Posted on 05/29/2009 9:21:13 AM PDT by IrishMike
There appears to be a side to the Chrysler bankruptcy that has the look of an ugly partisanship not seen in this town since Tricky Dick Nixon was in the White House composing his enemies list and checking it twice every night while watching the evening TV newscast.
Bloggers on the Right side of the Blogosphere are up in arms over data suggesting that President Obamas White House auto industry potentates are targeting for closure Chrysler dealers with records of contributing either to Republicans like John McCain or to other Democrats in the 2008 presidential primary.
Posts at RedState, Reliapundit, American Thinker, Gateway Pundit, Joey Smith and Doug Ross pointed intitially at the remarkable number of closed Chrysler dealerships whose owners happen to have been contributors to Obama opponents, mainly Republicans.
But those observations were all couched with important qualifiers, particularly that all conclusions were necessarily preliminary, pending completion of a comprehensive analysis of the political contributions by all closed Chrysler dealership owners, and a comparison of those results with contributions by dealers who are not being closed.
That said, when multiple dealers who have been closed are found to have contributed millions to Republicans and mere hundreds to Obama, the serious number-crunching cannot be completed too soon.
Then there is the Reuters report quoting a lawyer representing dealers being closed who came away from a deposition of a senior Chrysler executive with the distinct impression that the company is simply following orders coming from the White House.
"It became clear to us that Chrysler does not see the wisdom of terminating 25 percent of its dealers. It really wasn't Chrysler's decision. They are under enormous pressure from the President's automotive task force," said attorney Leonard Bellavia.
Bellavia zeroed in on the fundamental problem with Obamas takeover of two of Detroit Big Three something is terribly wrong when the government tells corporations who to hire and fire, what products to sell and who will be their dealers.
"What is the next task force? Shoe stores? Pizzerias?" Bellavia said. "The problem we have is the free enterprise system is not run by the government, it's run by business entrepreneurs. The dealers themselves will decide if it's not productive to go forward."
....White House car czar Steven Rattner is married to Maureen White, the former national finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee. And let's not forget that before Rattner became a Wall Street mover and shaker, he was a New York Times reporter.
Second, since neither Chrysler, nor the White House have made public the criteria used to select dealers for elimination - and because a significant number of those being closed were profitable - the only way to resolve the inevitable controversy about political considerations in political decisions is to make the criteria public and allow independent outside observers to assess how those criteria were applied....
What Obama is doing is illegal period and these panty waist coporations are right in there with him.
“make the criteria public and allow independent outside observers to assess how those criteria were applied....”
The kenyan goat herder won’t even release his birth certificate, or his college transcripts so he ain’t going to release the criteria for closing the dealerships.
Open and transparent my a$$!
Change.
Quote from an attorney who Deposed Chrysler’s president last week: “It became clear to us that Chrysler does not see the wisdom of terminating 25 percent of its dealers... It really wasn’t Chrysler’s decision. They are under enormous pressure from the President’s automotive task force.”
You know what, sometimes it is the small things that turn into the big things. The big 0 needs to be pressed on this.
Sounds silly. Why just Chrysler (Jeep/?) and not Ford and GM too?
I've been reading these blogs for a week now.
And now - it's making national news.
I can't wait till these conservative dealers file class actions lawsuits against One Big Ass Mistake, America (OBAMA).
My wife is certain that they eventually will use political affiliation to deny health care to republicans. She is a cancer survivor and is panic stricken over this.
Sadly I only half doubted it and now this. I really think teh health care “reform” could be a hooror story for many and it must be prevented.
Chrysler is smaller than Ford or GM.
Just a better place to start.
They need to make it a RICO action.
” White House car czar Steven Rattner is married to Maureen White, the former national finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee.”
Wonder if Mrs Rattner was driving a Chrysler when she had her DUI last October ?
The DUI that was mysteriously ( sarc ) ignored by the New York media.
Michael Wolff, the liberal writer for Vanity Fair, discusses the cover up here.
http://www.newser.com/off-the-grid/post/46/would-be-car-czar-silences-press-over-dwi-wife.html
Using the list of all 789 dealerships to be closed, WND found that owners contributed $450,000 to GOP presidential candidates; $7,970 to Sen. Hillary Clinton; $2,200 to John Edwards and $450 to Barack Obama. For the “progressives” out there, that’s a 1000-to-1 ratio of GOP-to-Obama donations for closed dealerships.
Item 2: Dealership conglomerate RLJ is owned by Democrat bigwigs Mack McLarty and Robert Johnson. RLJ magically happened to keep all six (6) of their dealerships while its competitors were shuttered. McLarty is a former Clinton chief-of-staff and Robert Johnson (founder of BET) is a major Democrat fundraiser. These politically connected, powerful Democrat supporters were completely insulated from the closings in every market in which they compete.
Item 3: Democratic donor Sidney Deboer is Chairman of Lithia Motors. He donated over $14,000 to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY). Lithia Motors lost only two of its 29 dealerships while gaining as many as five additional ones in the resulting carnage. Deboer was also insulated from Chrysler’s closings.
Item 4: Steven B. Fader contributed the individual maximum to Hillary Clinton for her 2008 campaign: $4,600. Fader is listed as owning four dealerships. Two of those dealerships are in Virginia Beach, VA: Hall Chrysler Jeep and Hall Dodge.
In the Virginia Beach area, Fader’s competitor Grafton Dodge (in Grafton, VA) was shuttered. Grafton is owned by L. A. Julien, Jr., who does not appear to have contributed to either party. Another Fader competitor, Tysinger Motor Company was also closed. Tysinger is owned by Mark Tysinger, who also does not appear to have contributed to either party. Fader’s two dealerships in the same city remain open, while nearby competitors were shuttered.
Another Fader dealership that remains open is Heritage Chrysler in Baltimore, MD. Nearby dealers that were closed include Antwerpen Dodge of Randallstown, MD owned by Jacob Antwerpen (no contributions founds); SKS Auto-Park of Baltimore; Bel-Air Dodge of Baltimore; and Schaefer & Strohminger Dodge Towson of Baltimore. The latter three are owned by Louis M. Schaefer, who has no contributions of any kind listed. Put simply, Fader’s dealership remained whole while four area competitors were wiped out.
The final Fader dealership is Motorworld Chrysler, in Wilkes Barre, PA. It remains open while nearby Pompey Dodge of Kingston, PA and Ertley Chrysler Jeep Dodge of Moosic, PA were both closed. Charles W. Pompey and Ronald D. Ertley are the owners, respectively, and neither contributed to any candidates in 2006 or 2008. Much of Fader’s competition in this area was also wiped out.
George Orwell was correct it is now 1984
Wonder if Mrs Rattner was driving a Chrysler when she had her DUI last October ?
.
.
.
.
: Steve Rattner, the man appointed by President Obama to redeem the American auto industry. But it’s not all that complicated to determine at least one of the cars in Rattner’s fleet. The couple’s 2006 black Mercedes-Benz 350 (New York license plate #CSL1498!) was entered into the public record when his wife, Maureen White, was arrested for drunk driving last October.
Ford did not take money From the Government, GM is not far enough into the bankruptcy process to begin cancelling franchises, they will be in a few weeks.
If only. I like the Examiner and it's affiliated group of newspapers. They do yeoman's work. But, I wouldn't classify them as a "national" newspaper.
The sad fact of the matter is unless the WaPo or the NYTs (or perhaps a handful of weeklies) get on this story, it's just going to slowly fade away. Of course, that will never happen.
None of the national newspapers or broadcast networks are going to touch this - at all. Even if FNC ran with this story every day for a month, it still wouldn't make it into the American zeitgeist.
Dieing or not, the traditional media still has a tremendous amount of power, especially if they want to bury a story. They're going to be burying a lot of stories the next three years.
“Chrysler is smaller than Ford or GM.
Just a better place to start.”
As Kerry said, ‘would that it were.’
Being smaller would only narrow the focus of impropriety (as I’m sure you know)
Bill Ayers: Praire Fire:
any typos are mine.
"We need a revolutionary communist party in order to lead the struggle, give coherence and direction to the fight, seize power and build a new society." "Our intention is to disrupt the empire, to incapacitate it, to put pressure on the cracks, to make it hard to carry out its bloody functioning against the people of the world, to join the world struggle, to attack from the inside." "Our job is to tap the discontent seething in many sectors of the population, to find allies everywhere people are hungry, to mobilize poor and working people against imperialism." "Our final goal is the destruction of imperialism, the seizure of power, and the creation of socialism. Our strategy for this stage of the struggle is to organize the oppressed people of the imperial nation itself to join the colonies in the attack on imperialism. This process of attacking and weakening imperialism invloves the defeat of all kinds of national chauvinism and arogance; this is a precondition to our fight for socialism."
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