Posted on 08/04/2009 12:48:46 PM PDT by khnyny
Economists can argue back and forth in the media about the effect of big government programs such as the stimulus package and Obamacare but few things have illustrated government waste as effectively as this disturbing YouTube video in which a well running Volvo engine was destroyed as part of the Cash for Clunkers program. This video is currently going viral on the Web and has sparked outraged comments from many people whom I suspect have previously remained somewhat uninterested in the often elusive topic of economics. However, the wasteful destruction of this car seems to have awakened an economic sense of revulsion to an extent rarely seen before.
Here is a sampling of their YouTube comments which are in sharp contrast to the glowing praise of the Cash for Clunkers program prevalent in the MSM:
(Excerpt) Read more at newsbusters.org ...
I still can't make sense of this program. In most cases a perfectly good car that would have economic value to the dealer and practical value to a buyer is destroyed on government orders in a subsidy program my tax dollars pay for. This could only make sense to liberals.
If they have already gone through the one billion dollars at $4500. per clunker that would be more than 222,000 cars turned in and 222,000 new cars sold. That seems like an awfully high number of cars.
I don’t see it that way. The people who are able to take advantage of the program have already paid plenty in taxes. Those tax monies have either been grossly wasted by the government in a myriad of ways, or given to some ‘poor’ person who won’t get off their fat ass and go to work, or corruptly used by legislators and government executives for paybacks to their crony supporters. I have no objection to the middle class Americans who made this a great country getting something tangible in their hands for a change. Their ‘neighbors’ you mention would have had to pay the tax anyway, which would have been pissed down a rathole. Better that it go to my neighbor than a bureaucrat or some ghetto lowlife or some bloodsucking, corrupt entity like ACORN or NARAL. I think that the attitude of “they’re stealing from their neighbors” is just falling for the ‘divide and conquer’ agenda the Marxist regime running this country is advancing.
That said, it’s a bad program for a lot of reasons long term, but let’s not let the Marxists trick us into turning on our own kind over it. We need to focus our well-deserved ire on them, not our neighbors or the guy trying to get to work and feed and shelter his family.
The dealer isn't allowed to keep it for resale. They are required to destroy them.
I don’t know for sure, but my guess is that dealers aren’t cutting real great deals because of this program, since there is no trade-in. They probably keep repeating the $4500 thing to get people to buy, but the buyers are paying the full load. I doubt that the dealers are giving much in the way of breaks or incentives when it’s a sale based on the C4C program. I think ostammer’s real motive for implementing C4C is to grow UAW jobs for his cronies by driving up demand for new autos. I also think his whole health care thing is union-driven by his connection to the SEIU which is run by ACORN.
I agree, and I don’t think I buy it. They won’t show how the money is being accounted for or paid out or earmarked for this or that buyer, etc.. There’s a complete blackout on the accounting end at the fed level. Why? There is no way for any given person or entity except congress to verify where this money is going or how much is actually being utilized for the claimed purpose. I’m made even more suspicious by the fact that less than 10% of the stimuloss money has been expended and repaid TARP funds are being recycled to more “investment” outside the U.S. Treasury function.
Absent truthful, accurate and real auditing by an unbiased outside authority, nothing that has been spent or claimed to have been spent has any validity and there is ZERO transparency. This alone should provoke riots in the streets, but we, the docile, tax=paying Americans just sit here doing nothing. As far as we know, billions, soon to be trillions, are being stolen and given to pet groups as ‘reparations’ which the Marxist-in-Chief and his ugly wife refer to as “social justice”. Ordinary, middle-class white Americans are being divested of our wealth at an alarming rate, and I see little difference between ostammer and Mugabe or Mandela in terms of divesting and disenfranchising whites.
I saw some places advertising $9000 off including the C4C.
The dealer couldn't simply decline to file the paperwork and let the government keep the $4500?
HOW MANY OF THE DEALERS WILL CONTRACT THE DESTROY PROVISION OUT TO JUNK YARDS AND REPORT THAT THE DEALER WAS THE ONE THAT DESTROYED THE ENGINE?
What idiot traded that car in to get $4500?
Anybody that falls for this scam is a fool.
How corrupt is the Obama administration?
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How corrupt is Obama
I’ll tell you no lie
How deep is the ocean
How high is the sky
Apologies to Irving Berlin
“I don’t think we’ve even begun to see the kind of stupidity and incompetence this bunch can do.”
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Don’t you understand yet? They couldn’t really be this stupid, if they were they would be chewing their own tongues. They are DELIBERATELY DESTROYING AMERICA!!!!!
Yeah, but $9k off what to start with?
I got an Idea, I don't pay taxes and I buy a better car and save the Goobermint all that paperwork.
Much better to have let that billion dollars go for gasoline than to just throw it away. But, we cant spend it on gas now, it just went up in smoke to enrich China's scrap metal market.
FRICKING Maniacs are in charge of the Asylum now...
The dealer is required to sign paperwork indicating that the vehicle has already been destroyed before he can seek to collect the money for it; the required destruction method is to be done at the dealer's premises.
My sister works at a car dealership, and if the Used Car Manager thinks the car is valuable , he will pay $1 above the $3500 or $4500 the Government pays and keep it for resale. Of course, he wouldn’t get the C4C rebate as well.
I must retract that statement, as pointed out by bustinchops, it tarnishes too many good folks. My bad.
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