Fausta’s Blog

So Hugo Chavez purchases five new police cars, which were parading as a caravan towards the governor’s office at the state of Bolivar in Puerto Ordaz, when the policeman driving the head car of the caravan sees a policeman lying on the street (I kid you not), and slams the brakes.

Kablooie!

A chain reaction ensues, and all five police cars are totaled.

Couldn’t make it up had I tried.

Gets even better!
Jungle Mom clarifies that “policia acostado” is Venezuelan slang for speed bump.
So the pileup happened when the lead car hit the speed bump.
Bwhahahahaha!

BlogHer has this post with practical advice, 10 Things Every Woman Should Have in Her Car. All well and good, but since I don’t have a dog I would replace item

5) Dog treats and a spare leash. If you’re not an animal lover I suppose you could skip this one… but, um, ever read Cujo? The chances of having to distract an angry dog are probably slim, but having Milkbones handy is never a bad idea. (Bonus: If you have a dog, yourself, you’ll probably be glad to have a treat handy at some point when your pooch is in tow.)

As for the spare leash, well, it’s possible I’m paranoid. But again, it’s not like it takes up a lot of room….

with an armed bodyguard guy with a carry-concealed permit who’s also a licensed auto mechanic.

Barring that, ignore the dog and stay in the stupid car until AAA gets there.

The Economist has a brief case study of automotive ineptitude

SELDOM, since the day Adolf Hitler gave the order to produce the Volkswagen, has a car been given such an explicitly ideological mission. But the vehicles that roll, occasionally, off the production line at Venirauto’s factory, west of Caracas, will free Venezuelans from the “yoke of capitalism,” declares President Hugo Chávez. The factory was opened with great fanfare by the president three years ago. It is a joint venture between Iran and Venezuela, which Mr Chávez predicts will turn his country into a car exporter. It is also intended to be an example of socialist production principles, although its workers see things a little differently.

In December they downed tools over the company’s refusal to negotiate a collective contract. Their wages, even at the grossly overvalued official exchange rate, are worth around $25 a day. They complained of poor safety conditions and exploitative work practices. Their supposedly socialist employer refuses to recognise trade unions and has ignored the labour ministry’s order to reinstate sacked union activists.

Venirauto’s cars are rehashes of clapped-out 1980s models from the imperialist West. The Turpial, a five-door hatchback, is based on the Ford Festiva, while the Centauro saloon is a clone of the Peugeot 405, though both are fitted with a conversion kit allowing them to run on natural gas. Their capitalist-busting claims are based on price: they undercut rival models by around 50%. If you can get one, that is.

This is what a Turpial looks like:

And a Centauro:

The Economist continues,

Perhaps it is just as well that the 30,000 customers the government says are waiting for an anti-capitalist car should learn to do without one.

Of course Chávez is ready to preach by example:

When not praising the Turpial and the Centauro, Mr Chávez has been known to rail against the whole concept of car ownership. “The urge to get a car,” he told students on one occasion, “is poison to the human soul”. With that, he got into his limousine and rode off.

Yet another way the Obama administration is wasting your money:
Cash for Clubbers
Congress’s fabulous golf cart stimulus.

The federal credit provides from $4,200 to $5,500 for the purchase of an electric vehicle, and when it is combined with similar incentive plans in many states the tax credits can pay for nearly the entire cost of a golf cart. Even in states that don’t have their own tax rebate plans, the federal credit is generous enough to pay for half or even two-thirds of the average sticker price of a cart, which is typically in the range of $8,000 to $10,000. “The purchase of some models could be absolutely free,” Roger Gaddis of Ada Electric Cars in Oklahoma said earlier this year. “Is that about the coolest thing you’ve ever heard?”

One question,
is it taxed both as income and as a purchase? Doesn’t look like it. The WSJ continues,

The IRS has also ruled that there’s no limit to how many electric cars an individual can buy, so some enterprising profiteers are stocking up on multiple carts while the federal credit lasts, in order to resell them at a profit later.

What it comes down to is this:

This golf-cart fiasco perfectly illustrates tax policy in the age of Obama, when politicians dole out credits and loopholes for everything from plug-in cars to fuel efficient appliances, home insulation and vitamins. Democrats then insist that to pay for these absurdities they have no choice but to raise tax rates on other things—like work and investment—that aren’t politically in vogue. If this keeps up, it’ll soon make more sense to retire and play golf than work for living.

Retire and tango!

Prior cash for clunkers posts.

Prince Charles urges people to abandon car in favour of walking and public transport
The Prince of Wales is urging people to give up their cars in favour of walking and public transport to try to reduce carbon emissions.

Yet another elitist who knows better than you what’s good for you, while he

has two Jaguars, two Audis, a Range Rover and still drives an Aston Martin given to him by the Queen on his 21st birthday

And that’s not counting the official Bentleys used for state occassions.

Chuck, auction your fleet of cars on eBay and take the bus.

Then come back and preach to the unwashed.

At the WaPo, the realization it’s a waste of money:
U.S. ‘Unlikely’ to Recoup Auto Outlay, Panel Finds
Treasury Urged to Be More Transparent

The federal government is unlikely to recoup all of the billions of dollars that it has invested in General Motors and Chrysler, according to a new congressional oversight report assessing the automakers’ rescue.

The report said that a $5.4 billion portion of the $10.5 billion owed by Chrysler is “highly unlikely” to be repaid, while full recovery of the $50 billion sunk into GM would require the company’s stock to reach unprecedented heights.

“Although taxpayers may recover some portion of their investment in Chrysler and GM, it is unlikely they will recover the entire amount,” according to the report, which is scheduled to be released Wednesday.

The report also recommended that the Treasury Department act with more transparency and provide a legal analysis justifying the use of financial rescue funds for the automakers. The report was prepared by the Congressional Oversight Panel, which is overseeing the federal bailout programs.

In all, the government has invested $74 billion in the nation’s auto industry, including $12.5 billion into auto financing giant GMAC and $3.5 billion into auto suppliers, according to the report.

Jacob Sullum poises the question of the legality issue, which remains unsolved.

And the government wants to run your healthcare, too.

At Reuters’s Green Business blog, this story, Audi Chief Calls Chevy Volt “A Car For Idiots”

In a frank conversation with MSN writer Lawrence Ulrich, Audi of America President Johan de Nysschen has said that the Chevy Volt will fail and that anybody who buys the car is an idiot. Not only that, de Nysschen has lumped proponents of any type of electric car into a category of “intellectual elite who want to show what enlightened souls they are.”

I wouldn’t know about any type of electric car (the Volt doesn’t look like it may have enough head room for tall adults), but, if there ever was a “car for idiots”, it would be the Smart Car.

And no, I wouldn’t call the PUMA a car – more like a triumph of hubris over practicality.

UPDATE
Blue Crab Boulevard looks at the green mirage. Dennis the Peasant looks at one of my favorite cars, the Volvo S80 T6 AWD and compares & contrasts what you get for under $40,000 (I drive an XC70 which cost much less than that).

Dan Riehl has it:

Clicking back a few links from an original tip from Snapped Shot on the Cash for Clunkers Program:

Here’s a new twist to both stories that you probably aren’t aware of yet:
The $4,500 rebate you “got” from the government was actually taxed both as income and as a purchase?

Even that may not be the end of people’s problems.

So here’s how that works: you pay taxes on your hard-earned income, which are spent on a wasteful handout, which is then taxed as both income and a purchase. Then the car dealers have to pay their business and income taxes on top of that.

And that’s what liberals call “creating wealth.”

The Washington Times article’s title sounds innocuous enough (h/t Hot Air), U.S. adds clerks to clear clunkers
Volunteers include FAA until you wonder who the FAA volunteers may be:

Employees of the FAA’s air-traffic-control unit were asked to help, but the Transportation Department stressed Friday that essential safety personnel were not diverted from their duties.

Let’s hope the air traffic controllers themselves weren’t. Still, the help ain’t cheap: According to one of Power Line’s readers,

Another reader directs us to this salary table and adds that “overtime is capped at time and a half for a GS-10 Step 1 ($39.90/hr). A GS-15 Step 1 makes $57.90/hr whether straight working hours or overtime.”

As if that’s not bad enough,

Planners who expected to sell 250,000 cars in three months are now deluged with nearly twice that many applications seeking more than $2 billion in rebates after less than one month. Only 7 percent of the rebates have been paid, leaving many auto dealers out millions of dollars. Dealers were supposed to be repaid within 10 days.

Auto manufacturers have agreed to provide financial assistance to dealers until they are reimbursed.

You mean, the guys who needed to be bailed out in the first place? Why does the phrase “smoke and mirrors” pop to mind?

But hey, it doesn’t stop there: ‘Clunkers’ Program Benefits Foreign Automakers More, Data Shows
Smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles like the Toyota Corolla are top sellers, while buyers are trading in SUV’s like the Ford Explorer to be scrapped, turning the already dwindling number of American car owners into the growing ranks of foreign car drivers.

Is this a teachable moment? The New York Post editorial thinks so: Clunker Health Care:

Now consider health care.

The car program involved all of just $3 billion. Health care is a $2.4 trillion business, about 800 times bigger.

And, let’s be honest, ObamaCare aims to control as much of that as possible — with or without the “public option.”

So, will doctors be waiting for reimbursements?

Will patients be waiting to see doctors?

Yes, the president’s health-care promises — greater choice, lower costs, more folks insured — sound good. But they may prove just as hollow as what the car program claimed it would do.

And, again, if Americans find out they don’t like it, it’ll be too late.

Health care is way too important to entrust to bureaucrats. Monday, maybe the Obama folks should pull the plug on their health-care plans, too.

And, as you may recall, Robert Reich admitted nine days ago that

there’s still no healthcare plan. All we have are some initial markups from several congressional committees, which differ from one another in significant ways. The White House’s is waiting to see what emerges from the House and Senate before insisting on what it wants, maybe in conference committee.

Doesn’t that simply make you warm all over? Why, you can almost look forward to the day when overpaid FAA clerks (or even air traffic controllers themselves) are making the decisions on your health!

But back to cash for clunkers,
Maybe the dealers should go on vacation while they wait for their checks, and go fly the friendly unwatched skies in the hope that the check is in the mail?

Speaking of vacation, Dan has an ad,

We need no further proof of governmental wasteful insanity than the Cash-For-Clunkers program.

The Volvo got it. Now it’s the Corvette.

Jim Lindgren at Volokh posts The Death Throes of a Corvette:

“Cash for Clunkers” appears to be a bizarre combination of the “broken windows fallacy,” the desire to change the climate of the planet, and staggering administrative incompetence. In other words, “Cash for Clunkers” hits the trifecta: bad economics, bad science, and bad government.

As Tim Blair said,

The Great Car Cull of 2009 is over, and not before time

And now for a rant:
Look, while I appreciate the good things in life, such as a nice car, I’m not a big car aficionada, but this really chafes.

These beautiful cars are junked for a reason or reasons that I simply can not comprehend.

Energy savings? Not so; as Tim Blair’s commenter Hanoi figured out,

So very roughly speaking, it would take the fuel savings (over 50K miles estimated remaining life in each) of recycling four or five (!) clunkers to account for the lifecycle energetics of only one new vehicle.

Monetarily, the $4,500 towards a car loan doesn’t justify borrowing the money towards the expense of a comparable new car, if your old car is fully paid and functional.

As for pollution, if you can stand watching the whole video, take a look at the amount of smoke and particulate coming out of that one engine. Multiply that times thousands of clunkers. Carbon footprint for that procedure? Oh yeah, baby! And while you’re at it, it’s a good idea that the government was incompetent enough to have run out of money now, or – had the Cash-For-Clunkers program run for several years – down the line we would be paying trillions of dollars’ worth of settlements for lung damage (as we do now with mesothelioma and the people who were involved in asbestos removal decades ago).

The idiot that turned in the Corvette should have looked into how much the car was worth, even if it needed to be rebuilt and restored. I would add a fourth item to Lindgren’s trifecta:

“Cash for Clunkers” hits the trifecta: bad economics, bad science, and bad government.

Add a stupid public to the trifecta.

Obscene.

UPDATE
Andy McCarthy

The Washington Times reports this morning that this simple, basic Big Gummint program has spun totally out of control: it was clearly not thought through (even a little), it was under-budgeted by 2 or 3 hundred percent (and counting), and it was woefully under-resourced — such that staff have to be hired from the outside or pulled away from other government functions (like running air-traffic control) in order to clear the back-log. Clearing the back-log, by the way, is a 24/7 operation that’s also requiring additonal budgeting for overtime pay and a training program.

Go read the Washington Times article; McCarthy asks,

All this from the people who, Mark Steyn reminds us this morning, tell you that the way to control healthcare costs is to set up a huge new entitlement program (even as the ones they’ve already set up sink deeper into a multi-trillion dollar sea of unfunded liabilities). Why do we trust them to do anything other than the very few things for which you actually need a government? How ’bout a deal where we leave healthcare and the auto biz to private industry but ask the government to see if it can at least keep convicted mass-murderers in jail?

UPDATE
Welcome, Denny’s readers. Please don’t miss this follow-up post.