Free Republic

The CEO for Fiat Chrysler (remember how an Italian company helped save Detroit?) is begging Americans to kill more polar bears, pollute the air, and continue to melt the polar ice caps… Or something. There’s also an outside chance that he’s just being a responsible CEO by trying to keep his company out of bankruptcy. Whatever the reason, Sergio Marchionne is asking consumers to steer clear of the company’s all electric Fiat. Under the direction of Marchionne, Fiat Chrysler is apparently taking a new approach to keeping the company solvent: Sell cars that people actually want to buy. And he...

Fifty years of Democrats running the city of Detroit led to it filing for bankruptcy last week. Unsustainable demands from its 48 unions gradually drove out private industry, as government became the largest employer. Its shrinking tax base can no longer support the massive pension debt obligations and still provide a minimum level of city services. Nearly half of the city’s debt is to underfunded pension plans and retirees. Mitt Romney presciently warned in 2008 that if the government bailed out the automakers, it would ultimately destroy Detroit. “Without that bailout, Detroit will need to drastically restructure itself. With it,...

The good news for GM these days is that no one has been consumed in a fiery death due to engine compartment fires since the Chevy Volt was discovered to spontaneous combust after accidents shortly after production began. The bad news for the company is that while Chevy Volt sales in June set a record, prior to June their sales for 2013 sucked despite general auto sales setting post-crash records. “With signs that sales of its Chevrolet Volt battery car could be coming unplugged,” reported NBC News in June, “General Motors is offering potential buyers as much as $5,000 in...

You may recall that during the presidential election, the Treasury Department refused requests by General Motors to unload the government's stake in the giant automaker. Taxpayers had sunk $50 billion into a union bailout in 2009 and were now proud owners of 26.5 percent of the struggling company. Reportedly, GM had growing concerns that the stigma of "Government Motors" was hurting sales in the United States. At the time, any transaction would have come at a steep loss to taxpayers and undermined the president's questionable campaign assertions that the auto union rescue had been a huge success. Well, now...

On Wednesday night, left-leaning TV anchor Jim Lehrer of government-supported PBS will moderate the first 90-minute presidential debate in Denver. The forum will focus on domestic policy. Lehrer alone will determine the topics and questions for six 15-minute segments, and then he will control an "open discussion" for each segment. We know the liberal media bias drill: Make the Republican candidate look like a scary extremist on social issues and a greedy capitalist pig on economic issues. Avoid the Democratic incumbent's record of failure. Run out the clock. Thank you and good night. Here's my starter list of domestic policy...

Bailouts for everyone! That's the latest push coming from President Barack Obama's lips. During a campaign event in Colorado today, Obama touted his "successful" bailout of the auto industry.  President Obama, while villifying Mitt Romney for opposing the auto industry bailout, bragged about the success of his decision to provide government assistance and said he now wants to see every manufacturing industry come roaring back. “I said, I believe in American workers, I believe in this American industry, and now the American auto industry has come roaring back,” he said. “Now I want to do the same thing with manufacturing...

Mitt Romney's literature and signs have been at every Republican event for years. He had quite an organization in 2008 with signs that said, "Michigan for Mitt," with the cute reference of the appearance of the lower peninsula being a mitten, and Mitt's name, well, it's just precious. But here we are, 9 days from Michigan's Presidential Primary, which the GOP in Michigan moved up and lost half of it's delegates as a result, and now Mitt has to actually compete. Mitt lost Iowa, Missouri, Colorado, South Carolina, and Minnesota, and may lose Maine. He has so far won New...

President Obama spent last week talking about the success of the auto bailout, but his conclusions about its success may be a bit misleading, according to the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler. The title of the piece is: President Obama’s phony accounting on the auto industry bailout. Kessler spells out four examples of things President Obama has said since June 4 on the topic of the auto bailout that aren't completely correct. * Chrysler has repaid every dime to the government: The U.S. government only got 90% back of their combined loans to Chrysler, made during both the Bush and Obama...

WASHINGTON – The Treasury Department is acknowledging for the first time that it lost $61 billion on two key programs designed to stabilize the economy after the largest financial crisis in decades. The government is losing more than $30 billion on lifelines extended to insurance giant American International Group Inc., according to Treasury data released Wednesday in an audit by the Government Accountability Office. It also is losing more than $30 billion on rescues of struggling automakers Chrysler and General Motors.