Fisker Automotive, which was granted a $529 million US Dept. of Energy loan guarantee and then announced they would assemble the first line of cars in Finland, has announced layoffs at a Delaware plant that has yet to produce a single car:

The company says 26 Fisker employees have been let go from the Delaware factory where renowned automotive engineer Henrik Fisker promised to one day begin producing affordable electric sedans. A Delaware newspaper also reported that subcontractors working on the car venture have been let go.

“It’s temporary,” said Roger Ormisher, a company spokesman. “We’re being prudent and sensible as a company.”

Because the initial phase sounds like it’s been such an unqualified success, the company is asking for terms of the federal loan to be altered so the company can have faster access to their line of time-released taxpayer-backed credit:

Accompanying the layoffs was an announcement that Fisker has approached the Department of Energy about revising the targets it had to meet in order to continue drawing money from the federal loan. Whether the Energy Department agrees to alter the terms, and invest more taxpayer [money] in the Fisker venture remains unclear.
[...]
To date, Fisker has received $193 million in government funds, according to a company statement. Back in October, the company acknowledged outsourcing Karma assembly to Finland, but said that the bulk of its government funds would be used to launch a second-generation electric vehicle, still under wraps, that would be assembled in a shuttered General Motors plant in Delaware. Some of those hired to prepare the Delaware plant for that effort were among those let go.
[...]
“We have temporarily delayed work at the plant based on ongoing discussions with the DOE regarding funding for the Project Nina program,” the company’s statement said. “As a result, we have laid off 26 people.”

This all sounds too familiar, doesn’t it? But since Leo DiCaprio, Al Gore and Colin Powell must not be denied warranty coverage, it’s important for the DoE to help keep Fisker afloat.

Related madness:

Obama’s green robber barons

Eleven other Solyndras

Stimulus-backed “green” bankruptcy of the week: Ener1

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

In an ad set to air during Sunday’s Super Bowl, aliens from outer space want to make sure their tax money didn’t get dumped into the Chevy Volt pit — at least that’s my take on it:

Ahead of the big game, Chevrolet has released its upcoming Super Bowl advertisement for the plug-in hybrid on the internet, in which a man in a bathrobe goes out to his garage in the middle of the night and discovers a group of little cone-headed green and purple creatures inspecting a Volt.

Exasperated by what seems to be a recurring event, he tells them, “I’ll say it again, it’s electric, but when I need to go farther it uses gas. Please tell me you understand.”

Here’s the ad:

There were 603 Volts sold in January, so encouraging sales numbers like that certainly justify shelling out the big bucks for some out-of-this-world ad time to attempt a product re-launch during the Super Bowl.

It’s not as expensive an ad purchase as it might sound. If the average Super Bowl spot this year is going for $3.5 million, then, according to some estimates, the commercial time was purchased at the total cost of just 14 Volts.

The spot would be more effective on a “high tech” level if the ET’s would have ditched their spacecraft in the guy’s driveway and taken the car instead, but even fiction has its limits when it comes to suspension of disbelief.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

Maybe it’s not as bad as it sounds. Technically a “call back” is a notch below a recall, and it only affects 8,000 vehicles — which is a mere, um, 100% of all Volts sold in 2011. Lucky sales didn’t catch fire or the fixes would have been a more massive undertaking:

General Motors plans to ask Volt owners to bring their electric cars into dealers to strengthen the structure around the batteries.

The automaker said Thursday it plans enhancements to the vehicle’s structure and battery coolant system to further protect the battery from the possibility of an electrical fire occurring days or weeks after a severe crash.

The enhancements come in response to a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Preliminary Evaluation to examine post-severe crash battery performance.

Has there ever been a year where an automobile has been named Motor Trend’s Car of the Year and also a Flop of the Year? They should have called it the Paradox. You certainly can’t argue with the value though — it isn’t often you can buy a $250,000 car for just $41,000.

In other Volt news, in spite of there being only 8,000 Volts sold in 2011 (1,529 in December alone, meaning either sales picked up or Al Gore used them as Christmas stocking stuffers), Michigan Rep. John Dingell thinks they’re flying off the lots:

Following Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney’s claim that the Chevrolet Volt is an “idea whose time has not come,” Dingell apparently issued a press release that said, in part:

Romney is the only fellow in the United States who appears to think that the Volt is an idea whose time has not come. Clearly it has not come to him. The Volt is selling like hotcakes.

For a car being called back to repair a possible fire hazard, “hot cakes” probably isn’t the best choice of metaphor, and it certainly isn’t the most accurate one.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

The Audi president called the Chevy Volt a “car for idiots,” but because the average Volt owner earns $170,000 a year and the average American couldn’t afford to buy it if they wanted to, it sounds more like the taxpayers are the ones who have been played for fools:

Each Chevy Volt sold thus far may have as much as $250,000 in state and federal dollars in incentives behind it – a total of $3 billion altogether, according to an analysis by James Hohman, assistant director of fiscal policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

Hohman looked at total state and federal assistance offered for the development and production of the Chevy Volt, General Motors’ plug-in hybrid electric vehicle. His analysis included 18 government deals that included loans, rebates, grants and tax credits. The amount of government assistance does not include the fact that General Motors is currently 26 percent owned by the federal government.

The Volt subsidies flow through multiple companies involed in production. The analysis includes adding up the amount of government subsidies via tax credits and direct funding for not only General Motors, but other companies supplying parts for the vehicle. For example, the Department of Energy awarded a $105.9 million grant to the GM Brownstown plant that assembles the batteries. The company was also awarded approximately $106 million for its Hamtramck assembly plant in state credits to retain jobs. The company that supplies the Volt’s batteries, Compact Power, was awarded up to $100 million in refundable battery credits (combination tax breaks and cash subsidies). These are among many of the subsidies and tax credits for the vehicle.
[...]
The $3 billion total subsidy figure includes $690.4 million offered by the state of Michigan and $2.3 billion in federal money. That’s enough to purchase 75,222 Volts with a sticker price of $39,828.

Any Volt story that references the Trabant for reasons of comparison is worth a read.

In many cases not only are taxpayers subsidizing the Volt’s manufacturing and incentives, but also its outright purchase for use in the public-sector fleet. The government purchases a little padding for the sales numbers:

(h/t Drudge)

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

**Written by Doug Powers

Would you have expected anything less from Motor Trend’s Car of the Year?

From Autoblog:

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has issued a statement on its investigation into a Chevrolet Volt fire that occurred at the organization’s facilities. NHTSA had done a side-impact test on a Volt then parked it outside, and three weeks later Chevy’s plug-in hybrid caught fire. The battery was determined to be the cause, after its coolant line was ruptured during the side-impact test. That led the NHTSA to consider a ruling forcing hybrid and electric-car batteries to be drained after a wreck.

On Friday, NHTSA said it is opening “a formal safety defect investigation” to study the risks of fire in Chevy Volts that have been in major accidents. To be clear, though, the larger story is that this isn’t just about the Volt, this is about any vehicle with a battery pack, with NHTSA gathering “additional information about the potential for fire in electric vehicles involved in a crash…”

The NHTSA obviously knows it’s working on thin ice when it comes to popping lucrative (for some) “green” bubbles:

NHTSA issued an unusually lengthy, even apologetic, statement saying electric vehicles have “incredible potential” to reduce gasoline consumption but said it was necessary to determine whether the batteries in electric cars are safe.

There’s one positive aspect of practically every wildly expensive taxpayer-supported product that is pushed by the government for reasons other than consumer demand: The inevitable recall won’t inconvenience very many people.

Update: GM is offering loaner cars to concerned Volt owners. The loaner will be a Hummer H3 (just seeing if Al Gore’s paying attention).

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

In January of 2010, a “green” automotive startup called Fisker, the recipient of a $529 million US Dept. of Energy loan, purchased a former GM plant in Wilmington, Delaware. Almost immediately there were suspicions of a possible quid pro quo deal involving Joe Biden.

For now, though, those allegations can be put on the back burner, because the car won’t be manufactured in Delaware. As a matter of fact, it won’t even be manufactured in the United States.

From ABC News:

With the approval of the Obama administration, an electric car company that received a $529 million federal government loan guarantee is assembling its first line of cars in Finland, saying it could not find a facility in the United States capable of doing the work.

Vice President Joseph Biden heralded the Energy Department’s $529 million loan to the start-up electric car company called Fisker as a bright new path to thousands of American manufacturing jobs. But two years after the loan was announced, the job of assembling the flashy electric Fisker Karma sports car has been outsourced to Finland.

“There was no contract manufacturer in the U.S. that could actually produce our vehicle,” the car company’s founder and namesake told ABC News. “They don’t exist here.”

Why is the car called the “Karma”? Because “Thanks for the Money, Suckers, We’re Outta Here” wouldn’t fit on the hood ornament.

One would have guessed that the ability to produce the vehicle in the U.S. might have been part of the intensive research the Department of Energy claims to perform before handing out “green energy” grant and loan. That doesn’t appear to be the case. Wile E. Coyote performed more competent due diligence before he bought a piece of Ajax and Acme.

I know… I know… it’s hard to believe the same administration that thought Solyndra was a good idea didn’t spot the pitfalls of the Fisker deal from a mile away. But Al Gore is pleased, and these days, isn’t that all that matters?

Update: Read well into the ABC story and you’ll run across the inevitable Obama campaign connection:

One of Fisker’s biggest financial supporters, records show, is the California venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The firm financially supports numerous green-tech firms, records show.

Kleiner Perkins partner John Doerr, a California billionaire who made a fortune investing in Google, hosted President Obama at a February dinner for high-tech executives at his secluded estate south of San Francisco. Doerr and Kleiner Perkins executives have contributed more than $1 million to federal political causes and campaigns over the last two decades, primarily supporting Democrats. Doerr serves on Obama’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. Doerr has not replied to interview requests since March.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

In a new letter Mulally received today, Rep. Issa requests more information and notes that he is “deeply concerned about undue political pressure exerted by the White House on public companies. Issa asks Mulally the same question I asked White House press flack Dan Pfeiffer yesterday (and which Pfeiffer refused to answer): Did any White House officials — or any other current or former administration officials — contact any Ford officials/employees to discuss the anti-bailout ad? He also asks whether any UAW employees, Obama for America staff, or DNC staff did likewise.

Here’s the full, seven-page letter:

2011-09-29 DEI to Mulally Re Ford Advertisement

Glad we have some representatives in Washington confronting the White House bully problem.

Media progs and Soros monkeys are working overtime to discredit yesterday’s Detroit News report on alleged White House intimidation of, and pressure on, Ford Motor Company over its popular ad critical of the government auto bailout. As I pointed out yesterday, it’s just another one of those Chicago coincidences that the Attack Watch goon squad’s most recent targets just happen to be…auto bailout critics.

My column below sets the latest Ford fiasco in the proper context: the long pattern of bullying by this White House. Obama defenders in the media believe that transcribing official denials will “put the story to rest.” ATF/DOJ/WH whitewashers love these tools.

Dan Ikenson at Forbes isn’t bowed: “To the extent that the administration wants to tout the bailout as evidence of its “successful” economic stewardship, it should know that there are plenty of us willing and able to do the auditing on that claim.”

Just Karl at Hot Air’s Green Room adds:

The widely-mocked AttackWatch has been eager to defend the bailout of GM and Chrysler. Moreover, touting these bailouts is a key to Obama’s effort to hold onto the Great Lakes region in 2012. Ford pointing out that it is easily outperforming GM and Chrysler is not helpful to Obama. Neither is pointing out that the bailout saved nowhere near the million jobs claimed. Indeed, it is likely that a regular bankruptcy would have yielded about the same number of continuing jobs as the taxpayer-funded bankruptcy. The only difference is that Obama intervened to bail out his union support at the UAW, rather than the companies’ creditors. With a economy mired in malaise overall, Obama does not need Ford reminding people that taxpayers were put on the hook to boost his re-election effort.

Related tidbit from John Hayward at Human Events: “Did you know Ford was the only one of the Big Three automakers that can be the target of a union strike, and the United Auto Workers are contemplating just such a strike? From a New York Times article published yesterday:”

After taking Sunday off, union negotiators began “high-level financial discussions” with Ford on Monday, according to a memo they posted online. A subsequent memo said the parties had agreed to meet for “very long negotiating sessions” this week and that bargaining would continue around the clock when a deal was near.

Ford is the only one of the three Detroit carmakers whose workers are allowed to strike in this year’s talks. Binding arbitration is the only option at G.M. and Chrysler in the event of an impasse, under the terms of their government-sponsored bankruptcies in 2009.

***

Our White House bully problem
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2011

Spin, baby, spin. Throughout his frenetic jobs tour across the West this week, President Obama tried to seize the narrative. Republicans, he told champagne-sipping, tea party-trashing Hollywood moguls and tech titans, are intolerant bigots, know-nothings and thugs. They’ve made his hair “grayer” and left him “all dinged up.”

But who’s battering whom? Since Day One, Obama has been the Chicago bully in victim’s clothing. The mask is wearing thin.

On Tuesday, Detroit News reporter Daniel Howes reported that White House officials leaned on Ford Motor Company to yank a popular TV and Internet ad critical of competitors who took federal bailout money. According to Howes, “Ford pulled the ad after individuals inside the White House” questioned the firm’s CEO Alan Mulally (who had earlier supported the bailout despite his company’s refusal to participate). Howes concluded: “You’re not allowed, in Obama’s America, to disparage the Auto bailout, or — indirectly — Obama. Especially during the election cycle.”

Both Ford and the White House officially deny any political pressure received or applied. But White House press flack Dan Pfeiffer refused to answer when I asked him whether anyone at the White House had ever contacted anyone at Ford to complain about the bailout ad. Ford’s social media director told me he personally “had no knowledge” of any contacts. While he disputed the gist of Howes’ report, the Ford official would not call for a correction or retraction.

Chris McDaniel, the real-life Ford customer who starred in the offending ad, told BigGovernment.com editor Larry O’Connor that he was exasperated when he heard about the Ford fiasco: “Now we have the federal government butting their nose into this TV ad. Another example of them getting involved in things they have no business getting involved in. Where is the free speech of American citizens?”

He better watch out for the Obama campaign’s official snitch brigade at AttackWatch.com. After a curious hiatus, the online speech monitors are up and running again. Coincidentally enough, the site (run by several George Soros-trained operatives) targeted conservative auto bailout critics just two weeks ago.

A left-wing Washington Post writer immediately scoffed at concerns about the administration’s heavy hand because the Ford fiasco “is being denied by the parties on both sides.” Must be nice to mainline White House talking points for a living. For the rest of us, reality intrudes.

This is the administration that threatened health insurers for candidly tying Obamacare mandates to rising premiums.

This is the administration that pummeled companies such as Deere, Caterpillar, Verizon and AT&T for speaking out about the cost implications and financial burdens of Obamacare — and then cheered from the sidelines while Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman attempted to haul the firms up for a congressional witch-hunt inquisition.

This is the administration that has seized Gibson Guitars’ instruments and has threatened whistleblowers who exposed bloody corruption and incompetence behind the Operation Fast and Furious gun-walking racket.

And lest they need a reminder, this is an administration that has clamped down on mainstream media reporters, too.

The Pleasanton (CA) Weekly was bullied by the White House press shop over a benign article that irked the administration because it made Michelle Obama look snooty.

The San Francisco Chronicle was punished by the White House because a print pool reporter used a cellphone to record video of protesters at an Obama Bay Area fundraiser.

A WFAA-TV Texas reporter was dressed down by the president for having the audacity to interrupt.

The Boston Herald was spanked by the White House for running a front-page op-ed by GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

The White House denied any pressure in all those cases, too.

Before his campaign finance-grubbing swing ended, Obama met the pop singer Lady Gaga. She lobbied him to combat bullying across America. It was a little like Red Riding Hood lobbying the Big Bad Wolf to promote vegetarianism.

Your Chicago Way read of the day comes from the Detroit News, where columnist Daniel Howes brings news that a few calls from the White House have led to Ford Motor Company yanking ads that spotlighted its refusal to take government auto bailout money.

Nice car company ya got there, fellas. Would be a shame if anything happened to it… (h/t Is This Blog On, Cold Fury):

For the only Detroit automaker that “didn’t take the money” of the federal auto bailouts, Ford Motor Co. keeps paying a price for its comparative success and self-reliant turnaround.

There’s no help from American taxpayers to help lighten its debt load, giving crosstown rivals comparatively better credit ratings and a financial edge Ford is working diligently to erase all on its own.

There’s no clause barring a strike by hourly workers amid this fall’s national contract talks with the United Auto Workers — a by-product of the taxpayer-financed bailout that General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC retain until 2015.

And there’s no assurance the Dearborn automaker can use the commercially advantageous fact that it didn’t “take the money” proffered by the Obama Treasury Department and use it in TV ads angling to sell cars and trucks. Not if the campaign takes a whack at its Detroit rivals and suggests that Ford no longer supports the Obama administration bailouts it backed in public statements and sworn congressional testimony.

As part of a campaign featuring “real people” explaining their decision to buy the Blue Oval, a guy named “Chris” says he “wasn’t going to buy another car that was bailed out by our government,” according the text of the ad, launched in early September.

“I was going to buy from a manufacturer that’s standing on their own: win, lose, or draw. That’s what America is about is taking the chance to succeed and understanding when you fail that you gotta’ pick yourself up and go back to work.”

That’s what some of America is about, evidently. Because Ford pulled the ad after individuals inside the White House questioned whether the copy was publicly denigrating the controversial bailout policy CEO Alan Mulally repeatedly supported in the dark days of late 2008, in early ’09 and again when the ad flap arose. And more.

In another typical Chicago-on-the-Potomac coincidence, the Obama campaign’s “Attack Watch” is back up and running on Twitter after a nearly two-week-long hiatus. The subject of the snitch squad’s last attack watch attack?

Yep.

Critics of the auto bailout.

Related: Interview with the guy who starred in the Ford ad…

In this case, it was Chris, who explained how he came to star in the commercial and reiterated his support for Ford during an interview this morning on WJR-AM 760.

“I still standby what I said, and that is, as Americans, we need to decide if we’re going to be run by a government or if we’re going to be run by free enterprise,” he told host Frank Beckmann. “That’s really the debate that we’re facing today. So I applaud Ford, still, to this day, for having the courage to put that ad on the TV and spur the debate.

Here’s Chris’s YouTube response:

***

More: A reader on Twitter points to Ford’s response to him on Facebook in which the company claims the ad campaign is still running:

Ford Motor Company Jeff we were not coerced into pulling the ad down. The campaign continues to run. We took the ad out of rotation after 4 weeks which is consistent with the typical lifecycle for the campaign.

There were conflicting reports that the ad had been yanked from YouTube. It appears that the ad is still there, though.

Check this link.

Someone’s in a panic over at Ford’s social media department, for sure. The original YouTube ad uploaded weeks ago on the site is not available. See the embed of the original ad from September 16 here at hotair: “Video has been removed by the user.”

The one now appearing on the site was re-uploaded on September 23.

I think diggrbiii has this right: “Ford pulls TV ad, claims it was just normal scheduling, keeps YouTube version up for plausible deniability.”

***

Update: I’ve heard from several readers who’ve contacted Detroit News reporter Dan Howes for comment. I have contacted him directly, too and will update.

Here’s what one reader forwarded are saying:

From: Wayne A
Sent: Tuesday, September 27, 2011 01:56 PM
To: Howes, Daniel
Subject: Ford ad article

FYI Ford says via its FB presence that they have not pulled the ad; that it simply is currently out of rotation.

Response:

Subject: Re: Ford ad article
Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2011 14:21:57 -0400
From: Howes, Daniel
To:

Sent via BlackBerry

Update: Scott Monty is the Ford social media director and writes on Twitter: “We did not pull the ad under pressure.”

I have asked him directly: “Did the White House contact Ford to complain about the ads or not?”

Waiting for a response…

***

Scott Monty’s response:

“I have no knowledge of the White House calling. We don’t make advertising decisions based on pressure.”

My follow-up: “So can you find out and let us know whether WH called to complain or not? It’s germane.”

And: “If you are denying substance of D. Howe’s Detroit News report, are you going to ask paper 4 a retraction?”

Seconds later, White House press flack Dan Pfeiffer tweeted: “Lots of bad info/reporting out there today: Report on POTUS and Troy Davis and Detroit News column saying WH pressured Ford are both false.”

My follow-up: “So did anyone at the White House contact anyone at Ford to complain about the bailout ad or not?”

I think a FOIA request is in order…

***

Larry O’Connor interviewed Ford ad star Chris McDaniel. Excerpt:

When I asked Mr. McDaniel what he thought about the reports that the White House may have pressured Ford into removing his commercial he said, “I understand the political world Ford lives in. I don’t fault them. But, I’m on the hook with my tax dollars on this Solyndra scandal. It’s exactly the same thing as the GM and Chrysler bailouts. Enough is enough! The only people on the hook in this country are the 50% of American who still pay taxes. And now we have the federal government butting their nose into this TV ad. Another example of them getting involved in things they have no business getting involved in. Where is the free speech of American citizens?”

With ideas like that, no wonder the White House got involved.

Spend even more money for batteries to power things that consumers either can’t afford or don’t want while debate over what to do about out-of-control deficits rages on? Hey, why not:

FLINT, Michigan — A federal bill expected to be introduced next week would create research and development grants to build advanced batteries like the one powering the Chevy Volt.

The bill would also push for domestic production of lithium for batteries, said U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., who discussed the planned legislation during a stop at a Flint business on Friday.

“We don’t want to go from foreign oil dependency to foreign lithium dependency or foreign advanced battery dependency,” Stabenow said. “This is about doing it here.”

Stabenow said she plans to introduce the Battery Innovation Act this week.

The legislation likely will cost about $2 billion, according to Stabenow’s office.

It seems like only yesterday that President Obama and Sheriff Joe Biden were in Michigan touting the $1 billion from the stimulus that would be spent in the state for “alternative energy” R & D — in other words, the exact same thing. Has that money gone up in green smoke already?

This is like some Field of Dreams re-make in Bizarro World. These Democrats must be awakened a nightly basis hearing a soft voice speaking in an Al Gore-ish drawl whispering, “If taxpayers fund the batteries, demand for expensive hybrids will come.”

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

If you paid attention here last fall, you know all about how Obama Treasury officials screwed over non-union white-collar workers at Delphi, a leading auto parts company spun off from GM a decade ago.

See my September 2010 Special Report– The Delphi disaster: An economic horror story Obama won’t tell. (More background links below.) A refresher:

The White House believes it can win back depressed and economically stressed voters by turning President Obama into the storyteller-in-chief again. But victims of Obama’s Chicago politics don’t want to hear any more of his own well-worn tales of struggle and sacrifice. They’ve got their own tragedies to tell — heart-wrenching dramas of personal and financial suffering at the very hands of Obama.

Consider the real-life horror story of 20,000 white-collar workers at Delphi, a leading auto parts company spun off from GM a decade ago. As Washington rushed to nationalize the U.S. auto industry with $80 billion in taxpayer “rescue” funds and avoid contested court termination proceedings, the White House auto team schemed with Big Labor bosses to preserve UAW members’ costly pension funds by shafting their nonunion counterparts. In addition, the nonunion pensioners lost all of their health and life insurance benefits.

The abused workers — most from hard-hit northeast Ohio, Michigan and neighboring states — had devoted decades of their lives as secretaries, technicians, engineers and sales employees at Delphi/GM. Some workers have watched up to 70 percent of their pensions vanish.

John Berent of Marblehead, Ohio, lost one-third of his pension: “I worked as a salaried employee for GM (30 years) and Delphi (10 years). After 40 years of dedicated service, I was forced to retire. Then Delphi terminated my health care, life insurance, vision, dental, then terminated the pension plan. Everything I worked 40 years for was wiped out.”

Kelly Fabrizio of Franksville, Wis., saw her pension reduced by 55 percent after working 30 years at Delphi/GM: “I am truly scared for my future. Every day I wake up, shake my head and say out loud — This Is Not How It Was Supposed To Be.”

Roger Hoke of Columbus, Mich., and his wife were both longtime Delphi workers. His pension shrunk by more than 40 percent: “After 33 years with GM and another 10 with Delphi, what did I do wrong to deserve such a fate?”

Paul Dobosz of the Delphi Salaried Retiree Association, which represents the pensioners and is suing the feds, recounts how they got screwed: The Auto Task Force hatched a plan to dump their pensions on the federally run Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, which slashed their benefits. At the same time, the White House and Treasury officials devised “a clever way to make the UAW pensions whole using GM and TARP money to accomplish it. The scheme was documented in sworn depositions (that) revealed … that some groups of workers were more ‘politically sensitive’ and would be afforded special treatment (i.e. subsidy using TARP money) while others less politically worthy would be left out.” The PBGC, which had the fiduciary duty to represent the best interests of all the Delphi workers, helped sacrifice the non-union employees at the UAW altar.

In other words: Obama’s team of auto-crats — stocked with Big Labor-friendly appointees and self-admitted know-nothings about the car industry — decided to “cherry pick” (one Obama official’s own words) which obligations the new Government Motors company would assume and which they would abandon based on their own political whims and fealty. Due process and equal treatment of union and nonunion workers be damned.

Yesterday, the House held a hearing on the Delphi outrage, and testimony fleshed out what I reported last fall. TheDC’s Matthew Boyle reports on details of new e-mails showing the extent of meddling by Team Obama:

At a Wednesday hearing, the House Oversight Committee’s Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs, Stimulus Oversight and Government Spending started pushing the Treasury Department for answers on the effects of the bailout and on how much of a role the department played in picking winners and losers.

The key point of the Wednesday hearing was to show that the Obama administration advised GM on how to eliminate the Delphi workers’ pensions. The evidence suggests Geithner’s team played a significant role in that process, despite claims to the contrary.

In 2009 congressional testimony, senior Obama administration official Ron Bloom said the president told the Treasury Department to stay out of the management of these companies and downplayed any administration intervention.

“From the beginning of this process, the President gave the Auto Task Force two clear directions regarding its approach to the auto restructurings,” Bloom said then. “The first was to behave in a commercial manner by ensuring that all stakeholders were treated fairly and received neither more nor less than they would have simply because the government was involved. The second was to refrain from intervening in the day-to-day management of these companies.”

But the emails TheDC obtained show high-ranking Treasury Department officials, including Matthew Feldman of Treasury’s Auto Task Force, corresponding with senior GM officials on how to make certain decisions regarding who was going to win and who was going to lose.

“Have you guys begun a dialogue with the UAW over your desire to see the hourly plan terminated?” Feldman asked GM’s Rick Westenberg and Walter Borst in June 2009. This email shows Feldman and the Treasury Department were involved in GM’s day-to-day management.

“One concern I have is that while the PBGC [Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, a federal agency that handles private-sector pension benefits issues] is likely to agree to terminate, it’s not clear what position they will take on the Benefit Guaranty,” Feldman continued in that email, demonstrating his involvement in union negotiations. “At a minimum this could get messy and the UAW should probably be brought into the loop.”

If only the activist Left media were as interested in these e-mails as they were in Sarah Palin’s…

Delphi retirees raised their voices. One summed it up well:

Declaring that salaried retirees have lost houses, declared bankruptcy and seen families dissolve, local Delphi Corp. retiree Bruce Gump on Wednesday told a Congressional subcommittee that the group will continue to fight to reclaim benefits earned over decades with the auto parts supplier.

“We will stand on the side of right and will fight. We need your help to win,” the retired Delphi Packard Electric engineer said in testimony before the House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs, Stimulus Oversight, and Government Spending in Washington about the government’s impact in bailing out General Motors and Chrysler during Great Recession of 2008-09.

Gump called cuts by federal pension insurer Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. of 30 percent to 70 percent in monthly pension checks for younger Delphi workers “political, illegal, unethical and immoral.

“Even though the government is charged with protecting all citizens, they did nothing for the salaried,” he said. “They cared for the groups that were rich and large enough to retaliate.”

This LA Times article casts the fight for Delphi workers as a partisan GOP battle: “Obama administration favored union worker pensions in GM bailout, House Republicans say.”

Attention, LA Times: Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, who has called out the Obama administration over the issue, is a Democrat:

Ohio’s own Senator Sherrod Brown has placed an indefinite hold on President Obama’s nomination of Joshua Gotbaum to head the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation in a bid to force the Obama administration’s intervention on behalf of retired Delphi workers whose pensions were jeopardized by GM’s bankruptcy last year, the Pee Dee is reporting.

For those who don’t know, the PBGC takes over the pensions of failed companies. Typically, they can continue to provide pension payments, but usually about half of what was previously promised to the retired workers by their former employers…

…The issue over which Sen. Brown is holding Gotbaum’s nomination is this: when GM declared bankruptcy, it agreed to supplement the PBGC pensions for Delphi UAW retirees, saying it was obligated to do so by its contract. However, non-union former Delphi employees received no such supplement. Brown is pressing that the government, which owns 60% of GM as the result of the old GM’s bankruptcy and subsequent rescue by the government, should intervene to force the new GM to make good on its pension promises to its non-union as well as union Delphi retirees.

***

Background:

October 6 2010 Document drop: Another federal investigation launched into Delphi Disaster

September 24 2010 The Delphi disaster: Judge refuses to dismiss non-union pensioners’ charges

September 22 2010 Special Report– The Delphi disaster: An economic horror story Obama won’t tell

UAW Bailout: White House Kneecapped White-collar Pensioners

Nonunion Delphi Retired Employees Get Shaft in Auto Bailout

Oversight Committee Republicans Question Politicization of Delphi Bankruptcy Deal

Boehner and Wicker Request GAO Report to Investigate Delphi Pension Treatment

Delphi pension dispute due for federal probe

The past few days have been a one-two punch to the eco-friendly market. First we heard that biodegradable products are not nearly as environmentally friendly as advertised, and now this:

ELECTRIC cars could produce higher emissions over their lifetimes than petrol equivalents because of the energy consumed in making their batteries, a study has found.

An electric car owner would have to drive at least 129,000km before producing a net saving in CO2. Many electric cars will not travel that far in their lifetime because they typically have a range of less than 145km on a single charge and are unsuitable for long trips. Even those driven 160,000km would save only about a tonne of CO2 over their lifetimes.

The British study, which is the first analysis of the full lifetime emissions of electric cars covering manufacturing, driving and disposal, undermines the case for tackling climate change by the rapid introduction of electric cars.
[...]
The study was commissioned by the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership, which is jointly funded by the British government and the car industry. It found that a mid-size electric car would produce 23.1 tonnes of CO2 over its lifetime, compared with 24 tonnes for a similar petrol car. Emissions from manufacturing electric cars are at least 50 per cent higher because batteries are made from materials such as lithium, copper and refined silicon, which require much energy to be processed.

Global warming may well end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a greenhouse gas problem didn’t exist going in, it sure might after Al Gore & Company are finished saving the world from it.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

The Reverse Midas Touch has claimed another victim:

TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio restaurant mentioned last week by President Barack Obama as an indirect beneficiary of the government’s Chrysler bailout will go out of business Sunday after a more than 70-year history.

Co-owner Richard Lawrence of New Chet’s Restaurant in Toledo says business has fallen victim to the economy and the workplace smoking ban approved by Ohio voters in 2006. He told The Blade newspaper of Toledo on Wednesday that auto industry cutbacks also hurt.

File that one alongside a teacher the White House used as a symbol for jobs saved by a $26 billion jobs bill who was subsequently laid off.

Moral of the story: If the administration approaches you and wants to use you or your business as an example of how massive government spending has saved the economy, politely decline the offer, go home for the day and come back when the coast is clear.

(h/t Gateway Pundit)

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

While you were being encouraged to trade in your gas guzzler and buy an expensive electric golf cart, the size of the government’s limo fleet was almost doubling:

The number of limousines owned by the U.S. government increased by 73 percent during the first two years of the Obama administration, according to a new report by iWatch news.

An analysis of General Services Administration data reveals the federal fleet has increased from 238 limos in 2008—the last year of the Bush Administration— to 412 limos in 2010. Much of the increase was recorded in the State Department under Hillary Clinton.

For its part, the Obama administration said the increased number of limousines in the federal fleet reflects “an enhanced effort to protect diplomats and other government officials in a dangerous world.”

Is each re-set button getting its own limo now? And not to nitpick, but wasn’t the world supposed to be markedly less dangerous as of January 20, 2009?

The “limo” data is difficult to track with any degree of certainty, because, well, the government doesn’t quite know how to define what a limo is:

The GSA (General Services Administration) said its limousine numbers are not reliable, even though the federal fleet numbers are officially recorded every year. In a statement, GSA spokeswoman Sara Merriam said, “The categories in the Fleet Report are overly broad, and the term ‘limousine’ is not defined,” adding that “vehicles represented as limousines can range from protective duty vehicles to sedans.” Asked whether the GSA actually knows how many limos it has in its fleet, Merriam responded that GSA “cannot say that its report accurately reflects the number of limousines.”

Leslie Paige, a spokeswoman for the nonprofit watchdog group Citizens Against Government Waste, was outraged that the GSA’s numbers may not be accurate. “They can’t figure out a way to define a limo? How hard can it be? If the government can’t track limos, I’m not sure we should trust the numbers they put out there on anything,” she said.

If they can’t define “green job” it’s no surprise “limo” throws them for a classification loop.

In fairness to the current administration, the report offers a slight “blame Bush” window of opportunity. Additionally, at last word there were several dozen limos stuck on bumps in roads all around the world that have to be continually replaced:

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

Yesterday, President Obama was speaking in Pennsylvania and implied in a not so subtle way that if you’re paying too much for gas, it’s your fault because you’re just too short-sighted and stupid to buy a government-approved eco-vehicle.

The exchange starts at around the 1:50 mark. Obama tells someone concerned about gas prices to trade in that SUV. The exact quote is, “If you’re complainin’ about the price of gas and you’re only getting 8 miles per gallon…” (chortle). That would have been an appropriate time for an audience chant of “drill baby drill,” but sadly that never happened:

He’s off on that 8 mpg SUV kick again — it’s been a talking point for a while now. Does Obama think everybody drives a presidential limo? And does he think that only SUV and truck drivers are complaining about gas prices? I’m assuming that Prius drivers, given the choice between $4 a gallon and $2 a gallon would choose the latter as well (unless they’re the types who have been told the extra $2 is going toward saving the rainforests and don’t mind).

In order to force the “green” agenda, we all have to pretend that fuel efficiency hasn’t been on a steady rise for decades and that all our “regular” cars get roughly the same mileage as a Sherman tank.

By the way, the Associated Press originally reported this exchange, but altered the story to exclude it. Instapundit has a screen-shot of the AP story as it appeared before the Hope & Change scrubber worked its magic for whatever reason.

Update: This isn’t the first time the AP’s story scrubber has been busy. More here.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe