinators to call meetings with city and state governments, rental car agencies, other auto manufacturers, and power company executives, will take money. Spend that money. I need a job; I'LL do that work for you. Put a czar over me, and I'll get on that phone and coordinate this thing myself, if no-one more competent than I is available (though I'm sure many would be clamouring to help, and probably some people in this country would even do it for free).
I'm getting a little tired of saying "if the political will isn't here now, then when will it be?" But this isn't a matter of getting into a headache with a Congress of Nyet staffed with well-paid industry shills. This time, let's get something done. Mr. President, you've seen the headache that results when you trust this Congress to make a massive change. But you can do a lot on your own. If the political capital isn't there, when the whole Gulf's shrimp and fish industries might just have been ruined for your political lifetime, then I don't know when it will be.
Let's do it. President Obama? Are you listening?