General Motors to Remain Government Motors?

National Legal & Policy Center ^ | August 10, 2011 | Mark Modica

[jazusamo]

According to a WSJ report, "people familiar with the situation" said on Tuesday that the Obama Administration has put on hold its decision to sell the taxpayers' stake in General Motors. The article also states that "Treasury officials had anticipated GM's share price would increase following its public stock offering last November at $33 a share." It would seem that Treasury anticipated wrong.

Once again, the Obama Administration is arrogantly assuming that GM share price will recover to above $33 a share in the near future. Or perhaps the administration is not as averse to continuing its intrusion in private industry as it would have us believe. Considering that President Obama is staking a great deal on the recovery of GM regarding his reelection chances, the decision to continue a market timing gamble on the company carries significant risk that the government will try and help GM recover at an ongoing cost to taxpayers.

The Obama Administration has been very generous with tax credits granted to GM. In addition to the approximate $45 billion tax loss carry over credit gifted to GM when it came out of bankruptcy, the Chevy Volt has been funded on the backs of taxpayers. The Volt receives a $7,500 subsidy on every vehicle sold. I'm sure our government has also siphoned taxpayer funds in the form of green initiative grants or loans to GM as well. All for a vehicle that has no mass appeal. Add the expense of government fleet purchases of GM vehicles to the pile of taxpayer cash thrown away on the continuing GM folly.

Also consider the fact that just a few years ago a debate played out on the suggestion that social security assets be invested in equity markets. President Obama was in the camp of those that thought taxpayer assets should not be gambled in the stock market. Why is the president now willing to gamble on the GM taxpayer stake? Will attempts be made to manipulate the stock higher? Why is Treasury so certain GM shares will increase when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has been so wrong to this point?

Geithner made statements on a Fox Business News interview in April that guaranteed there was no risk of a credit downgrade of US debt. Prior to that, Geithner and cohort Steve Rattner, former Auto Task Force head, boasted that taxpayers should see all of their "investment" in GM returned. After being so wrong on both counts, it is time for Treasury to drop the arrogance that it has displayed from the beginning of its auto industry intrusion. Face it guys, you are not quite as smart as you perceive yourselves to be. It is time to realize that stock markets can go down as well as up and the same holds true for GM share price. A recovery is not a certainty and Treasury should end what has been an ugly chapter in American history. The US taxpayer has no reason to be invested in GM stock. Geithner should accept the fact that he was wrong on the GM gambit and sell now.

Mark Modica is an NLPC Associate Fellow

[jazusamo]

GM stock at present -- 24.06 -1.48‎ (-5.79%‎) Aug 10 11:50am ET

[ken21]

we don’t buy union made cars.

[dila813]

Watch, they could sell now and accept the loss or they wait and it may be worth nothing.

Stocks are priced based on their expected future...based on that, they might as well sell.

In the very least, they should be selling some portion of it each week.

I wouldn’t want to be the one standing when the music stops.

[jazusamo]

Yep, these turkeys are playing the market with taxpayer dollars and shouldn’t be, especially now.

[jazusamo]

Please bump the Freepathon or click above and donate or become a monthly donor!

[blueunicorn6]

Gimmegimmegimmegimmegimmesoalwayslookfortheunionlabelitsayswe’reabletogivemoneytotheDemocratsgimmegimmegimmegimmegimme.

[Nachum]

The list, ping

Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list

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[Fantasywriter]

But no way Obama is a marxist, right?

[razorback-bert]

I saw my first Dolt the other day, it was black with big silver lettering on the side, saying volt. It was one ugly little car.

[MestaMachine]

This administration has not done one single thing that has been right for the country. Not one. But I wonder how much some *officials* are getting away clean with.

[muawiyah]

Even Karl Marx knew the difference between a junk yard and a "means of production". He'd not acquired GM for the state.

Here's the fundamental problem with that company ~ it was LOOTED over a period of 20 years and in the end could only produce SUVs ~ effectively light trucks ~ simple designs, easy to weld, easier to assemble than smaller compact cars with tight clearances.

Somebody seems to have forgotten to tell the UAW that GM was being turned into parts that would be sold at a final auction called BANKRUPTCY.

The next President will dump GM like the piece of junk it had become. And it hasn't changed under union and fascist ownership.

[jazusamo]

That’s correct. Obama is not interested in what’s right for the country and he’s surrounded himself with toadies.

[Fantasywriter]

I couldn’t agree more with every point you made. Obama is a human disaster bomb, exploding every time he makes a decision. His financial decisions have been exceptionally ignorant and catastrophic. However, the evidence does point to his being a marxist, which was my original point. He made be a fumbling, bumbling, ineffectual marxist, but that is his underlying economic philosophy.

[muawiyah]

Obama is one of the more stupid Marxists ~ the real deal would have sent him to the mines in the Donbas long ago.

[Fantasywriter]

Obama is just not that bright period. Finally more and more people are catching onto this fact. There was a time not long ago when even a fair number of FReepers thought Barry was some kind of malignant super-genius. Their numbers dwindle by the day. Eventually we may get a look at Barry’s college transcripts. The last of the ‘Obama is just so cunningly brilliant’ crowd will fall silent on that day.

[muawiyah]

Hey, I never thought he was brilliant, nor even smart. You can get through Harvard in a science curriculum with a 106 IQ. Legacies can do it with a 96 IQ ~ but in something soft like LAW.

Harvard is not difficult to graduate from ~ it is difficult to get INTO!

Big difference there.

Most state universities in the Midwest have curricula that are much more rigorous, and probably taught by folks just as smart ~ if not smarter. They are certainly more relaxed.

Obama has handlers. Axelrod, whose baby momma was a commie, is one of them. There are others as well known.

He responds well to handling ~

[Fantasywriter]

I certainly agree with your various points. I would make one slight modification. A Malignant Narcissist responds well to handling if (1) he’s being praised to high heaven, and (2) he and the handlers have identical goals.

In Obama’s case, as his numbers drop, he will be getting less praise and more ‘suggestions’ - which he will not like At All. Also, between now and ‘12, if he has sane advisers they will want him to deviate from his hard leftist agenda long enough to attract/dupe a few of the moderates that put him in office originally. Obama will NOT take well to that idea. Just about the only groups still praising him are pockets of moonbats whose hopes haven’t yet been crushed. Obama isn’t going to want to turn even them against him.

Which is to say, he’s responded well to handling so far but it’s likely to get progressively harder from here on out. We shall see.

[muawiyah]

He’s not a narcissist ~ just an ordinary guy in way over his head with people who are using him.

[muawiyah]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y06NSBBRtY Ike Eisenhower gives a speech. Note the cadence and vocal qualities. They were both very attractive to the American people in two landslide elections. Obama has the SAME cadence and the SAME vocal qualities. (They are also more closely related than Tricia Nixon Cox wants to admit but that’s for another day).

[ZX12R]

we don’t buy union made cars.

Me either, not GM anyway. Someone could shove GM up Barney Frank's rear to make him happy, and let Chris Matthews watch so he could get a tingle up his leg. I don't care. I'm still very angry about the bailout. I'll never buy one, new or used. I wouldn't even accept a free one.