Free Republic

Coming just a week after Coke made waves when it aired the first Super Bowl ad to showcase a set of same-sex parents, the car-maker's new campaign is called "The New Us" and portrays a series of wide-ranging families. "And while what it means to be a family hasn't changed," intones the Chevrolet narration over clips that include nuclear families, mixed race couples, adoptive parents, gay and lesbian parents, combinations of the above, and others, "what a family looks like, has. This is the new us." The games have been criticized for taking place in Russia, which has made "gay...

General Motors announced disappointing earnings results today and issued a warning that first quarter results will underwhelm as well. The reasons behind the earnings' miss are surely going to be explained away by pundits and proponents of the company still known as Government Motors to many. Sorting through the smoke and mirrors can lead to some important and simple explanations as to what is going on at GM. Before looking at the reasons why GM has drastically underperformed the broader markets since the Obama-orchestrated bankruptcy process of 2009, let's take a look at one of the most critical takeaways from...

The Obama Administration may have sold the last of the taxpayers' shares in General Motors, but it appears that politics will continue to play a powerful role in the management of the company. New GM CEO Mary Barra did not seem too concerned about appearances when she attended the State of the Union as Obama's guest. Her predecessor Dan Akerson in previous months had gone to great lengths to distance GM from the federal government. With President Obama praising Ms. Barra in front of the nation, the field is once again set for GM to take the stage during upcoming...

I made these remarks today at the National Press Club in Washington, DC before the luncheon speech of outgoing General Motors CEO Dan Akerson: President Obama justified the auto bailout by predicting it would make money for the taxpayer. With Treasury now selling its remaining shares, the direct loss is about $10 billion. So on its most fundamental level, the auto bailout is a failure. But that $10 billion figure dramatically understates the true cost. There were separate multibillion dollar bailouts of Ally Financial, formerly know as GMAC, and Delphi and other suppliers. There was cash for clunkers, the government...

Peter Flaherty, president of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), today posed key questions to the General Motors leadership at a National Press Club press conference, including whether the company will repay to taxpayers the $10 billion direct cost of the GM bailout. News that the U.S. Treasury Department has sold its remaining stake and that Mary Barra will take over as GM's new CEO have put the spotlight on the company and its future. GM executives have pointed to GM's $26.8 billion in cash as evidence of its improved financial position. Analysts have raised the possibility that the...

<p>With final losses from the auto industry bailout near $15 billion, President Obama is using fuzzy math to claim that taxpayers lost no money on his administration’s portion of the rescue program, analysts say.</p> <p>On the heels of the Treasury Department’s announcement Monday that it was selling its final shares of General Motors Co. acquired during the 2008-09 bailout, Mr. Obama seems more intent on claiming credit and avoiding blame than providing taxpayers with a final accounting of the bailout that also included Chrysler LLC and GM’s financing arm, Ally Financial.</p>

General Motors Co. said Wednesday it will stop making cars and engines in Australia by the end of 2017, with nearly 2,900 jobs to be lost, because of high production costs and competition. The decision could spell the end of car manufacturing in Australia as the industry will be too small for supporting businesses such as parts makers to remain economic. Toyota Motor Corp. announced it is reassessing its future in Australia. A union said 50,000 jobs in the auto industry are in jeopardy. GM’s Australian subsidiary Holden once dominated Australian auto sales, but lost market share to imported cars....

General Motors (GM) tapped products chief Mary Barra to become the auto maker's first female CEO, taking the keys from current chief Dan Akerson who will step down ahead of schedule in January. The promotion of Barra instantly makes her the most powerful woman in Detroit and one of the most influential in corporate America. The move comes just hours after the Treasury Department exited its ownership of GM following the auto bailouts of 2008 and 2009.

One of the major architects of the General Motors bankruptcy process, Harry Wilson, recently gave a very optimistic outlook for GM future share price. Mr. Wilson was a member of President Obama's Auto Task Force, and was an instrumental player in seeing that UAW interests were put ahead of other creditors, like old GM bondholders. Automotive News now reports that Mr. Wilson feels that GM may be a target for activists because of their "huge" cash hoard. According to the piece: "Any company that isn't efficient about capital allocation is a target for activists," said Wilson, who is now a...

Washington’s $49.5 billion bailout of General Motors saved at least 1.2 million jobs, protected hundreds of thousands of pensions and earned about $40 billion in tax collections, turning what some have dubbed a poor investment into a whopping bang for Uncle Sam, according to a new report. The bottom line, according to the Center for Automotive Research study heralded by GM: When the full picture of what was at stake is considered, including the potential for millions to be put out of work, the government actually made out big time. And when bailed-out Chrysler is included, the study found that...

The Chevy Malibu, which first appeared in 1964, has grown and improved immensely throughout its lifetime. Now, in its 50th year, it is offered with a standard 2.5L four-cylinder engine and also features stop/start technology, numerous safety features, and plenty of comfort and connectivity - a far cry from its predecessor. It has gained about 14 percent fuel economy in the city (25 mpg) and 6 percent highway (36 mph) since the 2013 model alone, and delivers 65 percent more horsepower than the '64 Malibu's 3.2L six-cylinder. When it debuted in 1964, dubbed Chevy's first "intermediate" car, it was one...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury Department said it expected to sell its remaining shares of General Motors Co by the end of the year, a plan that may leave taxpayers with a shortfall of about $10 billion on the automaker's 2009 bailout. Treasury on Thursday said it had completed the sale of 70.2 million shares of GM stock and to date had recouped $38.4 billion from the $49.5 billion taxpayer-funded rescue of the Detroit company. At current prices, Treasury would recoup another $1.2 billion from its remaining stake, bringing its total recovery to $39.6 billion. "Our goal was never...

General Motors is recalling nearly 60,000 Chevy Malibu midsize cars to fix window defrosters that may not work and power seat wiring that can catch fire. … GM dealers will reprogram the computer at no cost to customers. The company says it doesn’t know of any crashes or injuries from the problem. …

President Obama loves taking credit for saving the American auto industry and this week a federal audit reveals that the rescue effort has fleeced U.S. taxpayers out of an astounding $9.7 billion. While this may seem inconceivable to most, the numbers don’t lie. The United States Treasury has recorded a $9.7 billion loss on its $49.5 billion bailout of General Motors, according to a report released this week by the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). Remember the $700 billion boondoggle created to help stabilize the nation’s financial system during the 2008 crisis by purchasing “toxic...

The past month has brought much confusion and concern for General Motors' shareholders regarding the most important and profitable segment of sales for the company. As the company prepares to report earnings for the third quarter this week, media reports are still unclear on just what is going on with GM's new truck lineup; specifically pertaining to the reasons behind the disappointing sales figures that were reported for the month of September when Ford's truck offerings left them in the dust. While GM's Obama-appointed management spun the story ( claiming supply could not keep up with demand ) to some...

Chevy Silverado: "Strong" Commercial | Chevrolet 1:03 minute One of the most disappointing aspects of last week's sales results from General Motors was the underperformance of the much-hyped new truck offerings from the company. While the industry-leading Ford F-Series saw sales increase about 10 percent to around 60,500 vehicles for the month, GM's combined sales for its competing Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra fell approximately 8 percent to about 46,000 units. GM's Obama-appointed management's performance in trying to explain the declining sales was as lame as the sales results. Amongst the excuses for disappointing truck sales, GM did not include...

The U.S. government is starting another phase of selling off its General Motors stock after cutting its stake in the automaker to just over 7 percent. The Treasury Department says it still owns 101.3 million GM shares. It got 912 million shares, a 60.8 percent stake in the company, in exchange for a $49.5 billion bailout of GM in 2009. So far taxpayers have recovered about $36 billion. That means they’re still around $13.5 billion in the hole. …

As automakers race to make cheaper electric cars with greater battery range, General Motors is working on one that can go 200 miles per charge at a cost of about $30,000, a top company executive said. Vice President of Global Product Development Doug Parks wouldn’t say when or if such a car will be built, however. … The 200-mile car would cost about the same as the current Volt, and it would match the range and be far cheaper than Tesla Motors’ $71,000, all-electric Model S. The Model S can go up to 265 miles on a single charge. …

The Canadian government said on Tuesday it had a deal to sell nearly a quarter of its common shares in General Motors Corp (GM.N), part of a longer-term plan to shed the stake it acquired when it helped bail out the automaker. It said the shares were sold at the closing market price on Tuesday, minus a small discount. GM shares finished the session at $37, putting the value of the stake at about $1.11 billion. The governments of Canada and the province of Ontario, the heartland of the country's auto sector, became shareholders of GM in 2009 when they...

As much as electric car builders hail their vehicles as the future of transportation, one question they couldn't answer fully was just how well their vehicles would withstand a crash. Automakers have spent decades finessing their chassis; what happened when an engine-less vehicle went head-on into a barrier wasn't clear, and as the post crash-test smoldering of a Chevy Volt demonstrated, the batteries posed new challenges. Leave it to Tesla to provide the first hard evidence — with data from U.S. government tests showing the Model S sedan may be the most crash-proof passenger vehicle on the road today. Normally,...