Chevy Volt a Failure - GM to Layoff 1,300

As I understand it, the Tesla loan -- and, let's get this straight, from a Bush-initiated loan program to jump-start the building of advanced technology vehicles which also provided $5.9 billion to Ford and $1.4 billion to Nissan -- has been restructured and no interest payments have been missed. Perhaps you know something of which I'm unaware?

Further, I believe I've read that Tesla is coming off it's highest production month and that it expects to be cash flow positive by next month. Seems a pretty fast ramp-up for a company involved in expensive technology. Tesla has also announced it has moved up its earnings report to the day before the election.

Anyway, my main point is that I don't think you guys (or Gov. Romney, for that matter) even begin to understand how despicable you appear in rooting for the failure of an American company.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-57542722-76/tesla-celebrates-production-of-1000th-model-s-car/

 

This was a political "it was a mistake to bail out GM" thread from the very first post below. Perhaps you didn't notice?

I do not give a flying fuck about Tesla, other than the fact that it was being used as a way to beat up the president during election season. If the low-interest loans don't eventually get paid back, it becomes a problem. Until that, as far as I'm concerned, it's money being pumped into an economy that needs a capital injection.

But, beyond that, the Model S, seems to be taking electric cars to a new level in terms of performance. In other words, advancing the technology. There's a lot of good work being done here, so, frankly, it bothers me not a bit that Obama has chosen this particular "winner." The vehicles are getting great reviews and clean technology is worthy of government investment through the low-interest loan program, with which I also have no issue.

http://www.automobilemag.com/features/awards/1301_2013_automobile_of_the_year_tesla_model_s/

http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/tesla-model-2013-yahoo-autos-car-165907072.html

Whether the employees ever decide to organize a union is entirely up to them, not Musk, who isn't the first company owner who would rather his employees do not form a union.

Finally, the term "crony capitalism" is redundant. You seem fixated on this but patronage has been part of every political system since the dawn of mankind and will not end in our lifetimes. Better that the patronage in this case goes to a company that is advancing clean, environmental friendly technology (265-mile range, four-hour charge) rather than to, say, Haliburton or Blackwater.

So, again, let me know if the loan isn't repaid and I'll sign your petition or whatever but, until then, we've given a low-interest loan to a clean vehicle company that appears to be advancing the technology. I'm OK with it.

 

Apple sells the most expensive computer on the market, but people seem to have no problem buying them.

 

And yet they're not buying a whole lot of electric cars.

 

You have it wrong. I'm not rooting for any company to fail. I would love to see them all succeed wildly -- on their own.

 

Nice try.

http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/mbaumhefner/electric_car_sales_increase_22.html

 

We are $16 trillion in the hole, give or take. The liberal argument is that the government needs to make "investments" in these new technologies and that it's vital. No, it's not. In the free market, you have to make a case that your product or service is a viable one that will make money for investors. When it comes to government "investments," it's just a manner of filling the right politico's campaign coffers, damn the viability. Even if it's a loan and even if it represents a miniscule part of what is a ridiculously bloated federal budget, every little bit helps in keeping the debt monster that threatens to eat our economy and superpower status alive from overwhelming us.

And this "capital injection?" The government can only acquire money by diverting it from the private sector. That's capital that is needed elsewhere and is ducted to this claptrap garbage because lefties think western civilization is destroying the planet. The free market is the best utilizer of capital, not a corrupt government without an ounce of sense.

And where's the need? The only reason why oil prices are ridiculous is because we won't properly utilize our mammoth supply of fossil fuels. There's no need for these short-ranged, dangerous glamour projects designed to assuage the guilt of Starbucks-sipping liberals. Besides, you've got to generate the power somewhere and unicorns on treadmills, rainbows, geothermal, wind, cow farts and other pie-in-the-sky ideas aren't going to cut the mustard. Imagine what'll happen to our transmission lines if everyone had one of these fun-free automotive obscenities.

Teslas and Fiskers are nothing more than foreign-made toys for rich folks and are the last car companies that need to be getting checks cut from taxes stolen from my tiny check by the wizards of smart in D.C. And the Fiskers catch on fire, apparently, dockside in NYC in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.
http://www.autoblog.com/2012/10/31/hurricane-sandy-destroys-16-fisker-karmas-at-port-with-water-and/

What next, Porsche and Ferrari building electric cars and getting Federal money? It'd be no different than flushing dollars down the rathole to the snakeoil salesmen at Tesla and Fisker.

The internal combustion engine has been with us forever. It'll still be here long after the batteries in these short-legged styling exercises won't hold a charge. This is a fad, nothing more. I have no problem with people buying these useless hunks of scrap metal. I have no problem with people trying to build a better electric car that could survive in a real free market. But where I have a problem is that my tax dollars are going to support this garbage. Stay out of my pocketbook and get off my lawn.

 

From the story:

While it’s true that plug-in electric car sales still represent a very small fraction of total auto sales, model year 2012 saw about 38,000 Americans buying plug-in cars.


That's 38,000 out of the more than 14 million new cars expected to be sold in 2012 -- about 0.3 percent. And many of those (the majority in the case of the Volt -- I haven't checked on others), as pointed out earlier in this thread, are fleet and commercial sales, which are heavily discounted and make little profit for the manufacturer. The general car-buying public is buying very few plug-in electric cars.

 

The rest of the paragraph:

 

When you start at nothing, every sale is a big percentage increase.

 

Just like the Model T.