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Tuesday, February 2, 2010

The Toyota Metaphor




After 50 years of growing a corporation, a brand, a reputation, Toyota went down. It went down rather quickly, but began to trip over its feet several months ago, and some might rightfully say years ago. Toyota became the most respected name in automotive manufacturing. Quality and reliability were its first names.

It went down due to continued outsourcing of its parts, lack of quality control, and possibly, over expansion. It began to over-plant its fields stripping the soil of its vital nutrients. Instead of manufacturing its own parts, it outsourced them to places where they were far from the corporation’s laboratories. They fell from grace because of a sticky gas pedal. Several months ago, its flagship brand, Lexus, rolled a car off its line, and into the hands of an unsuspecting owner who, along with two others, met their death because the gas pedal got stuck against the floor.

At first, the cause was said to be from the floor mat, so floor mats were recalled and modified. But the problem persisted. It got to the point where around 8 of Toyota’s brands were suspended from sales. Dealers were freaked out that they would be risking defaults on their loans they made to obtain cars. Mortgages on dealership buildings were at risk of defaults, too.

Consumers were trading in their Toyotas for models not at risk of a sticky pedal. Consumers were over-reacting and began to panic over what the company had not figured out. This is America. The land of the panicked, and home of the over-reacted. Be afraid!!! Be afraid of the sticky gas pedal. We must have our solutions right this damn minute. There is no time to waste. We want it now. Keep government out of my Medicare!

Toyota worked day and night with the gas pedal manufacturer once they realized the US consumer was ready to storm the dealerships and surround them with their Camrys, Corollas, Tacomas, and more. It was starting to get primitive, and looking like the cavalry surrounding the enemy. “Keep government out of my Medicare”, I heard confused, flustered and angry Teabaggers yelling out at the local Toyota service department representatives.

There were signs with “Obama” crossed out reading “Toyotacare: Seniors will be shovel ready!” I guess that meant they were ready to bury their Toyota. Here is another sign reading “Seems like Toyota (liberals crossed out) can sell (dish crossed out) it out, but can’t take it back. (Democrat and Republican crossed out) Toyota, Chevy, Chrysler: same sh*t different heap (pile crossed out).”

I guess I would have to say to anyone who is still driving their Toyota and worried, drive carefully!!! Drive more defensively. And drive with caution and with due diligence that at any moment you might have to shove it into neutral, pull it over, and cut the engine. Machines do screw up. There is no getting around it.

I find it a bit funny that Ray LaHood, President Obama’s transportation secretary, saying Toyota was a “little safety deaf” because it dragged its feet over its gas pedal problem. In this AP interview story titled “LaHood says Toyota slow to respond”:
"They should have taken it seriously from the very beginning when we first started discussing it with them," LaHood told AP. "Maybe they were a little safety deaf."
 AP wrote, LaHood also said the government was considering civil penalties for Toyota over its handling of the recalls but declined to elaborate. Sales fell 16 percent in January, hurt by Toyota's decision to halt sales while it sorted out a fix for problems with faulty gas pedals. Most other automakers reported sales gains for the month as the broader industry continued to show signs of improvement.
That problem prompted the company to recall 2.3 million vehicles two weeks ago in the United States. In October, Toyota recalled more than 4 million vehicles to replace floor mats that were suspected of causing accelerators to get stuck, leading to crashes. The recall has since grown to more than 5 million vehicles. Toyota has announced a separate fix for that problem, and parts for that repair are expected to arrive at dealerships beginning later this week. Beginning in 2003, the government conducted several investigations into reports of unwanted acceleration involving Toyota vehicles but failed to find any evidence that the vehicles were defective. When the government probed reports of floor mats in Lexus vehicles jamming gas pedals, Toyota said there was "no possibility of pedal interference" with the floor mats if they were placed properly and secured.
But a government survey of Lexus owners found dozens of reports of sudden acceleration and evidence that in some crashes owners had pressed hard on the brakes but failed to stop the vehicles. The investigation led Toyota to recall an accessory all-weather floor mat for 55,000 Lexus vehicles in September 2007.
The problems grew last August when a California Highway Patrol officer and three family members were killed in a high-speed crash aboard a 2009 Lexus ES350. The Lexus hit speeds exceeding 120 mph, struck a sport utility vehicle, launched off an embankment, rolled several times and burst into flames as a family member called 911.
Toyota hopes a small steel insert the size of a postage stamp will solve problems with friction that are blamed for the potential glitch. Dealers said they expected to receive parts for the fix starting Wednesday. LaHood said the Toyota recalls "may be the most serious safety issue that we have faced here at DOT" during his tenure. "This is a big deal, this is a big safety issue," LaHood said. (End)

Toyota was legally required by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to stop selling the cars that were at risk of gas pedal failure.

Wow! If only Goldman Sachs were told by the Treasury to stop selling securities and derivatives until they reduced their leveraging, and held more capital reserves before selling a single at-risk investment, and required all transactions be made in the open market then our president might have some sharper teeth when he bites back today!

Now, if only George W. Bush and President Obama had handled this Toyota incident in the same way as our economy, maybe the economy would be running safer and smoother.

Ray LaHood claimed this mechanical failure was a big deal and a big safety issue. Well, I would say that so was the economic and financial hijacking of our economy by the banking mobsters, such as Goldman Sachs, and AIG, Bank of America, and Wachovia, and the rest of the ‘too-big-to-failure’ bankstas.

But our rescue of the economic “big deal” was handled not for the consumer and the middle class investor saving for retirement, but for the richest 1% of the corporate elite, or the ‘corporate totalitelites’. Did the government tell the Bankstas to go out and find their own fix; to find their own financing? No. The fix was in for them. Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke, Bush, and Tim Geithner, and now Obama handed them the crazy glue in the form of TARP, and other Treasury and Federal Reserve bailouts totaling a support structure of $23 trillion, and Senators Chris Dodd and Barney Frank’s Senate Banking Committee have now agreed to offer another $4T if they need another bailout.

Now, Paul Volcker has made a strong recommendation to President Obama how to fix his “broken gas pedal problem” by, once again, separating out banks from investment houses and creating regulation that works. But, Geithner seems to be saying that is a bad idea and will cause a storm in the financial markets, even though that is what caused it in the first place, and the markets have been rallying because there are no regulations to speak of.

LaHood says the Toyota sticking gas pedal incident is the most serious safety issue seen at DOT. How about we rephrase that and say that the mega-banks feeding from the public trough, not abiding by government regulations, buying Congressional legislators and Bush43 to make laws that assisted their looting process, being over-leveraged, and under-capitalized during the time when they were selling fake securities to unknowing “Johns” who were caught with their pants down, while making huge piles of billions of dollars as they engaged in the destruction of the Real Economy by sending investment capital overseas to build Chinese manufacturing plants so as to make cheap stuff they could then export back to the unemployed American worker. 

Wow, Ray LaHood, wouldn’t you say that what I just described out-does ya? How about that what I just described has ended up being the biggest national security issue to face the US government?

Maybe the fix would have been a bit more complex that a postage stamp piece of metal, but just as you had gone over to Japan to express your concern on behalf of the American consumer, had our government leaders went into the offices of Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein and the other banksta CEO mobsters and told them that they were responsible for their own fixing so that the consumer would be safe and protected, otherwise they would have to go into bankruptcy court, and the FDIC would then step in break up the bloated behemoths into smaller pieces as the government protected the consumer’s investments. Then an investigation into possible crimes would then proceed.

This did not happen. Instead, Geithner, Bernanke, and Paulson made fabulous deals with these bankstas protecting their wealth and balance sheets, as well as the opportunities to pay huge bonuses during a time of economic hardship. Oh well. Just Keep Government Out Of My Medicare. That is all I want!!!

Just as millions of consumers were at risk of death and/or injury from the gas pedal defects, more Americans were taken down by the financial banking mobsters, to the tune of tens of trillions of dollars, than by this single car company, and the reverberations worldwide were much more powerful than aftershocks, yet our government reacted with more force and hyper-diligence to protect the consumer from risk of harm caused by a sticky gas pedal than we have seen over what many have coined the Second Depression.

Thanks Ray LaHood for making it clear that Toyota has been more important to consumers than this economic recession. I appreciate it, and feel better already.
So, is my Medicare looking freedom-like yet?

Thanks for reading, jerry

http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com



13 comments:

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

False Hope in Financial Free Lunch
by Richard Daughty

http://www.lewrockwell.com/daughty/mogambo29.1.html


Why The Government Wants To Hijack
Your 401K

http://moneymorning.com/2010/01/27/retirement-plans/


20 reasons Global Debt Time Bomb explodes soon
Commentary: Which trigger will ignite the Great Depression II?

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/our-debt-time-bomb-is-ready-to-go-ka-boom-2010-02-02?dist=beforebell

Anonymous said...

"LaHood says the Toyota sticking gas pedal incident is the most serious safety issue seen at DOT. How about we rephrase that and say that the mega-banks feeding from the public trough, not abiding by government regulations, buying Congressional legislators and Bush43 to make laws that assisted their looting process, being over-leveraged, and under-capitalized during the time when they were selling fake securities to unknowing “Johns” who were caught with their pants down, while making huge piles of billions of dollars as they engaged in the destruction of the Real Economy by sending investment capital overseas to build Chinese manufacturing plants so as make cheap stuff they could then export back to the unemployed American worker."

Wow. The most prescient paragraph I've read in he blogosphere so far this year! My old English teacher, Mrs. Jones, would say there's a run-on sentence in there, but what a magnificent run-on sentence it is indeed!

muralsigns said...

Hi Spectre,

I don't agree with the assumption that was written in Rockwell's piece that if the mega-banking investment predators have regulations placed upon them, and are charged penalties for one reason or another, then such fees will be passed onto to the average American client.

At this point, these are the very thieves that stole away the economy, and they have been given a Treasury ATM card, and a Fed Reserve debit card with no questions asked. They have racked up huge profits and bonuses.

If they begin to hit on the customers, then the customers will transfer their holdings and savings to competitor investment agencies, which would be happy to see the fat cats lose clients.

The possibility of a 401K theft into equities by the Fed, would be terrible. We will have to keep a close eye on the unfolding of this. Keep me posted what you find out!

The global time bomb debt has some valid points, but I don't totally agree with his positions.

I want to thank Anonymous for his or her very complimentary comment. Thank you so much!!! Even though there maybe a run-on or two, I would hope Mrs. Jones would put a smiley face next to that paragraph, too!

Thank you again!

jerry

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Jerry, as I have said many times, we are flat ass broke. Bread and circus for the sheeple has held everything together, but that is about to change. Prepare folks!!

Next in Line for a Bailout: Social Security

http://finance.yahoo.com/focus-retirement/article/108747/next-in-line-for-a-bailout-social-security?mod=fidelity-readytoretire

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Jerry, and here I was buying Tommy Bahama shirts and Bermuda shorts. LOL! This is the first time we haven't had a global warming summit during a major snowstorm. Meanwhile, Gore-be is becoming a BILLIONAIRE while peddling complete bullshit. Ain't Amerika great.


Eastern storm - The Albert Arnold Gore, Jr. Memorial Blizzard.

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

U.S. Intelligence Officials Asked State Department to NOT Revoke Crotch Bomber’s Visa
Published on 02-07-2010

http://www.blacklistednews.com/news-7318-0-20-20--.html

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

U.S. Counterterrorism Officials Insisted that Crotch Bomber Be Let Into Country

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/us-counterterrorism-officials-insisted-crotch-bomber-be-let-country

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Jerry, even the supposed good guys are wolves in sheep's clothing:


In a separate Wall Street Journal editorial, “Andrew Cuomo has more to answer for than does Bank of America.”

He sure does. The Journal quotes this document at HUD’s own web site bragging about what happened there during Cuomo’s tenure there (under “Increasing Homeownership and Helping Homebuyers”):

In July 1999, Secretary Cuomo established new Affordable Housing Goals requiring Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – two government sponsored enterprises involved in housing finance – to buy $2.4 trillion in mortgages in the next 10 years.

In other words, Cuomo created the framework for the housing bubble and subprime mortgage mess —and HUD is bragging about it.

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Obama’s $6.3 Trillion Scam Is America’s Shame: Jonathan Weil

Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Look through President Barack Obama’s proposed 2011 budget, and you’ll see a line calling for a $235 million increase in the Justice Department’s funding to fight financial fraud. Lucky for them, the people who wrote the budget can’t be prosecuted for cooking the government’s books.

Whether on Wall Street or in Washington, the biggest frauds often are the perfectly legal ones hidden in broad daylight. And in terms of dollars, it would be hard to top the accounting scam that Obama’s budget wonks are trying to pull off now.

The ploy here is simple. They are keeping Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac off the government’s balance sheet and out of the federal budget, along with their $1.6 trillion of corporate debt and $4.7 trillion of mortgage obligations.

Never mind that the White House budget director, Peter Orszag, in September 2008 said Fannie and Freddie should be included. That was when he was director of the Congressional Budget Office and the two government-backed mortgage financiers had just been seized by the Treasury Department.

The White House is already forecasting a $1.3 trillion budget deficit for 2011, which is about $3 of spending for every $2 of government receipts. By all outward appearances, it seems Obama and his budget wizards decided that including the liabilities at Fannie and Freddie would be too much reality for the world to handle. So they left the companies out, in a trick worthy of Enron’s playbook, except not quite so hidden.
(SNIP)

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=a.G6KFfaDdSc

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Jerry, this is my definition of a parabolic move. When this blows, we are done!


Net Federal Outlays - St. Louis Fed

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_pCDyiFUv9XU/S3AilYf3AII/AAAAAAAAIhU/-y3hM6RYgJo/s1600-h/Federal+outlays.png

SPECTRE of Deflation said...

Jerry, the comments below the article aren't mine, but they could be. Don't think for a minute they don't have an end game once the pillaging of the sheeple has been completed:

"Obama is upping his dictatorship another notch."

"Remember Missouri's Governor who had his state cops treat people with Chuck Baldwin or Ron Paul stickers as "domestic Terrorists"?"

"Well, Obama just named him to his new "Council" that will advise him on military actions INSIDE the U.S."


Missouri report tied 'domestic terrorists' with opposition to abortion, immigration (Or Ron Paul Support)
Posted: February 07, 2010
9:24 pm Eastern

By Bob Unruh
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

Missouri Gov. Nixon
President Obama has picked to advise him on military actions inside the U.S. the Missouri governor whose state "Information Analysis Center" last year linked conservative organizations to domestic terrorism and said law enforcement officers should watch for suspicious individuals who may have bumper stickers from Ron Paul or Chuck Baldwin.

Missouri Gov. Jeremiah Nixon, a Democrat, is being joined on the Obama's special advisory panel by the governor of Puerto Rico, Luis Fortuno, and Arizona Gov. Janice Brewer, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's replacement when she moved to Washington.

They are among Obama's nominations for the 10 positions on Obama's new "Council of Governors" that he will use for advice on "military activities in the United States."

WND reported earlier when Obama announced the council to advise on military actions in the U.S. and "to protect our nation against all types of hazards."

A subsequent WND report confirmed when a rebellion developed to the order, and a new push was launched for states to adopt laws limiting the use of their National Guard units unless there is an invasion, insurrection or other limited circumstance.
(SNIP)

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=124238

muralsigns said...

Hi Spectre,

Thanks for the incredible comments and links!

The connection between those inside the US government military complex knowing and following the pre 9/11 disaster even up to the moment clearly shows further that the event was sanctioned by Bush, and the CIA along with the Pentagon. The links posted on Zerohedge.com clearly outlines the layers leading up the September 11, 2001.

The allowance of the Testacle Bomber to enter the US, and put innocent passengers at risk shows that after 9/11 the American people are only pawns in a larger game played not unlike the one played during the Byzantine Empire era when the Christians and Islamists battled each other.

The chart showing how the US government is trying to Bubble, ie., asset inflate, itself out of a deep crevasse. We are doomed! There is no such thing as a jobless recovery especially when the joblessness and underjoblessness equals nearly 20%.

The piece about Cuomo was very disappointing to read. Where are the political heroes? There are really none anymore.

Thanks for sending those links to all of us!

jerry

muralsigns said...

Spectre,

You are right in that James Kunstler has a superior self image of himself. He often puts down others because he sees them as simple-minded in their ways, habits, and lifestyle.

He is an angry person.

He is also a frustrated person because he feels the nation is being led astray by people who have been brainwashing the sheeple into accepting their plight by those they should resist.

take care, jerry