Throwing money down the drain

The US automakers are heading to Washington to ask that the United States taxpayers bail them out for their financial imprudence. Next Wednesday, the House Committee on Financial Services will hold hearings with the chief executives of the automakers, with the goal of determining whether to modify the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) such that money can also be given to the automakers. General Motors has stated that it might not survive the rest of 2008 without the government providing it aid. And while the automakers blame the credit markets, the reality is that the Big Three have been in dire financial straits for the past several years. Everyone knew that GM's strategy of relying on SUV's to survive would fail as soon as gas prices went up. The US automakers have a reputation for making uninspiring, fuel-inefficient, and unreliable cars. As a result, Toyota and Honda have been steadily taking market share away from them.

From the standpoint of being a resident of Michigan, I hope that the Congress does not pass any aid bills for the automakers. Michigan's economy has been undergoing a slow bleed for many years, and until its industrial sector undergoes a major realignment, the automakers will continue to drag Michigan's economy down. Giving taxpayer money to the automakers won't save them, as it is likely that they will soon be back in front of Congress begging for more. I would rather Michigan rip off the bandaid now instead of prolonging the agony. The immediate effects would be harsh, with significant job losses, more decreases in the housing market, and significant economic pain. And while I wouldn't be in immediate danger of losing my job, I would be personally affected if one or more of the US automakers went bankrupt.

Michigan's economy lives with the fantasy that the glory days of the automakers will return. Those days are long gone, and Michigan needs to take its destiny into its own hands and diversify its industrial base. We need to accept that the car market can really only support two of the Big Three players - and perhaps at half their current size. Perhaps then, Michigan residents will seek out jobs in sectors other than the auto industry, and Michigan's economy will be diverse enough to weather whatever the future brings our way.

The continuing march into the long night

If there was every a question of where the political loyalties of the mainstream media lay, this morning it was pretty clear. From some of the headlines and hyperbole in the articles, one would have thought that the Second Coming of Christ happened yesterday. In fact, it was only the First Coming of Obama, which to some elements of the media, might actually be more important. The New York Times had an article about the renewed hope in America that the rest of the world has due to Obama. A Washington Post headline blared, "On Distant Continents, Praise for Obama". Articles hoped for a new era of prosperity, and reading between the lines, one just knows that every little girl will finally get her pony under Obama. And these articles weren't even the ones on the opinion page.

Of course, the Dow Industrials fell 5.1% today, the economy is still a mess, and Social Security remains a mess of unpaid IOU's. Russia continues to exercise its nationalistic tendencies, Iran is still in turmoil with its neighbors and itself, and Venezuela still despises the United States. The automakers have not changed their goal of laying off thousands of employees, the national debt is out of control, and it's merely a matter of time before the government starts printing money just to stay afloat.

I wish good luck to all of the people partying like it's 1976, but may I suggest that now would be a good time to start saving money for a rainy day? Because a rainy day is coming, and one man's charisma can't change that.

Obama gets the gold

As the election results roll in, it appears that Obama has won the race for President. Granted, this has been widely expected for the past several weeks, but it is still an historic occasion that the people of the United States voted for the first non-white President. While we are far from the color-blind society championed by Martin Luther King Jr., it is nice to know that we have made a little progress over the past four decades.

It remains to be seen what President-elect Obama's policies will look like once he moves past the campaigning stage. Will he merely play the role of a "progressive" Democrat in order to appease the left wing of his party, or will he swing far to the left towards full socialism? Given the recent trends towards economic socialism by the Bush administration in partially nationalizing banks, Freddie Mac, and Fannie Mae, I worry that the United States is poised on the slope for full-blown socialism. If the government continues to purchase ownership stakes in companies, nationalizes health care, and starts massive transfers of money from the "wealthy" to the "middle-class" (however one defines these terms), a socialist state might not be far behind.

Still, the Republicans have done such a miserable job over the past eight years that they deserved their fall from grace. Hopefully this election will force the party to figure out if it is the party of the Gingrich revolution, or the party of Paulson's buddies on Wall Street.

Home to Vote

I flew home to Ann Arbor this weekend in response to a summons for jury duty. As it turns out, the court does not need my service for this week, and so I am off the hook for jury duty. I will vote in the election on Tuesday, and then head back to DC for another week of work inside the Beltway. I spent some time today researching the candidates for all of the state and local elections on my ballot, which is a tedious process. For example, choosing a candidate for Trustee of Michigan State University isn't as easy as picking a Federal congressional representative. Many of the candidates for the state and local races don't have websites, so it's hard to figure out where they stand on the issues.

I had an unexpected chore tossed my way yesterday. After doing a load of laundry, I threw in a new load of clothes into the dryer, pressed the start button, and ... nothing. It was a bit of a suprise for the dryer to suddenly be as dead as a doornail. This afternoon, I started dismantling the dryer and testing the various parts. I found that the dryer door switch had broken. Luckily, I should be able to buy a replacement for under $20, which will be far better than having to spend $400 to purchase a new entry-level dryer.

Other than having to take care of the dryer and other issues around the house, I have really enjoyed being home. Tonight, my roommate and I had dinner at Grizzly Peak, and then drinks at Ashley's. Tomorrow, I get to work from home, and hopefully, I will catch up a bit on the backlog of administrative work I have to do.