[OT - US/Canada] E-85

"All Things Mopar" wrote in message
. ..
Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphatically, William
Graham laid this on an unsuspecting readership ...

What unbiased? - Did I ever say that my view of the auto
industry was unbiased? - It is very biased, but there's a good
reason for that.......50 years of putting up with boats will
make a saint biased. Sure, some American manufacturer can, and
probably has, made a good car that I would like very
much......But it is way too little, and way too late. All I
can do now is wish them good luck with my children and
grandchildren.

I've been driving Chrysler products for 43 years, and damn few of
what I drove were "boats". If that is what you bought, that is
what you got, so what's your complaint?

As to muscle cars.....The best piece of Detroit Iron I
ever owned was a
'63 stingray fastback coupe. The FI model, with 360 HP. A
screamin' machine, to be sure, and handled about as well as
anything could before the era of the radial ply tire. But it
still was a boat.....Anything that needs 360 HP in order to
get below a 10 to 1 weight to HP ratio has to be a
boat......If you discount the blinding acceleration, my VW bug
handled just as well. As a matter of fact, the only real
sports car that Detroit has made in the 30 years of my
"driving life" (1060 - 1990) was that 'vette. And I am proud
to say that I did buy one. How can you Detroit guys ask any
more of me than that?

You have to put handling, braking, NVH/BSR, crash, safety,
emissions, mpg, ride quality, the whole nine yards into
perspective, d00d. No 1963 car did all those things at all as
well as any equivalent car does today. And, you have to be the
only person on the planet who thinks a 327 FI Sting Ray is a
"boat", but today's Z-06 is so many parsecs ahead of it that a
comparison cannot even be made.

90% of the better handling in today's cars is directly due to the radial ply
tire......I don't know who developed that, but it is easily the greatest
contribution to automotive engineering in the 20th century..........

"All Things Mopar" wrote in message
...
Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphatically, William
Graham laid this on an unsuspecting readership ...

Clinton managed to reduce spending, reduce the size of the
government, and was just about to eliminate deficit spending
when the Republicans took control.

What do you mean by "eliminate deficit spending?" there was no
way in hell he was going to pay off the national
multi-trillion dollar debt, if that's what you mean.....If you
mean that he was going to have a year where the government's
outgo was equal to or less than their tax dollars in, well,
sure. That's possible for selected years where there is no
war, and no reason to spend a lot of money. But that happens
under republican administrations, too. But given the choice
between a president who is too wishy-washy to declare wars on
idiots who are murdering people and doesn't spend any money as
a result, or one who goes after the murderers even though it
costs us, I'll take the latter every time. You know, you could
save a lot of money by firing all the country's policemen, and
just letting the thieves take anything they want.....For a
year or two, anyway.....But, sooner of later, you would wake
up one morning without a roof over your head.

I still will not get into the Blue vs. Red argument, but
President Clinton still was the first president since Eisenhower
to create a budget surplus.

President George Walker Bush, on the other hand, will go down in
history as having creating a larger deficit in just the first 5
years of his administration than /all/ presidents did from
Washington to Clinton, and that includes FDR with WWII and LBJ
with Tiev Man.

The problem is straight-forward: you cannot spend and grant huge
tax reductions at the same time. And, if we as a nation were more
concerned about winning the war /we/ started in Iraq than we
appear to be about killing a stray Iraqi or two, we wouldn't need
2 million smart bombs, we'd just turn the desert sand into glass,
declare victory, and come home. And, my friend, over 2,500 good
American men and women in uniform would be alive today and our
treasury would be $380B (and counting) less in the red.

Look at the amount of money you send to the federal
government. 25% of that is just used to pay interest on the
debt.

And this is the republicans fault because........


Big snip of tired old complaints......



There were /no/ WMD, Bush knew it, and Colin Powell knew it. We
went to war for avarice, then screwed it up to the tune of almost
$400B and close to 3,000 American lives, and there is no firm
exit plan in place yet!

Well, let's hear your "exit plan" Jerry......I'm sure the president would
like to hear any reasonable plan.....Unfortunately, the democrats are all
bitch, and no idea........When you don't know what's in the hole, you can't
very well plan how you are going to climb out. There wasn't any "exit" plan,
because we didn't know the future, and neither did anyone else, so bitching
about it is a waste of time......Now the only question is, do we leave now,
or later? So tell us your brilliant strategy.........

"All Things Mopar" wrote in message
. ..
Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphatically, TMG laid
this on an unsuspecting readership ...

What do you mean by "eliminate deficit spending?" there was
no way in hell he was going to pay off the national
multi-trillion dollar debt, if that's what you mean.....If
you mean that he was going to have a year where the
government's outgo was equal to or less than their tax
dollars in, well, sure. That's possible for selected years
where there is no war,

Maybe the key is to stop spending on war.

Exactly. And, it will have the much more important benefit of
saving the lives of countless hundreds more uniformed men and
women, for which no dollar value can ever be place, especially
since they are dying and being maimed for life for no good
reason.

And how about the 2 million Iraqis that Saddam managed to do in over the
last 30 years? Are you willing to consign them to the deep to save those 2
or 3 thousand American and British soldiers? Yes? - You are? - Well, that's
OK, but just tell it like it is, and don't suggest/imply that we are there
for nothing.......

"TMG" wrote in message
. ..
All Things Mopar wrote:

How many billions are you willing to spend on stopping central
african genocide - which is killing thousands of times more
than conflict in the oil rich areas you're willing to spend
money and lives to protect?


I'm not willing to spend even 10 cents on that. When the hell are the
American people going to figure out that they cannot be the policemen for
the rest of the world? The geneocide is 100% the problem of the countries
in which it is occuring, and none of the business of the United States.

Spoken like a true isolationist.

Except you aren't.

You profess to have "enemies!". You rail against "military enemies such as
China and Middle East terrorist regimes or economic enemies such as the
entire Asian continent."

Asia EVIL,...

There's a cogent trade policy.

Yes. His, "Let them eat cake" policy will someday come back to guillotine
him........

"Rita Ä Berkowitz" ritaberk2O04 @aol.com wrote in message
...
William Graham wrote:

I have been screwed several times by American Car manufacturers and
their dealers during my auto-life, and so have many of my friends. I
didn't start getting and driving decent automobiles until I started
to buy foreign, and I will never, (repeat, never) go back to buying
American again. Some of the worst pieces of junk have been dumped on
me and mine over the years

Yep! Thank your unions for this. They reward and foster stupidity and
laziness just as long as the union dues are being paid. And the best part
is you can't cut the "deadwood" like you can in the non-union shops. It's
amazing their foreign counterparts can build a better product with pride
while our union workers wouldn't last a week in that environment.


Rita
Nope, I don't think so. The same workers build
Camry/Accord/Mazdas here. They're just as good as the Japanese.
About 45 years ago, I worked for GM on broken buses, in a Rosedale airport.
Each month they fired 30% for no reason than to keep out the union. You
wouldn't believe work conditions could be that bad in a civilized country.
Bob Hickey

Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphatically, Bob Hickey
laid this on an unsuspecting readership ...

Yep! Thank your unions for this. They reward and foster
stupidity and laziness just as long as the union dues are
being paid. And the best part is you can't cut the
"deadwood" like you can in the non-union shops. It's amazing
their foreign counterparts can build a better product with
pride while our union workers wouldn't last a week in that
environment.


Rita
Nope, I don't think so. The same
workers build
Camry/Accord/Mazdas here. They're just as good as the
Japanese. About 45 years ago, I worked for GM on broken buses,
in a Rosedale airport. Each month they fired 30% for no reason
than to keep out the union. You wouldn't believe work
conditions could be that bad in a civilized country. Bob
Hickey

Agreed. My father participated in the 1937 sit-down strikes at
the Plymouth Plant in Detroit. Management abuse was simply
outrageous in those days and strong action by the government in
forming the NLRB as well as the rapid rise of trade unions was
clearly necessary.

In the last 10 years, unions across all manufacturing segments of
the economy, including the auto industry, have increasingly
learned that their welfare and the destiny of their members
depends in no small part to stopping the militant **** and
building good products. While no end of the nonsense in auto
plants is likely, it is way, way smaller today than a decade ago,
and a mere shadow of the intentional saboutage of the 1940s-
1970s.

As you observed, people are people and the same general mentality
of men and women in UAW/CAW plants and those in the greenfield
state plants of the Asian and European transplants is about the
same. And, management in both unionized and nonunionized plants
realize as does union leadership that only a partnership can
ensure the success of the other.

At one time, a worker could be fired for stopping an assembly
line for any reason, including building of obvious shoddy quality
cars. Today, not only can workers stop a line, they are
/encouraged/ to do so, and strongly encouraged to work in small
or large teams to solve vexing production problems, including
involving engineering, manufacturing, purchasing, and finance to
gain the benefits of cross-functional problem solving synergies.
While not perfect, it /does/ work.

Look no further than the J.D. Power IQS numbers for Top Ten cars
in each of dozens of market segments. The difference in C/100
between #1 an #10 is often less than 10% and seldom over 15%.
And, every manufacturer regardless of country of origin stumbles
at least somewhat when launching an all-new car, especially if it
also includes an all-new engine and driveline. What the
manurfacturer does to correct early production problems is what
separates #10 from #1.

--
ATM, aka Jerry

"English is a language hard to understand, but easy to
misunderstand" - Unknown or George Bernard Shaw

"Alan Browne" wrote in message
...
All Things Mopar wrote:

Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphaticly, William
Graham laid this on an unsuspecting readership ...
They were all boats until the 60's, when the Japanese and
Germans started to cut into the American market......Why do
you think the VW bug was so successful here? There was no
reason on earth that the big three couldn't have made a car
like that........


I don't know why the VW was such a success, do you? As to "they were all
boats", that isn't a very intelligent statement. Did you do a Rip Van
Winkle during the muscle car era, for example? And, have you driven any
recently produced Detroit iron? With rare exceptions, dollar-for-dollar
and feature-for-feature, American cars /can/ compete with any in the
world.

With my 4 cyl Accord I leave 8 cyl detroit "iron" lagging in the curves.
The suspensions are just too soft to follow. They do catch up and burn me
on the straights, but if I choose the ground, they're toast.

A parking lot, I suppose. An Accord? I didn't see the little smiley-face
there, so I have to assume you were trying to be serious.

If you left an 8-cylinder detroit piece of "iron" lagging in the curves, did
you notice the amused smile on that driver's face? Hell, lots of Accord
drivers have "raced" me over the years, and most of them won. I'd be
embarrassed to be caught racing an Accord.

Reliability wise, while detroit has improved (through neccesity) they are
still lagging Toyota and Honda and others.

Maintenance on my previous Honda in 8 years was oil changes, tires, 1
exhaust system change (after 6 years), 1 battery change (6 years), 1
timing belt change (at 120,000 km). That's it. (Oh, 1 alignment).

Current Accord (5 years, 72,000 km): nothing but oil changes and tires.
Oh, the cruise control light burned out. Damn.

Anecdotal evidence. Love it. I have twin '93 Mustangs, both with the
bulletproof 5.0 engines, neither has ever been opened. One just passed
196,000 miles, the other (a convertible) is a baby at only 104,000. Based
upon this anecdotal evidence, Ford builds incredible machines. But, again,
no doubt the driver/owner plays a big part in this. I faithfully change my
oil every 20,000 miles.

A few years ago, I read of a pending lawsuit regarding a failed fuel pump on
a 1952 Cessna. Apparently there is no statute of limitation for the
manufacturer, where the litigious are concerned. Alternately, if I get five
worry-free years out of a new car, I'm satisfied. I don't baby my cars, and
I expect parts to fail periodically. If the water pump on my 13-year-old car
were to fail today, I wouldn't go crying about it being a stinkin' American
product.

A friend of mine is on his 3rd Chrysler Grand Caravan, and while the model
has been basically reliable he's had a water pump die (in first year),
electrical problems, he's had to replace the computer that controls
ignition, etc., etc., etc. All within the first 5 years, usually first
couple.

Former brother in law, had endless front wheel bearing and transmission
failures. (Caravan).

One Chrylser I do like to drive, esp. in winter, is the Intrepid. Very
stable car.

My father's many woes with Fords and GM's is what kept me away from those.
My ex-Wife had a Fury that was always in need of fixing (this goes back 25
years).

I went to buy a Volkswagen. Didn't fit.

Bought the Honda Accord. All over. No problems.

next car might be a Camry; might be an Accord (a 4 cyl. hybrid would be
just right, though I'll miss the manual).

Sounds like the Camry would be perfect for you. Now go out and find some
"woe" stories from owners of Jaguar, BMW, Mercedes, (yes) Honda, Toyota,
etc. They're out there, too.

I care not about my own reputation, I know what I know and I know what
I've accomplished in my life time. That is enough for me. But, statements
like you made above will not ensure a credible reputation for you of your
independent, non-biased view of the auto industry.

The so-called bias against the US auto industry has been brought on by the
US auto industry, its labour unions and, ironically, its own overly loyal
customer base.

Cheers,
Alan

US auto makers have "overly loyal customers", while Honda sells cars to
discriminating buyers who want only the most reliable. Viewpoint has nothing
to do with this type of thinking, I'm sure.

Decades ago, the Big Three were putting out total crap. I know this, because
I lived through it. And I've always said that the American driver owes a
debt of gratitude to the Japanese, who forced us to look at quality issues.

But, today, there's really no difference. Parts fail in every product line
on the planet, and every product line has customers who will swear that
they've never had a problem. As long as it's not a "lemon" and covered under
warranty, who cares? And if I choose to keep the car long after the warranty
has expired, any repairs are on me, anyway.

Yesterday, I went to a Mustang show, held in conjunction with a classic car
club, a Corvette club, and a (generic) Chevy club. The Acura club and Camry
club didn't make it, and I'm not even sure they exist.

(On topic content ---) All of this discussion over import vs. domestic,
Ford vs. Chevy, or any other overly-generic or anecdotal talk about
automobiles boils down to nothing more than a Canon vs. Nikon fence
building. You don't care for U.S. products, I don't care for anything out of
Asia. Who really gives a crap?

We have come to an incredible time in automotive history, wherein choices
are endless, vehicles are better in every respect, and the days of built-in
obsolescence are over. Why not just enjoy what you have, and stop worrying
about the other poor schlub out there who made the wrong choice?

As long as he's smiling when he sits behind that steering wheel, he probably
doesn't care what you think, anyway.

dwight

Today, with great enthusiasm and quite emphatically, dwight laid
this on an unsuspecting readership ...

With my 4 cyl Accord I leave 8 cyl detroit "iron" lagging in
the curves. The suspensions are just too soft to follow.
They do catch up and burn me on the straights, but if I
choose the ground, they're toast.

A parking lot, I suppose. An Accord? I didn't see the little
smiley-face there, so I have to assume you were trying to be
serious.

If you left an 8-cylinder detroit piece of "iron" lagging in
the curves, did you notice the amused smile on that driver's
face? Hell, lots of Accord drivers have "raced" me over the
years, and most of them won. I'd be embarrassed to be caught
racing an Accord.

I've not seen an Accord on earth that can stay with my 2006
Charger in acceleration or cornering, nor any other performance
sedan, whether a Mopar or any other make. The Accord is exactly
what Honda wants it to be - a very bland but competently designed
and built mid-size car. They are slow to accelerate and "wallow"
is the best way to describe their cornering non-prowess.

Reliability wise, while detroit has improved (through
neccesity) they are still lagging Toyota and Honda and
others.

Maintenance on my previous Honda in 8 years was oil changes,
tires, 1 exhaust system change (after 6 years), 1 battery
change (6 years), 1 timing belt change (at 120,000 km).
That's it. (Oh, 1 alignment).

Current Accord (5 years, 72,000 km): nothing but oil changes
and tires. Oh, the cruise control light burned out. Damn.

Anecdotal evidence. Love it. I have twin '93 Mustangs, both
with the bulletproof 5.0 engines, neither has ever been
opened. One just passed 196,000 miles, the other (a
convertible) is a baby at only 104,000. Based upon this
anecdotal evidence, Ford builds incredible machines. But,
again, no doubt the driver/owner plays a big part in this. I
faithfully change my oil every 20,000 miles.

A few years ago, I read of a pending lawsuit regarding a
failed fuel pump on a 1952 Cessna. Apparently there is no
statute of limitation for the manufacturer, where the
litigious are concerned. Alternately, if I get five worry-free
years out of a new car, I'm satisfied. I don't baby my cars,
and I expect parts to fail periodically. If the water pump on
my 13-year-old car were to fail today, I wouldn't go crying
about it being a stinkin' American product.

A friend of mine is on his 3rd Chrysler Grand Caravan, and
while the model has been basically reliable he's had a water
pump die (in first year), electrical problems, he's had to
replace the computer that controls ignition, etc., etc., etc.
All within the first 5 years, usually first couple.

Former brother in law, had endless front wheel bearing and
transmission failures. (Caravan).

One Chrylser I do like to drive, esp. in winter, is the
Intrepid. Very stable car.

My father's many woes with Fords and GM's is what kept me
away from those. My ex-Wife had a Fury that was always in
need of fixing (this goes back 25 years).

I went to buy a Volkswagen. Didn't fit.

Bought the Honda Accord. All over. No problems.

next car might be a Camry; might be an Accord (a 4 cyl.
hybrid would be just right, though I'll miss the manual).

Sounds like the Camry would be perfect for you. Now go out and
find some "woe" stories from owners of Jaguar, BMW, Mercedes,
(yes) Honda, Toyota, etc. They're out there, too.

The so-called bias against the US auto industry has been
brought on by the US auto industry, its labour unions and,
ironically, its own overly loyal customer base.

US auto makers have "overly loyal customers", while Honda
sells cars to discriminating buyers who want only the most
reliable. Viewpoint has nothing to do with this type of
thinking, I'm sure.

Decades ago, the Big Three were putting out total crap. I know
this, because I lived through it. And I've always said that
the American driver owes a debt of gratitude to the Japanese,
who forced us to look at quality issues.

But, today, there's really no difference. Parts fail in every
product line on the planet, and every product line has
customers who will swear that they've never had a problem. As
long as it's not a "lemon" and covered under warranty, who
cares? And if I choose to keep the car long after the warranty
has expired, any repairs are on me, anyway.

Agreed.

Yesterday, I went to a Mustang show, held in conjunction with
a classic car club, a Corvette club, and a (generic) Chevy
club. The Acura club and Camry club didn't make it, and I'm
not even sure they exist.

(On topic content ---) All of this discussion over import vs.
domestic, Ford vs. Chevy, or any other overly-generic or
anecdotal talk about automobiles boils down to nothing more
than a Canon vs. Nikon fence building. You don't care for U.S.
products, I don't care for anything out of Asia. Who really
gives a crap?

Agreed again.

We have come to an incredible time in automotive history,
wherein choices are endless, vehicles are better in every
respect, and the days of built-in obsolescence are over. Why
not just enjoy what you have, and stop worrying about the
other poor schlub out there who made the wrong choice?

As long as he's smiling when he sits behind that steering
wheel, he probably doesn't care what you think, anyway.

--
ATM, aka Jerry

"English is a language hard to understand, but easy to
misunderstand" - Unknown or George Bernard Shaw

"Bob Hickey" wrote in message
...

"Rita Ä Berkowitz" ritaberk2O04 @aol.com wrote in message
...
William Graham wrote:

I have been screwed several times by American Car manufacturers and
their dealers during my auto-life, and so have many of my friends. I
didn't start getting and driving decent automobiles until I started
to buy foreign, and I will never, (repeat, never) go back to buying
American again. Some of the worst pieces of junk have been dumped on
me and mine over the years

Yep! Thank your unions for this. They reward and foster stupidity and
laziness just as long as the union dues are being paid. And the best
part
is you can't cut the "deadwood" like you can in the non-union shops.
It's
amazing their foreign counterparts can build a better product with pride
while our union workers wouldn't last a week in that environment.


Rita
Nope, I don't think so. The same workers build
Camry/Accord/Mazdas here. They're just as good as the Japanese.
About 45 years ago, I worked for GM on broken buses, in a Rosedale
airport.
Each month they fired 30% for no reason than to keep out the union. You
wouldn't believe work conditions could be that bad in a civilized country.
Bob Hickey


Well, basically, my argument with my American built cars was with the
design, rather than the manufacturing quality....My Subaru's were both built
here in the US, and they are reliable, satisfactory cars......The American
cars I have owned were bad handling rattletraps....After a few thousand
miles, the number and loudness of the squeaks emanating from their
dashboards and other unidentifiable places was hard to believe. In some of
them, it was impossible to keep the wheels aligned properly, and the
resulting tire wear made them, IMO, expensive and dangerous. But, in
general, I had little choice until the 60's when foreign imports gave me
some selection. IOW, I could buy any American car I wanted, as long as it
was a boat....They made a huge selection of boats, mind you, but they were
all boats. the first decent car I ever owned was my MG "A". It was both
pretty, and good handling. It did have a tendency to stop running because of
a broken fuel pump, but as soon as I replaced that with a Borg-Warner
electric pump, I had no more trouble. In general, there are two types of car
buyers. those that go for size per dollar, and appreciate freeway handling,
and those that like small cars that handle well on mountain curves.....I am
the later type, and apparently, most Americans are the former type,
although, that still doesn't explain the huge number of bugs that VW was
able to sell to the American car buyer back in the 60's and 70's. It's too
bad that Detroit never built a car like that.......

"All Things Mopar" wrote in message

A friend of mine is on his 3rd Chrysler Grand Caravan, and
while the model has been basically reliable he's had a water
pump die (in first year), .....

Now that brings up a memory....I struggled with bad water pumps for years
until one day, I looked under the hood of some Japanese product, and saw a
water pump that was external to the engine, driven by the fan belt, or some
auxiliary belt driven from the front pulley...."What a refreshing idea" I
remember thinking....You don't have to virtually overhaul your engine in
order to replace the water pump....You can just go down to the parts store,
and buy another one like you would a generator, and install it in a few
minutes......Now, why couldn't the American designers think of that?