Death on the Slow

By
eric
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75
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Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares gets it – he just doesn’t want to do anything about it. More finely, he is ok with going along with it.

Speaking to a group of journalists in Britain the other day, he said the regulations forcing the manufacture of battery powered devices – EVs – into production (and onto dealer’s lots, there to sit) will “kill” the car industry. He was speaking of the British car industry – which is mostly owned by the Chinese now. But his observation applies generally. The regulatory apparat is out to kill vehicles that aren’t battery powered devices. But most people don’t want – or can’t afford – a battery powered device This is how most people are to be forced out of vehicles. Which is how electric vehicles will kill the car industry.

Does Tavares object? Not really. He’d just like for the killing be done on a  less hurried schedule.

“I think the fact that they’re imposing a ramp-up of [EV sales] makes sense,” he said. “The problem is the magnitude and the positioning of the ZEV mandate vis-à-vis the natural demand of the market.” 

Italics added.

This is Mitt Romney Republicanism. Agree with your enemies – and hope that’ll make ’em like you better.

But how does it “make sense” to agree with the people who want to force everyone to drive a battery powered device that most people don’t want because most people like being able to just drive wherever they like, spur of the moment, without having to plan around whether their device has enough charge to get them there? When even if they don’t object to being leashed, they can’t afford to buy the leash?

How does it “make sense” to amen-brother those who are forcing Stellantis and every other manufacturer to make devices that are costing them money because they can’t sell them in any numbers at a price that recovers what it cost to make them, plus enough profit to make it worth making them?

Ford just announced it has lost “$132,000 for each of the 10,000 (electric) vehicles it sold in the first three months of the year,” amounting to a loss of $1.3 billion so far this year. There are still nine more months of losses to come. And the bleed is general. It includes Stellantis. Dodge – one of the brands under the Stellantis umbrella – currently has very few new cars available that people want to buy, the popular Charger and Challenger having been taken off the market, but not on account of declining demand. A battery powered simulation (literally) is on deck that looks like and even sounds like the Charger Dodge isn’t selling anymore.

Good luck selling the simulation to people who prefer the authentic.

That leaves Dodge with just one model left in its lineup that exists as a result of market demand – the Durango – a mid-sized SUV with a V8 engine that’s almost certainly going to be pulled off the market for the same reason the Charger and Challenger (the real ones) have been pulled off the market. Which leaves the new Hornet – which is a partially-electric (hybrid) four cylinder powered compact crossover.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that . . . per se. The problem – for Dodge – is that everyone else already makes four cylinder powered crossovers. Dodge has tried to make the Hornet sportier than other small crossovers, which is good. But it’s still a small crossover and so a lot like the small crossovers everyone else already makes.

Dodge has committed to making more of what the market doesn’t want. New devices that are just the same as everyone else’s, for which there is little, if any market demand.

No one else made anything like the Charger and Challenger. These cars gave Dodge life because they gave Dodge an identity. Not just a brand. The difference is important. Ask a Plymouth salesman about that.

Dodge is thus down to one vehicle that sells without losing money – the Durango. And so is Chrysler, the luxury-badged version of Dodge. It no longer sells the Charger-based 300 sedan it once sold hundreds of thousands of because there are no longer Chargers being made to base them on. It has one new vehicle – a minivan – in its portfolio.

How does this “make sense”?

As far as “the natural demand of the market” . . . oy meet vey. As Tavares knows well and even tacitly admits, there is no market for these devices. A market being a situation in which there is natural demand for a thing. There is almost no natural demand for battery powered devices. If the manufacturers were not being forced to manufacture them – to “achieve compliance” with federal regulations – would they be manufacturing them?

Does Apple manufacture computers with floppy drives that take 15 minutes to boot up and can only get you online via dial-up? No, Apple doesn’t. Why? Because there is no market for inferior computers like that. Just as there is no market – no mass market, at any rate – for these inferior devices called EVs that the car manufacturers are being forced to make.

Without the “zero emissions” requirements – and without the tax-kickbacks used to pay people to buy devices – it is probable that only Tesla would be making devices. And Tesla loses money on its devices. It depended on extortion to fund its manufacture of devices. Other manufacturers were put in the position of having to make devices – in order to meet “zero emissions” quotas – and lose money on each one made. Or they could buy “credits” from Tesla deemed the equivalent of making a device of their own.

If there were no “carbon credit” grift – and if Tesla were unable to depend on stock valuation dependent upon federal regulations forcing the manufacturer of devices, creating a “market” for its devices – even Tesla would probably not be manufacturing devices.

Tavares knows all of this. Everyone in the car business does. So why do they agree with it?

Is it that important to secure the good feelings of those who are out to – as Tavares himself said – kill you? Do cattle entertain similar thoughts as they are loaded onto the trucks that will take them to the abattoir?

Marjorie Taylor Green put it nicely the other day, in a different context. “America last,” she said of the congressional “sellouts” who amen-brother’d yet another Brinks Truck load of Americans’ money to be sent to Keeeeeeeeeev.

Which aways comes first.

Tavares, et al, seem to think the “market” will eventually catch up to the mandates. This implicitly assumes the “market” will have no other choice, exactly as planned.

Just let’s get there a little slower, on the Mitt Romney express.

. . .

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75 COMMENTS

    • Hi ypto –

      Yup. I feel the same way. I have driven many EVs and they’re all the same devices. It is like feeling up a store window mannequin.

  2. Throughout history, government always ends up murdering itself or putting itself to death. Government always attracts the psychopaths, invalids and control freaks because there are no qualifications, no accountable responsibilities and you are free to act in any manner you see fit…in many cases that even involves murdering citizens and taxing them to death. It’s a freak show at best.

    The US government has been perhaps the best attempt at providing freedom and liberty and self-reliance but even from the get go, citizens became slaves to the masters. It just took 200 years for the ball to get rolling downhill in a disastrous way as it’s about to crash into the re-enforced titanium wall at the bottom.

    You see the self-destruction all around as government continues to impale itself with it’s beyond insane ideas and agendas. Our government is now virtually leftist, communist and Marxist all balled up into one big pile of cowflop and no leftist government has ever survived very long.

    • Amen, Tom! What is sad, is how many people do not see this. They just go along to get along. And when the bottom drops out, they are going to be wholly unprepared for what is next. I used to joke that “my world” was coming to everyone else’s word. I do not joke now, it is here. That sucks. I was hoping to be 90 years old, and on my way out the door. As it stands, I am still young enough, to where I will most likely see the final destruction and collapse of a once-great nation that was too stupid to understand that it could happen to them and did.

  3. There is no such thing as “coming together with” or “sitting down with”
    or “compromising with” the Leftist neurotic-psychotic collective.
    There is only self defense..

  6. Most of these companies are not independent. Majority owned by Blackrock or Vanguard, they do what jewbamkers tell them to do, just like your politicians.

  8. Along the lines others have mentioned, what lies at the crux of the issue is that EVs are political products, as opposed to economic products.

    Economic products are products that are made and sold based on the law of supply and demand: People have a demand for widgets, and thus there is an incentive in terms of profit for people and organizations to supply them. This also applies to certain “public goods” like roads and bridges.

    Political products, on the other hand, are products that are made because of political fiat or government coercion. People and organizations produce them because they are forced under penalty of law to do so—even if there is little or no demand for them.

    EVs are being made to satisfy various and sundry government regulations, as well as provide “optics” of “being green.”

    The real heck of it is, EVs aren’t necessary to address the “problems” that IC vehicles have of pollution, expense, and dependence on dwindling resources found in politically unstable and anti-Western countries. Those problems came to the fore some 50 years ago, and while government regulation was a factor; e.g., CAFE and the 55 MPH speed limit. the market addressed these issues with more efficient and cleaner vehicles—incidentally, several of those solutions, namely quality small vehicles, EU-spec clean diesels, compressed natural gas vehicles, usable motorcycles that aren’t crotch rockets or hogs, are few and far between right now.

    What gives me hope is that anything that can’t go on forever, won’t. The question is when?

      • Thanks, Eric. Feel free to use those terms.

        I came up with the idea of EVs as a political product when I see that serviceable options to address the problems with IC vehicles aren’t readily available, and when EVs are being pushed as the only solution to those problems.

        I’ll also add that there is often a nexus between political and economic products, such as the forever wars our government engages in and the products defense contractors make from them.

  10. The homogenization of every single ice vehicle into a 2.0T is also sucking the enthusiasm and joy out of owning traditional vehicles.

    • I agree, Snake –

      And whether it’s deliberate or not. I began to feel this way more than a decade ago, when it became common to cober up engines with essentially the same black plastic covers. Why? Ostensibly, to “cleanup” the engine compartment (and reduce noise). But regardless, it made all engines look the same. Pop the hood of an EV and what do you see? A swath of black plastic.

  11. Folks,

    I’m going to post a link from UK Fires, a UK gov’t sponsored think tank; that is to say that, what UK Fires thinks is what the UK gov’t thinks. While you can get the document, it’s not necessary; they have timelines of objectives for cars, airports, etc. One that’s particularly interesting is for the car. After the majority are EVs, they want the weight of the cars to be no more than 1,000 kg., or about 2,200 pounds. Scroll down to see the timelines here: https://ukfires.org/impact/publications/reports/absolute-zero/

  12. As we have determined, the real goal of the EV push is to near eliminate private vehicle ownership. The corporate poo-bahs, the glitterati and the politicians** will be the only ones who can afford a personal vehicle. The unwashed riff-raff get to take the electric bus. (assuming an acceptable social credit score that is).

    With private vehicles hat will be affordable to only a small fraction of the population it will only require one manufacturer.^^ Tavares wants Stellantis to be that ONE. So do the rest. Let the brown-nosing and envelope passing begin. May the one who can produce the biggest suction or the thickest envelope win.

    **the enduring mystery is how a politician in congress can go from broke to an 8 figure net worth in 4 years on a $200k/year salary. Enquiring minds want to know.

    ^^The other reason only one manufacturer is necessary is as Eric recently pointed out is that these devices are virtually indistinguishable from each other.

    Oh I saw my first actual Cyber Truck live today tooling around South Jacksonville Beach, FL.

    I didn’t know whether to laugh or gag. It had some kind of flat dark gray finish and nearly completely opaque windows. It almost looked like a doorstop on wheels. It was absolutely the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen and I used to live in Southern California!

    • How will this be any different as fuel becomes more expensive in the next few decades anyway? If anything I’d imagine some here would like that if the roads are less congested.

      • There is no technical reason why fuel should get more expensive in the coming years. A few political reasons perhaps but no technical reason. Fuel today is in real terms cheaper than it was in 1964.

  13. Tavares is a perfect illustration of the real problem: There are few people of character left. Instead we have people who can clearly see the things that are wrong (Things that even affect them personally), but who instead of fighting the enemy or at least refusing to cooperate with the enemy (Which often means to stop participating, even if that participation brings them temporary financial benefit) just bellyache as they do what they are told.

    Ironically, this is analogous to voting. (“We’ll participate in their charade and give our formal consent to the tyrannical system because at least we get to signal our preference for the guy who speaks words which make him appear to be 0.001% less evil than the other scumbag”)

    • “Ironically, this is analogous to voting. ”

      Yup, it all ties together. Democracy – a failed false God. Yet the public was indoctrinated for at least 12 years about how government is our savior and the vast majority are believers.

      Even if they aren’t believers, they have become dependent on the State and have to keep the gravy train flowing (social security, ethanol / corn subsidies, MIC, Medicare, etc.)

      There are no coincidences. This is the plan.

      • Even if their dieties Rachel and Bill sang this post nightly in two part bullshevik harmony its pravda would fall on plugged ears.

      • Words matter. Pledge allegiance to a flag (Whatever that means) every day of your childhood for over a decade, and you are programmed. You believe it. You do it. They throw a war, and you go, and vote “guilty” when doing your “jury DUTY” when someone doesn’t pay *their taxes* or uses an unapproved drug.

        ….And you too can be a good American. Baseball, apple pie, and tyranny for all.

        • It reminds me of Mike & The Mechanics song “Silent Running”. With the line:
          “swear allegiance to the flag, whatever flag they offer. Never hint at what you really feel. Teach your children quietly. For someday sons and daughters will stand up and fight while we stood still”. Who would have thought such song lyrics (1985) would be so prophetic.

        • More nihilism from Gil. Consider the non-aggression principle as being the optimal standard for all individuals.

          Yeah, yeah, I know. You’re going to say while clutching your pearls: “But dear God, how will anybody be able to determine harm (or aggression)?”

        • What is good? “Anarchy”. [In quotation marks, because most people have a false idea of what anarchy truly is].
          What it boils down to is that ANY form of government is bad because it limits liberty and personal responsibility; gives special rights to some people at the expense of others rights; gives others the ability to control you, and gives undo power to some, and that power will ALWAYS be abused.

  14. Eric,
    I kept a quote you wrote that sums the EV inevitability up nicely:

    ‘I loathe the electric car and all it embodies – for it represents the transformation of passion into passivity, of fun into dreary utility. Of the end of difference for the sake of the same. Which is a kind of sampling of death, where we’re also all the same.’

  15. I hate think this way. Re: loses.
    Is it possible that uncle will use all the ev loses to insert itself to ‘bail’ everyone out then take control? This way they then can literally force it, and the non-players to go away.

  16. Nice shot of Burt Lancaster in Elmer Gantry.
    You could see this coming when GM and Chrysler went to congress with hat in hand, in ‘o8 i think it was. If you watched it at all you could see the hostility elected officials had towards the carmakers. They wanted them gone. Always looking for a way to hamstring the auto industry they have found the perfect construct in climate scare. As Ben Franklin put it, “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

  17. I think it is important to listen what we people say, but even more important to see what they do. Anyone who has lived life realize most people talk a lot of shit, but it is their actions that decipher the kind of individual they are.

    Dodge is doing (not saying), what most of us pure-bloods did…sit back and wait. Look at Dodge/Ram’s history in the EV market-they were the last to the party. They were still manufacturing Chargers and Challengers while both Ford and GM jumped on the EV bandwagon. I read recently that Dodge is bringing back a gasoline powered Challenger in 2025. Yeah, they are replacing the V8 with a turbo V6 (yuck), but they realize what butters their bread and it isn’t an electric car.

    Dodge is anticipating the long game. They are pretending to play along to get along. I am not a huge supporter of that. I would have a lot more respect for them if they told the federal government to kiss their ass, but I also realize that puts a target on their back. When millions of dollars are at stake and thousands of jobs maybe bucking the system isn’t the wisest decision.

    I wouldn’t pull the rug from underneath Dodge yet. Toyota, Mazda, and Dodge seem to be the only ones that are seeing the big picture. They know the technology, infrastructure, and desire for EVs isn’t there, which is why they haven’t gone all in. They are just sitting down and shutting up while waiting for their competitors to destroy themselves.

  18. This answers the Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn question of why people don’t fight back – the U.S. is turning to Communism and no one’s doing a thing except count down the days until the gulags are open.

  19. They have poisoned our water, fluoride,,, poisoned our food, MRNA pumped into pigs and everything else they can think of,,, stolen any fun, flying used to be s great adventure, today with shoes in hand watching your wife an children being felt up by govpedo’s sort of kills the fun. Loading up the station wagon for a vacation, today few can afford a real vacation and there are no station wagons.
    The worse part is having to deal with the “We don’t care crowd”. You name it,,, they don’t care. Flying foreign flags in our halls of government. In a normal society the buildings would have been burned to the ground with the traitors inside. Not Americans. They shrug their shoulders, shake off the insults and carry on. These traitors in corpgov have no room to talk about the Jan 6 made up bullshit.
    If not for the USA the killing in Ukraine would have been over long ago. The J’s in Israel would have run out of bombs to kill Palestinian women and children. For sure would piss off the USA MIC warmongers.

    • “fluoride” the #1 side effect of this drug is not caring.

      Been in our water food and drink for over 50 years now. So don’t expect people to care, they don’t.

      WE HAVE BEEN DRUGGED. Period.

      Very few of us have been wise enough to avoid fluoride once we realized what it was doing to us.

      And boy, this world sure does suck when you actually do care.

    • The flouride story….

      The slave owning control group owns the big corporations through Blackrock, Vangaurd, etc…
      Some of the corporations they owned had flouride left over as a waste product, from industrial processes.

      They decided to dump the flouride in the slave’s drinking water…they sold it to the cities….

      This damaged the slave’s health and lowered their IQ…..two goals on their agenda…keep the slaves weak and stupid….

      Profiting through causing harm….

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJ_CvgT47bI

  20. I imagine a lot of executives think about EVs as a marketing problem to be solved. Trouble is, they have no idea how to market an EV. No one would ever dream of marketing a car by showing you stuck in your daily commute, or running to the grocery store, even though that’s probably where an EV begins to make sense. No, the agencies are so hidebound that they continue to put a pretty girl driving on the PCH or some other gorgeous back road, knowing full well the only way an EV could speed along like that is if it were trailered there (which it likely was).

    Why not show someone unplugging their car, hoping in and heading to work? On the way show them in the HOV lane even though they’re not carpooling. Show them at the grocery store, while their car tops up at the charging station. Play to the strengths (such as they are) instead of trying to show it replacing gasoline, which we all know is a fantasy.

    And while you’re at it, really make an effort to lobby for lower tag and registration fees. Total cost of ownership matters, and even $3.50 gasoline doesn’t add much to the cost of owning a vehicle, especially if an EV owner uses commercial charging (and pays full cost for electricity, at ~$0.12 – $0.28 per kWh). This stuff ain’t free either you know.

    • ‘EVs [are] a marketing problem to be solved.’ — ReadyKilowatt

      In the shifting algorithmic sands of social media, auto makers are dead whales on the beach. A millennial’s lament:

      ‘Pursuing Instagrammability is a trap: the fast growth that comes with adopting a recognisable template, whether for a physical space or purely digital content, gives way to the daily grind of keeping up posts and figuring out the latest twists of the algorithm – which hashtags, memes or formats need to be followed.

      ‘Digital platforms take away agency from business owners, pressuring them to follow in lockstep rather than pursue their own creative whims. There’s a risk as well in hewing too closely to trends. If a trope becomes stale, the algorithmic audiences won’t engage with it.

      ‘That’s why the perfect generic coffee shop [or generic transportation device] keeps changing slightly, adding more potted plants [Clownscreen icons] or taking a few away. In the algorithmic feed, timing is everything.’

      https://archive.ph/ZPISS#selection-1567.0-1567.768

      No amount of Instagramming can save the 3-ton EeeVee whales.

      He’s gone country, look at them boots
      He’s gone country, back to his roots
      He’s gone country, big V8s still suit
      He’s gone country — here he comes

      — Alan Jackson, Gone Country

    • Trouble is, [a lot of executives] have no idea how to market an EV.

      That’s because the EV is an inferior product that’s not really marketable as anything else than a virtue signalling dEVice.

      Why not show someone unplugging their car, hoping in and heading to work? […] Show them at the grocery store, while their car tops up at the charging station.

      That would just highlight the fact that charging is ridiculously slow, and that’s probably not something manufacturers want to broadcast. (In fact, many EV manufacturers boast that it is possible to fast charge their EVs, which is a blatant lie, but they do it nevertheless..)

      On the way show them in the HOV lane even though they’re not carpooling.

      And admit in a marketing context that the EV is such a fundamentally unattractive proposition that it is necessary for the government (!) to intervene and provide EVs with an artificial advantage that may be arbitrarily restricted or removed at any time at the government’s whim?

      Play to the strengths (such as they are)

      EVs have no real strengths, and that’s the problem. EVs need to go away, that’s the solution.

      • You’re not thinking like a marketing guy. Especially one that might have graduated from an Ivy League school, hired on to a top Madison Ave firm, whose award winning campaigns pushed sales and even created a catchphrase or two.

        These types don’t believe the product matters, only their ability to create a brand around it.

  21. Once you realize the average person has no spiritual belief in something greater than themselves, it’s easy to understand how we got here. No morals.

    Might just as well collect $20M or so a year to run a company into the ground. Don’t have any other choice you see. My new God (government, climate change, Blackrock, WEF, whatever . . . ) told me I “have” to.

    Same thing as all the useless quacks that went along with mask mandates and mandates for injections an EXPERIMENTAL potion. No morals, no courage, no brain. . . Just go along to get along.

    Pathetic.

    • I think you’re on to something, Let it Burn –

      I have tried to understand why almost no one in a prominent position at a major automaker (Akio Toyoda is an exception; so also Sergio Marchionne) is willing to publicly stand up to this, even if it means the loss of their job. They can certainly afford to – a luxury most of us haven’t got. Anyone who gets paid hundreds of thousands per year (if not millions) should have Fuck You money. They also ought to have the confidence in themselves and their value to be willing to risk losing a job that requires them to suck tailpipe as the condition of remaining employed – because they ought to be able to find another job. If you’re that worried about losing the job you’ve got.maybe you ought to be worrying about something deeper…

      • I’ve been blessed (or cursed) to have been allowed to see a glimpse of how the truly wealthy think and live.

        Truth be told. Enough is never enough.

        Have to own a private jet. Not because it makes financial sense or saves time. Have to own the jet so you fit in with the other cool kids at the Mar-a-Lago club, Davos, etc.

        Auto execs are vain. They are no longer content to run an auto company. They now want to be like the cool kids running tech and start ups. Wannabe like Apple, Google, Tesla. Screw those degenerates in flyover country that don’t want to do what they are told. They don’t see the irony that the auto industry is part of the flyover country. If only we could evolve the industry into something new, cool, modern.

        • Think about little Billy Ford. Born into wealth and privilege. But all his “friends” think he’s wrecking the earth and is going to cause the oceans to boil.

          Not only does little Billy embrace EVs . . . No he champions them at his own peril.

          Henry must be proud.

        • Ah yes big B…..
          I’ve seen how “ the other half 😂” lives….
          While hanging in Palm Beach county for a time….
          You’re correct these individuals have simply divorced themselves from 95% of humanity and are “on Elysium “

          The Classic “tell” is asking the WALL ST
          Question…. Okay Gordon HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH !

          There will be a dismissive response ….from a psychopath….
          Holy cow Bezoar Bezos ..Just purchased another yahchet….. I only own 3 so damn 🤔I’m going to have to squeeze the workforce
          To afford a 4th!
          Pssst July 14th …..IS APPROACHING.. hint hint

          • Oh forgot to mention July 14th will be the 235? anniversary of the Frog revolution…..I think??

            Oh heck, I’m an old fart ….And I “lost my head” for a second…
            Hint, Hint…..

        • I always wanted to walk up to one of those rich old guys in Aspen and tell them how beautiful “their daughters” were. Probably end up floating face down in Rudi reservoir after their security man gets through with me though.

          Trade in the wife for a new one. Very expensive but often satisfying.

      • I’ve wondered aloud here why oil company executives don’t fight the climate hoax or EV scam. Where is their sense of self preservation?

        • Hi Mike,

          Exxon is sitting at $117 a share and Chevron is at $165. Exxon’s gross profit at the end of 2023 was $85 billion. Chevron’s was $77 billion. The oil companies aren’t going anywhere.

          Just another case of watching their competition eradicate themselves as they chug along doing they have always done.

          • RG, during the 2020 lockdown of the planet, XOM fell to 30 USD per share, a lot of other oil corporations fell too. Continental’s share price suffered. Equinor was at 14 dollars, now at 27 USD.

            Oil consumption went from 100,000,000 bpd down to 91,000,000 bpd. Petroleum companies exist and have been around for more than 100 years. Pennzoil has been around awhile. Where did that name come from? Quaker State your car!

            The demand is there, hence the supply, the market does all of the talking. If nobody wanted oil, no demand, it would be the end of oil.

            Don’t need no stinkin’ supply, nobody wants any of the stuff. When pigs fly.

            Not the case, oil sells, fungible too. Armies fight for the oil, might have to, however, it is better to reach goals through diplomacy.

            Something the US gov has zero interest in, diplomacy doesn’t work when bombs are used.

            Actions speak louder than words. Billy club the protesters.

            Time to go all Kent State, deja vu all over again. Have to wait about five days, though. When all else fails, beat them into submission, teach your children well.

            Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) had a share price of $5.00 per share in 2014. AMD is 157 USD per share with a PE of 299. 299 falling to 10 is going to make a mark.

            PE’s are in the stratosphere these days.

            Bibi is the Charles Manson of the Jews, the bodies are stacked as high as he can see. Madness gone plaid. A dream come true for Charles.

  22. Mitt Romney Republicans agree with the enemy and hope that the Netflix documentary is as kind as the one Hollywood made about the Mittens 2012 campaign.

    Jeb! is still sore that the Orange Man cost him a legacy of a similar documentary covering the 2016 campaign. The cabal would still like to get George P. (Diddly) elected Governor in Texas, but the clock is ticking on the legacy.

    • The big problem facing the Bush cabal is that Mitt Romney Republicans already run Texas as the state drifts blue. What would be the point of Governor George P. (Diddly) other than extending the Dynasty?

  23. Speaking of Tesla, the reality of Eloon’s scam may finally be catching up with him:

    Tesla’s Autopilot and Full Self-Driving linked to hundreds of crashes, dozens of deaths
    NHTSA found that Tesla’s driver-assist features are insufficient at keeping drivers engaged in the task of driving, which can often have fatal results.
    Read in The Verge: https://stocks.apple.com/Az3PEhiwYQM2W4j1nZQGI7Q

    • Hi Mike!

      It’s interesting – telling – that Musk has been allowed to get away with selling his self-driving cars despite the fact that his self-driving cars have killed at least as many people as died in Ford Explorer rollover wrecks. Ford (and Firestone) got raked over the coals – and every new vehicle had to be fitted with tire pressure monitors. But Tesla can do no wrong…

  24. This is the ying and yang of modern college graduates. They are dipped in the scripture of communist wokism, but have a job to do that is incompatible with these teachings.

    Oh what to do? Half measures. Tight rope walk between survival and acceptance by the thought rulers.

    Weak men make hard times.

  25. Cheapskate Carlos at French Leyland (aka Stellantis) is counting on governments to force into existence an artificial market for his fundamentally flawed dEVices. He cannot even be bothered to fix those fundamental flaws, that’s why not even a single one of French Leyland’s BEVs is currently able to meet even extremely modest expectations of a 300 mile realistic range and a charging time of five minutes for 0-100 % battery capacity, and why in the next few years this will continue to be true. This is a testament to Cheapskate Carlos’s incompetence, and he can’t hide behind ridiculous “excuses” like blaming the laws of physics, because if a technology is rendered unfit for purpose as a result of such limitations, Cheapskate Carlos should not have been using that technology in the first place, and he most certainly should not have bet the farm on it.

  26. “I think the fact that they’re imposing a ramp-up of [EV sales] makes sense,” [Tavares] said.

    As the New York Slimes asserted last week, ‘Auto companies grudgingly say they want the rules to stay. One major reason: Automakers are now designing the vehicles they will put in showrooms by 2028, said John Bozzella, president of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation.’

    On its website, AAI blathers on: ‘We are on the leading edge of transforming personal mobility, in a cleaner, safer, and smarter manner.’ Who asked AAI to ‘transform personal mobility’? Big Gov did, not the customers. Who says auto makers are ‘smart’? Why, they themselves. We are not obliged to agree.

    In the long-gone 20th century, cars meant freedom — freedom to go where you wanted; to customize the vehicle to your taste. Now cars are telematically-tethered, chip-encrusted, bureaucrat-designed spyware, built by collaborationist auto makers. Algorithms harry the ‘driver,’ an increasingly redundant button-pusher of Clownscreen menus.

    From the aspirational objects of our youth, cars have morphed into loathsomely bland, overly-complex appliances, having zero interest or appeal.

    The next recession will provide us with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to line up automakers against a wall like Elena and Nikolae Ceaușescu and dispatch them into the waiting arms of Chapter 7 liquidation. As Wikipedia recalls, ‘Before the legal proceedings began, General Victor Stănculescu already had selected the spot where the execution would take place: along one side of the wall in the barracks square.’

    Verdict first, trial later: death to collaborationist auto makers.

    • Unfortunately, once Western automakers collapse, our choices will largely be limited to disposable, low-quality cars from Chabuduo Motors.

      • We must level AAI’s compromised, insular little club to the ground, to build something new from the ashes.

        Soichiro Honda got his start in postwar Japan, amid the wreckage.

        All-new players — none of them government dupes — will bring a fresh perspective.

    • There never was such a thing as “the EV revolution”.

      In general, people should be wary of people who use the definite article to describe something they want to wish into existence by asserting it as a reality.

  28. As I’ve often pointed out to socialist/communist adversaries, the only way one can make money in a free market is by serving their customers. They must offer a product people want, are willing to buy, at a price they are willing and able to pay, with acceptable or better quality. No guns required.

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