Gm's Bob Lutz calls global warming "total crock of shit"; same co cutting entire US hourly workforce

[dajoki]

From the same company that is trying to "buy out" its entire U.S. hourly workforce. And is saying: "The goal is not to reduce headcount but rather to bring in new workers at a lower cost." Those who leave and agree to sever all ties with the company - including giving up lucrative pension and health care coverage wll recieve the "buyout." The current veteran UAW member at GM today has an average base wage of $28.12 an hour, by comparison, new hires will be paid between $14 and $16.23 an hour. Now General Motors Corp Vice Chairman Bob Lutzhas called global warming "atotal crock of shit." With this kind of thinking, GM should become totaly irrelevant!!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2861740
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GM exec stands by calling global warming a "crock"
Fri Feb 22, 2008 3:08pm EST
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN2237297620080222

DETROIT (Reuters) - General Motors Corp Vice Chairman Bob Lutz has defended remarks he made dismissing global warming as a "total crock of s---," saying his views had no bearing on GM's commitment to build environmentally friendly vehicles.

Lutz, GM's outspoken product development chief, has been under fire from Internet bloggers since last month when he was quoted as making the remark to reporters in Texas.

In a posting on his GM blog on Thursday, Lutz said those "spewing virtual vitriol" at him for minimizing the threat of climate change were "missing the big picture."

"What they should be doing in earnest is forming opinions, not about me but about GM and what this company is doing that is ... hugely beneficial to the causes they so enthusiastically claim to support," he said in a posting titled, "Talk About a Crock."

GM, the largest U.S. automaker by sales and market share, has been trying to change its image after taking years of heat for relying too much on sales of large sport-utility vehicles like the Hummer and not moving faster on fuel-saving hybrid technology.

"My thoughts on what has or hasn't been the cause of climate change have nothing to do with the decisions I make to advance the cause of General Motors," he wrote.

[defendandprotect]

1. GM going to offer us electric cars --- or continue to work for oil industry interests --- ??? ??? ?

We should nationalize the oil industry ---

and raise up a corporation to put Electric Cars on our highways in 3-5 years ---

We can replace every gas guzzler and turn things around ---

We can subsidize both manufacturer and purchase ---

[dajoki]

2. Nationalize the oil industry...

I'm afraid is a non-starter.

[baby_mouse]

3. Why?

Serious question. I'm more than prepared to believe you, but it seems like such an elegant solution...

[JCMach1]

4. Then use the profits to repay the stockholder and then reduce/eliminate the deficit

Sounds like a brilliant plan.

[dajoki]

6. Yes it does...

but that would mean less profits for the oil companies. To me it sounds like the same argument going on about healthcare and we can't get anywhere with that. I would be all for it but I doubt that the oil industry would allow it.

[defendandprotect]

18. No --- NO profits for the oil companies ---

The oil industry is nationalized as a commonwealth ---
and whether we continue to pound down our resources and pollute the planet ---
or whether we then go forward with electric cars ---

MINUS the oil industry's propaganda which has kept the public from truly understanding the
huge threat of Global Warming for more than 30+ years ---

What do you mean . . . you "doubt that the oil industry would allow it" --- !!! ???
Do you understand it's a natural resources --- a commonwealth?

You can't get anywhere on healthcare because of corporate-fascism ---

Same problem with GW, and oil-guzzlers with low MPG --- and war, war, war ---

Think about it . . . !!!

[Junkdrawer]

9. Too bad...It would get to the very heart of our current problems...n/t

[defendandprotect]

12. Well, it could have --- and should have -- been done a long time ago ---

FDR was moving to do it and then he sought LBJ's advice ---
A Texan, closely connected to Murchison/Mafia --- !!!

[DainBramaged]

5. The GM Volt plug in car will be available no later than 2010

Lutz is an asshole, ex Chrysler guy, shouldn't be in charge of product development.


PS, this news is three days old.

PS

Correct your op, they are not cutting the entire workforce, they are offering buyouts of which approximately 16000 of the 70000 hourly workers will participate. The hourly workforce averages over 50 years of age with approximately 25+ years of service.

[dajoki]

7. Yes, I know...

its a buyout, but I doubt that the people who are losing their jobs feel that way. People that age and with so many years of service to the same company deserve better. Many, if not most will have a hard time finding something else, not to mention the benefits, and the "buyout" money will only last so long. The new employees will recieve half the pay as the current. That's a cut.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/12/news/companies/gm/?post...

[defendandprotect]

13. Did you see "Who Killed The Electric Car?" -- It's terrific --- !! Rent it--!!!

They put more than 4,000 beautiful electric cars on the roads in California . . .
late 1990's . . . . . into 2000 ---

Anyway, for like 5 years --- or a bit more?

They REFUSED to sell the cars --- would only lease them.

Everyone loved them and wanted to buy them ---

They then demanded the cars back ---

and crushed every one of them !!!!

Who were they protecting but the oil industry?

[fascisthunter]

8. What the GM exec says is actually the "crock"...

He's nothing more than an opportunistic lying greedy bastard that has screwed his workers so he and others around them can make the money they make. If he really gave a shit about his company he would create more fuel efficient vehicles and take a pay cut himself.

He's full of shit.

[dajoki]

11. That's it in a nutshell, thanks!! n/t

[spoony]

10. Once the Volt is in production I couldn't care less what he thinks

He can hold a presser and announce he's the king of the lost Atlantis. The net will be positive because the Volt is going to be the most important vehicle ever made in America.

http://www.gm-volt.com/

[saltpoint]

14. There just might be some folks who feel the same way about some of

Mr. Lutz's cars.

Toyota is rocketing up to the top of the charts these days.

As to global warming, Mr. Gore speaks for me.

[DainBramaged]

16. Ask tOOyota about their Land Cruiser

Oh what a gas burner it is. :puke: :puke: :puke:

Their fleet barely makes the CAFE standards, and you loves them? Marketing, got to love it.:crazy:

Ford Expedition, Infiniti QX56, Nissan Armada, 12 m.p.g. city and 18 m.p.g. highway; Toyota Sequoia, 14 m.p.g. city and 19 m.p.g. highway.


They just suck. And such great car names, Toyota, Nissan. (snark)


They missed the Land Cruiser, from our friendly hybrid makers

http://www.toyota.com/landcruiser /

Should be Land CRUSHER

STARTS at $63,200 (oh what a feeling)

"Toyota strives to build vehicles to match customer interest"

Mileage Estimates (mpg city/highway) 13/18

Plop plop fizz fizz, oh what a scam it is.

[saltpoint]

17. My quarrel is not with rank and file U.S. workers at all at all at all but with

top-down ignoramuses like Mr. Lutz.

We own no Toyotas but we read the market share updates and GM has lost a lot of ground to the competition.

[reprehensor]

15. Yeah... he's probably wrong.

http://nafeez.blogspot.com/2008/01/hidden-holocaust-civilizational-crisis.html

Industrial civilization derives all its energy from the burning of fossil fuels, pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The C02 emissions from the industries that drive our economies, our societies, that sustain our infrastructures, are the main engine of global warming in the last few decades. This doesn’t mean that all climate change ever is due to human-induced C02. Scientists know that there are many other factors involved in climate change, such as solar activity, as well as periodic changes in the Earth’s orbit. But they have overwhelmingly confirmed that these are not the primary factors currently driving global warming. The primary factor is C02 emissions induced by human activities.

The origins of climate change are no longer a matter of serious scientific debate. Early in 2007, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported the findings of a three-year study projecting the rise in temperatures due to global warming by 600 scientists from 40 countries, peer-reviewed by 600 more meteorologists. The report confirmed that human-induced global warming is “unequivocally” happening, and that the probability that climate change was due to human C02 emissions is over 90 per cent.

Indeed, climate scientists last year published the results of the latest research into the relationship between the sun and climate change in the top journal, Nature. The London Times reported on the study as follows:

“Scientists have examined various proxies of solar energy output over the past 1,000 years and have found no evidence that they are correlated with today’s rising temperatures. Satellite observations over the past 30 years have also turned up nothing. ‘The solar contribution to warming... is negligible,’ the researchers wrote in the journal Nature.”<1>

Continued...
http://nafeez.blogspot.com/2008/01/hidden-holocaust-civilizational-crisis.html