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The report by the NY Times that it would take up to 27 years for Chevy Volt buyers to save enough money in gas costs to make up for the high price of the car must be very confusing for apologists of the vehicle. The normal defense for any criticism is to accuse sources of having a right wing hate of the car. But the NY Times? The very vocal Volt defenders, who are quick to attack anyone who doesn't agree that the car is a technological marvel worthy of billions of dollars of taxpayer largess, will have to...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Charles Gasparino with a piece in the New York Post today. "Back when he agreed to advise the Obama [regime] on economics, General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt told friends that he thought it would be good for GE and good for the country. A life-long Republican, Immelt said he believed he could at the very least moderate the president's distinctly anti-business instincts. That was three years ago; these days Immelt is telling friends something quite different. Sure, GE has managed to feast on federal subsidies, particularly the 'green-energy' giveaways that are Obamanomics' hallmark." Yeah, there's no question...

General Electric has brushed aside the doubts leading Republican presidential contenders have raised about climate science. The US industrial and financial conglomerate said it had long seen climate change as a valid concern after an internal evaluation of the scientific case in 2005. (Snip) Observers have attributed the party’s shift since the last election to a range of factors, including the rise of the anti-regulatory Tea Party and fears about unemployment. Others suggest the change is due to fossil fuel interests using so-called super PACs – the new generation of political action committees empowered by a 2010 Supreme Court ruling...

When GE announced at the end of February that it would be bailing out General Motor’s green car strategy by ordering 12,000 electric-gasoline powered Chevy Volts for their fleet, it was more than just Government Electric doing a solid for Government Motors doing a solid for the Government Owners in the Obama administration. Rather it was an admission of failure by the monetization arm of the Green Conspiracy to control market behavior. While GM bet that Volt would be “a magnet around everything we are trying to do to showcase our brand,” so far it’s been a millstone for the...

Last week, Greencarreports.com reported that crony corporation, General Electric, will be purchasing only Chevy Volts for employee use. The move will help General Motors proclaim that the Volt is a success (and help ensure that GE sells more charging stations) as thousands of orders for the vehicle hit the books, conveniently timed to coincide with the run up to the 2012 presidential election. The Volt has not caught on with the majority of consumers as the benefits of traveling 20 to 45 miles on an electric charge before getting about 30 miles per gallon on premium fuel do not...

Sixteen months ago, General Electric announced it would place the "largest order in history" for electric cars , to be used by its employees who are issued company cars. Now, those cars are starting to arrive and be placed with employees. And where changes are made, personnel policies are sure to follow. A person inside GE recently forwarded a memo to us that covers some of the nuts and bolts of using the 2012 Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car. It's from the fleet operations manager for GE Healthcare. Among the interesting points: "All sedans ordered in 2012 will be...

The United Auto Workers plans to take part in more non-violent protests in its fight against what it calls right-wing policies that have hurt the middle class. UAW president Bob King told a crowd of more than 500 at the 75th anniversary of union's first contract with General Motors that more direct action like such as the Flint sit-down strike of 1937 is needed today. “They’re trying to shred the social contract,” King said at the event held in Flint. “We don’t spend too much. This is still a rich country The problem is we’ve lost our moral compass,” said...

After November’s elections, Senator John McCain, former Congressman Dick Armey and others called for a return to the principles and policies of Ronald Reagan. At the time these policies were first advanced, many observers believed they constituted a revolution. But how did Reagan himself come to these views and where did he learn to translate them from one man’s vision into governmental policies and acts? In my book, The Education of Ronald Reagan: The General Electric Years and the Untold Story of his Conversion to Conservatism, I trace Reagan’s evolution from liberal to conservative, from actor to politician. The changes...

By Kirk Myers, Seminole County Environmental News Examiner This article, the second in a series, focuses on the misleading performance claims surrounding the “more energy efficient” compact fluorescent light (CFL) bulbs now replacing traditional incandescent bulbs. These potentially harmful mercury-filled lamps (see my previous column describing the dangers) are being forced on consumers by the U.S. congress with support from the Green Lobby and light-bulb manufacturers like GE, Sylvania and Phillips. These and other manufacturers stand to make huge profits selling the more expensive CFLs (more on that issue in my next column). There is a growing body of evidence...

Crony Capitalism: As the president embraces Occupy Wall Street, his favorite corporation paid no taxes in 2010 on $14 billion in profits, much of it overseas. Meanwhile, 20,000 jobs for the 99% go unfilled. At a recent town hall meeting, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., chairman of the House Budget Committee, reminded constituents of a story that broke earlier in the year — that General Electric paid no taxes on profit of $14 billion, $9 billion of which was earned overseas. Ryan related how he had asked a GE tax officer the length of GE's tax filing. The tax guy said...

Noting that we’re celebrating the Reagan centennial, he praised President Reagan for being both “tough-minded and hopeful,” and also “willing to work with his detractors.” That approach, said Immelt, should also be a model of leadership in the 21st century, which “is about building bigger and diverse teams; teams that accomplish tough missions with a culture of respect.”

General Electric Co., where Ronald Reagan honed his communication skills as a company spokesman, is struggling to fend off attacks from conservatives over its relationship with the Obama administration and ventures in China, raising concerns inside GE that the controversy could damage its brand. Former Republican Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin last month slammed GE for being "the poster child of corporate welfare and crony capitalism." Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich used GE as an applause line during the Republican debate sponsored by the tea party in September. And Fox News television personality Bill O'Reilly has derided the conglomerate and Chief Executive...

The White House's invited guests who will hear President Obama speak to Congress tonight about creating jobs for the common man include a CEO under fire for moving jobs to China and a mayor who recently built a six-foot wall around his mansion. Jeffrey Immelt, chairman of GE and head of the president's jobs council, tops the list of invited guests who will listen to Mr. Obama's speech from the first lady's box in the House chamber. Mr. Immelt has been criticized for GE's plan to move the headquarters of its x-ray business to Beijing; Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, Ohio...

Kucinich to Immelt: ResignBy Dan Freed 08/26/11 - 01:22 PM EDT NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- General Electric chief Jeffrey Immelt should resign from his position as head of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness because many of his company's goals conflict with the council's goal of boosting U.S. employment and economic output, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) argued Wednesday in a little-noticed press release. "If he does not resign, the White House should remove him," Kucinich said in the statement. Kucinich's statements came in response to a story in the Washington Post describing General Electric's transfer of sophisticated aviation technologies...

Scientists have long sought easier ways to make the costly material known as enriched uranium — the fuel of nuclear reactors and bombs, now produced only in giant industrial plants. One idea, a half-century old, has been to do it with nothing more substantial than lasers and their rays of concentrated light. This futuristic approach has always proved too expensive and difficult for anything but laboratory experimentation. Until now. In a little-known effort, General Electric has successfully tested laser enrichment for two years and is seeking federal permission to build a $1 billion plant that would make reactor fuel by...

General Electric announced this week it will relocate its X-ray business to Beijing in order to capitalize on the burgeoning Chinese health care market.Bravo for them. Kudos. I’m sure it’s a smart business move for the company – just like not paying taxes in the U.S., rent seeking for “Green” subsidies and mandates, and reducing American jobs are also bottom-line wise. But let’s please stop listening to GE CEO Jeffery Immelt (if he ever was really taken seriously), who is the head of President Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, whenever he tries to lecture other American corporations on...

General Electric Co.’s health care unit, the world’s biggest maker of medical imaging machines, is moving the headquarters of its 115-year-old X-ray business to Beijing. Tweet 14 people Tweeted this.ShareThis .“A handful’’ of top managers will move to the Chinese capital and there won’t be any job cuts, said Anne LeGrand, general manager of X-ray for GE Healthcare. The headquarters will move from Wisconsin amid a broader plan to invest about $2 billion across China, including opening six “customer innovation’’ and development centers. The division should have “double-digit’’ growth rates as the country converts from film and analog to digital...

The parent company of Fox News — News Corp. — paid the U.S. government $4.8 billion in taxes over the last four tax years (2007-2010). GE, which owned most of MSNBC until late last year, paid zero taxes in 2010.In fact, GE received a $3.2 billion welfare check from Uncle Sam.From Pulitzer Prize winner David Cay Johnston: (Reuters) — Readers, I apologize. The premise of my debut column for Reuters, on News Corp’s taxes, was wrong, 100 percent dead wrong.Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp did not get a $4.8 billion tax refund for the past four years, as I reported. Instead,...

The House on Friday morning moved to block federal light bulb efficiency standards without even a roll call vote. An amendment from Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) defunding the Energy Department's standards for traditional incandescent light bulbs to be 30 percent more energy efficient starting next year was approved rather anticlimactically by voice vote. The success of the amendment appeared inevitable in the House, where the fate of the incandescent light bulb became a symbol in the fight against federal regulations. Democrats and the White House have opposed the move to block the standards, which were included in a 2007 energy...

Will Lockheed's Rival Crash and Burn? By Rich Smith Investors know the saying: "Bulls make money, bears make money, but pigs get slaughtered." If you stumble onto a "good thing," don't get greedy -- take a fair profit. France's Dassault would be wise to heed that lesson. Yesterday, DefenseNews.com reported that Dassault has run into trouble in negotiations to sell the United Arab Emirates a fleet of Rafale fighter jets. The UAE wanted to purchase several dozen of the jets to replace its 63 French Mirage fighters. But a deal that was supposed to cost somewhere between $2.5 billion and...

Late last year, Republican Congressman Fred Upton, who co-sponsored the infamous ban on the current generation of inexpensive incandescent light bulbs included in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, was desperate to secure conservative support for his bid to become Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the same committee in which he had introduced the despised ban three years earlier. He therefore promised that one of his first acts would be to advance legislation that would repeal the very light bulb ban he had once championed. Upton’s ploy succeeded, and in January of this year, Speaker of the...

WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama will nominate businessman John Bryson to lead the Commerce Department, a White House official said Tuesday. Bryson's appointment brings another private sector player into an administration that has been making a concerted effort to improve its relationship with the business community.

New evidence of CFLs causing fires -- even exploding -- as well as new environmental concerns have come to light since my article The CFL Fraud published.  Here are some of the additional fires:  "I had one of these CFL's in my garage socket, and it blew a component (not the glass corkscrew) and caught fire.  Fortunately, I was standing four feet away at the time.  I turned off the power and smothered the bulb with a towel." LINK "I heard a sizzling sound like bacon, looked in the direction of the sound and watch the CFL burst into flame...

General Electric Co. reported a 77% increase in first-quarter earnings, lifted by marked improvement at its GE Capital financing arm and gains at most of its industrial units. The company also boosted its quarterly dividend by a penny to 15 cents. The move marks GE's third dividend increase in the past year, although the payout remains well short of GE's 31-cent dividend before the financial crisis and economic downturn. Many companies have been boosting dividends, looking to give cash back to shareholders as the need to hoard it wanes amid an improved economy.

President Barack Obama has been unabashed in his close association with General Electric CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt, including naming him to head the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. Obama has continued to shower such honors and attention on Immelt despite the fact that GE has avoided paying ANY taxes. Indeed, GE has demanded a tax benefit of $3.2 billion. Now, GE has posted a 77% increase in profits while paying less taxes than any of its factory workers. Investors are doing well even if the taxpayers are getting killed. The company increased its quarterly dividend for the third time...

General Electric paid no American taxes in 2010, the New York Times reports: The company reported worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, and said $5.1 billion of the total came from its operations in the United States. Its American tax bill? None. In fact, G.E. claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion. That may be hard to fathom for the millions of American business owners and households now preparing their own returns, but low taxes are nothing new for G.E. The company has been cutting the percentage of its American profits paid to the Internal Revenue Service for years, resulting in...

In America today, the biggest recipients of handouts are not poor people. They're corporations. General Electric CEO Jeffrey R. Immelt is super-close to President Obama. The president named Immelt chairman of his Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. Before that, Immelt was on Obama's Economic Recovery Advisory Board. He's a regular companion when Obama travels abroad to hawk American exports. (Why does business need government to do that?) "Jeff Immelt is perhaps the CEO who is most cozy with President Obama," says journalist Tim Carney. "General Electric is structuring their business around where government is going ... high-speed rail, solar, wind....

Thanks to a nuclear-industry practice known as channeling law, General Electric (GE: 19.59, 0.00, 0.00%) doesn’t appear to be on the hook for liabilities related to the nuclear crisis at Japanese reactors designed 40 years ago by the blue-chip conglomerate. Since the magnitude 9.0 earthquake that has paralyzed Japan, GE’s stock has slumped as much as 7.4%, in part due to worries about its legal exposure to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility, which is said to be teetering near a nuclear catastrophe. However, analysts believe GE has little to worry about from a legal perspective and its bottom line may...

The warnings were stark and issued repeatedly as far back as 1972: If the cooling systems ever failed at a “Mark 1” nuclear reactor, the primary containment vessel surrounding the reactor would probably burst as the fuel rods inside overheated. Dangerous radiation would spew into the environment.

Some 40% of the roughly 700 waivers issued on Obamacare have gone to the Democrats’ liberal allies in the labor unions who, ironically enough, campaigned long and hard to get Obamacare passed. But now we learn that waivers from Obamacare isn’t where the cronyism is going to end. Guess who just got a big, fat waiver from new EPA rules? Why, none other Obama’s good friend General Electric whose CEO Jeff Immelt is one of Obama’s economic advisers. I wonder how long it will take someone to challenge this selective enforcement of the law in court. After all, it surely...

President Obama is continuing his outreach to American business, though the principal business he wants to reach out to is General Electric. Mr. Obama seems to have decided that what's good for GE is good for America, or at least for himself. It has been a banner year in government largesse for America's fourth-largest corporation. This month, the Federal Communications Commission approved the 51 percent/49 percent NBC Universal joint venture between Comcast and GE. Last week, GE announced a White House-backed plan for another joint venture with a Chinese avionics company. Mr. Obama capped the good news by naming GE...

Technology Transfer: During the visit of China's president, and as China's new stealth fighter takes to the sky, America's top jet engine manufacturer agrees to provide Beijing with state-of-the-art aircraft technology. The aircraft industry remains one of America's strongest manufacturing sectors, providing needed jobs and industrial sales. Already buffeted by the heavily subsidized European Airbus, it may also face stiffer competition one day from a Chinese behemoth buying what American technology it cannot steal. General Electric plans this week to sign a joint-venture agreement under which it will share its most sophisticated airplane electronics, including technology from Boeing's 787 Dreamliner,...

Last Night On "TingleBall", Chris Matthews continued his rants on Sarah Palin as if she was the primary culprit behind the Saturday Shootings. He put together a compilation Sarah Palin video with bits of her "Reloading Related Remarks",and in the video,there is a carefully edited bit of Palin shooting the caribou/reindeer.The shooting of the deer was the focus.Chrissy Tingles Matthews actually thinks that the average American will believe that Sarah Palin shooting the deer is the Primary Reason A Lunatic Went On A Shooting Spree In Tuscon! Could a cable news anchor BE ANY MORE IGNORANT? !!

The General Electric-Rolls Royce F136 alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter program looked increasingly vulnerable Dec. 15 when efforts to prolong the controversial program appeared to be losing steam in Congress. In separate but related actions Dec. 14-15, defense lawmakers and their aides said they have worked out a quick compromise to help pass defense authorization legislation for Fiscal 2011, not including an earmark for the engine, while a Senate Democratic appropriations proposal that included F136 language ran into growing conservative opposition. The authorization measure – stripped down after a provision to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy stopped...

General Electric and Rolls-Royce have been granted a two-week breathing space by the F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) to continue tests of the endangered F136 Joint Strike Fighter alternate engine. GE-Rolls says the JPO “has enabled us to find a way to stretch the funding” for continued testing of the F136 until Dec. 17, the date earlier indicated as a possible extension by the development team. The change was made possible, the JPO says, by the program execution to date. “The JPO has modified the contract accordingly, and there is no indication that a stop-work order will be issued,” GE-Rolls...

BRISTOL — America’s most popular radio talk show host, Rush Limbaugh, blasted Bristol the other day for supposedly making off with some of the $3.3 trillion in loans given to businesses by the Federal Reserve during the recession. While the charge is false – even absurd given the city’s paltry place in the financial arena – Limbaugh didn’t stop there. He described Bristol to his millions of listeners as nothing more than ESPN. “That’s all that’s there: ESPN and a couple of cheap hotels,” Limbaugh said on his nationally syndicated show Thursday. That was more than enough to stir Bristol’s...

An important skirmish in the battle over military spending is taking place in this industrial suburb of Cincinnati. At stake is a program to develop an alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter, a stealthy, supersonic jet supposed to be the backbone of the U.S. fighter fleet for the next three decades. For the past four years, Congress has funded the development of the second engine against the wishes of the Pentagon, which maintains that only a Pratt & Whitney engine should be funded. View Full Image Reuters Congress could decide within days whether to fund a second engine for...

The failure of the F136 engine in late September resulted from a “seal clearance” in the fan that was set too tight, causing friction. “The issue with engine 008 was unique to that engine,” GE spokesman Rick Kennedy said in an email. “No modification [will be] required to other engines.” Engines 05 and 07 continue to run well in tests. The program could ill afford any bad news at this time. The Air Force Chief of Staff, Gen Norton Schwartz, appeared to open the door to a compromise with GE and Rolls Royce over the F136 when he said they...

An announced engine selection for Israel's first batch of F-35 Joint Strike Fighters has sparked a new dispute between both rival manufacturers. Pratt & Whitney says the company has received a verbal commitment by Israel to buy the F135 engine to power the first batch of 20 F-35s ordered under a $2.75 billion agreement signed last week. The General Electric/Rolls-Royce team developing the F136 alternate engine claims the selection process remains ongoing. "We fully anticipate we will have an opportunity to compete with the F136" in Israel, GE says. The controversy leaves in doubt the first potential engine selection by...

The Obama administration gave corporate giant General Electric—the parent company of NBC--$24.9 million in grants from the $787-billion economic “stimulus” law President Barack Obama signed in February 2009, according to records posted by the administration at Recovery.gov. Despite getting $24.9 million from U.S. taxpayers, GE decreased its U.S.-based employees by 18,000 in 2009, according to the company’s 2009 annual report. According to Standard & Poor's, GE took in $156 billion in revenue in 2009. GE was the primary recipient of 14 stimulus grants, a spokeswoman for Recovery.gov confirmed to CNSNews.com. These 14 grants provided GE with $24.9 million in tax...

Complete title: Obama Administration Gave General Electric—Parent Company of NBC--$24.9 Million in ‘Stimulus’ GrantsThe Obama administration gave corporate giant General Electric—the parent company of NBC--$24.9 million in grants from the $787-billion economic “stimulus” law President Barack Obama signed in February 2009, according to records posted by the administration at Recovery.gov. Despite getting $24.9 million from U.S. taxpayers, GE decreased its U.S.-based employees by 18,000 in 2009, according to the company’s 2009 annual report. According to Standard & Poor's, GE took in $156 billion in revenue in 2009. GE was the primary recipient of 14 stimulus grants, a spokeswoman for Recovery.gov...

General Electric/Rolls-Royce is investigating manufacturing and assembly data on a single F136 engine after it was damaged during a checkout test on 23 September. The alternate engine for the Lockheed Martin F-35 was shut down "in a controlled manner" after an unknown anomaly at near maximum fan speed on the test stand damaged the front fan and compressor area, the company says. The GE/Rolls team is continuing to run two test engines after inspections revealed no signs of "similar distress". Five development engines have run for more than 1,000h since early 2009. As the cause for the anomaly on the...

This could confirm what many suspected all along - the corporate heads at General Electric (NYSE:GE) would try to use their media holdings to portray President Barack Obama and his administration in a positive light in order to gain a corporate advantage. That's how former CNBC reporter and current Fox Business Network senior correspondent Charlie Gasparino explains it in his forthcoming book, "Bought and Paid For: The Unholy Alliance Between Barack Obama and Wall Street." According to Gasparino, GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt had "helped his company feast off of the subsidies of Obamanomics," including the green energy initiatives and health...

Eco-Extremism: A light bulb factory closes in Virginia as mandated fluorescents are made in China. It's now a crime to make or ship for sale 75-watt incandescent bulbs in the European Union. Welcome to green hell. Thomas Alva Edison was a genius credited with the invention of many things — the phonograph, the motion picture, the incandescent light bulb, global warming. That last credit was given by those who rank light bulbs right up there with the internal combustion engine as ravagers of the planet. The General Electric light bulb factory in Winchester, Va., closed this month, a victim, along...

Light bulbs sprang from the brilliant mind of Thomas Edison -- a true American hero, right up there with Benjamin Franklin. But his legacy is coming to an end. General Electric, the company that he founded, is closing America's last factory for making incandescent light bulbs, victim of liberal environmental politics and zealotry. Sadly, not only will the workers be losing their jobs -- devastating another small town (Winchester, Virginia) -- but the boon created by their replacements, compact fluorescents (CFLs), will not be realized in America, where they were first dreamed up and created, but will instead be enriching...

WINCHESTER, VA. - The last major GE factory making ordinary incandescent light bulbs in the United States is closing this month, marking a small, sad exit for a product and company that can trace their roots to Thomas Alva Edison's innovations in the 1870s. The remaining 200 workers at the plant here will lose their jobs. "Now what're we going to do?" said Toby Savolainen, 49, who like many others worked for decades at the factory, making bulbs now deemed wasteful. During the recession, political and business leaders have held out the promise that American advances, particularly in green technology,...

Taxes: While the oil and gas companies are bearing the brunt of taxation, regulation and environmental angst, others are doing just fine, thank you. If you think cap-and-trade is dead, just follow the money. According to a recently released Center for Responsive Politics review of reports filed with the U.S. Senate and U.S. House, General Electric and its subsidiaries spent more than $9.5 million on federal lobbying from April to June — the most it's spent on lobbying since President Obama has been in office. Why? As the fight over cap-and-trade grows, so does lobbying. Since January, GE and its...

Any time Erin Burnett tells a guest "You will not be back, you have to be more polite than that" you know the "guest" is telling the truth, the one commodity rarely if ever discussed on General Electric's circus station. Enter (or rather, exit) R&R Consulting's Sylvain Raynes, a structured finance expert, who at 3:10 into the clip takes on what he calls the "public relations officers" for Goldman, and asks "is it all right if I am a little critical?" Apparently the answer is no. First, Sylvain completely destroys Cramer's false "breaking news" about Goldman being long Abacus... And...

Liberal TV show host? Eager to guarantee that the post-Stack finger will be pointed at conservatives? Choose as your sole guest on the subject someone from the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center. That's precisely what Chris Matthews did this evening, with utterly predictable results. Right on script, SPLC director Mark Potok twice associated Austin plane-bomber Andrew Stack with "the radical right." How fraudently did Matthews stack the deck? He described the SPLC as a group "which monitors extremists"—as if the SPLC looks for wackos on the left as well as the right. View video here.

<p>It certainly is a remarkable speech. Under Immelt’s eight years at the helm, General Electric has lost almost two-thirds of its value. Earlier this year, GE was on the verge of a total meltdown. So was GE’s “leadership” to blame?</p>