I just wanted to pitch you on building factories in the Puget Sound area. When I read that you probably wouldn’t be building more Southern plants as long as they refuse to unionize, I realized that Western Washington is a great fit.
We have some of the best manufacturing in the world being done in Western Washington, and the major manufacturing employer, Boeing, is currently in the process of screwing over its workers. That means that you can get a good strong workforce that understands manufacturing processes, that has the hands on experience required to build large things, that knows how to prevent FOD. And you can get them for a steal, because Boeing just gave them a horrible contract.
Airplanes aren’t cars, of course, and there will be hiccups. Not everyone will want or be able to make that transition. But the change won’t be nearly as rough as starting from scratch.
We are also a region that embraces unions. We know, like you, that keeping unions at the table, and keeping workers happy will lead to better products. We certainly won’t have Senators threatening you if the UAW tries to organize a plant in Western Washington.
Thank you,
Carl Ballard
P.S., As an added inducement, our local manufacturers not only don’t pay state or local taxes, they don’t pay federal taxes either. We’re not promising you the same deal, of course, but the precedent exists.
“One of the largest recipients of federal government contracts paid nothing in taxes last year, according to an analysis from the Center for Effective Government, a left-leaning think tank. Boeing reported an $82 million tax refund last year, but made $5.9 billion in U.S. pre-tax profits during the same period, the analysis of the company’s recent government filings found. That means Boeing paid a federal tax rate of -1.4 percent. At the same time, the company won 4.4 percent of all federal contracts last year, according to the report.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....24918.html
Volkswagen still makes the worst cars. If you’re gonna buy a new car, make it a hybrid, not a Nissan Leaf, Tesla or all-battery type. I’d explain why, but with seattle websites, there’s too many frickin idiot activist-types who only want to argue. Bertha will destroy Seattle.
@2 “Bertha will destroy Seattle.”
You’re not from around here, are you? Let me explain how things are done in Seattle.
1. We vote on everything, but have no say in anything. For example, we voted against the shiny new baseball stadium sitting down by the waterfront next to the shiny new football stadium, but that vote didn’t count. About 90% of us voted against a shiny new basketball palace, too, but that didn’t keep it from being built; what kept it from being built is the NBA wouldn’t let us have a team.
2. Rerouting State Route 99 from a collapsing waterfront viaduct from which drivers had a superb view of the harbor (admittedly at the risk of their livs) through an underground tunnel wasn’t the vox populi’s idea. The rich downtown property owners wanted a tunnel, at twice the cost to taxpayers as a replacement viaduct, to enhance their views and increase their property values.
3. Our state highway’s department not only digs outrageously expensive tunnels the public doesn’t want, it also builds outrageously expensive floating bridges the public does want, except they don’t float. All three of them sank at one time or another. We also boast a suspension bridge that collapsed back in the ’40s. Sinking and collapsing bridges is our highway department’s specialty, so why is it so fucking shocking that Bertha is stuck? The only thing that shocks the people who live here is that Bertha got as far as it did before getting stuck.
4. Who gives a rip if VWs are lousy cars? We’re not offering to buy the things, we’re offering to build them. It’s about jobs, see? We want the jobs, not the cars. Whoever buys them, the cars are their problem.
5. It’s not true that we want to argue. Seattleites hate arguing as much as everyone else. We “discuss,” not argue. We have a well-defined procedure here, known as the “Seattle Way,” that involves discussing every possible angle of an issue and never taking any action. We just like to be thorough, that’s all. If you decide to live here or do business with us, you’d better get used to it, because that’s how we do everything around here. If you have murder in your heart, and decide to kill someone or commit a terroristic act in Seattle, you can take comfort in knowing that while we have a death penalty law and our juries are as hard-assed as anywhere else, our judges will discuss your pending execution until they retire, and then their replacements will discuss it some more, actually a lot more, and we’ll never get around to actually executing you. We don’t execute anyone here, we just talk about it. We didn’t even execute the Green River Killer. That’s just how we do things around here. It’s just the local culture.
I hope this clears up your misunderstandings about Seattle.
Obama Ditches Chained CPI …
Republicans are expressing outrage tonight because the president announced today his budget will not seek cuts in cost-of-living allowances for recipients of Social Security, veterans benefits, and other federal income support benefits.
Chained CPI, which would progressively lower such payments over time, was part of a “grand bargain” deal Obama hoped to strike with GOP House members and senators. But that deal, which involved a tradeoff of entitlement cuts and tax hikes, never came to fruition. All Obama said today is that he won’t offer those cuts in exchange for nothing.
These whining Republicans apparently don’t understand what “negotiation” is. They apparently expected to get entitlement concessions in exchange for nothing on their part. Bargaining is what normal politicians do. But these GOP politicians are abnormal and engage in a lot of strange thinking. I suppose that’s not really surprising, coming from folks who also think workers should work for $7.25/hr. (and they would lower or abolish that, if they could).
You know, if those guys want chained CPI, they could at least offer something in return. Like making Boeing pay some taxes. Or, if they insist that giant corporations earning $5 billion a year of profits shouldn’t have to pay any taxes, they could at least agree that the working stiffs who do pay taxes shouldn’t have to continue forking over $86 million a year of “tax refunds” to a giant company that makes
$5 billion a year and doesn’t pay any taxes. But they won’t even agree to that; so why then should Social Security pensioners give them chained CPI?
What we really need is an honest CPI so retirees would get COLAs that keep up with real-life inflation, instead of giving us 1% COLAs concocted from cooked inflation formulae. I’ve never bought a big-screen TV, and don’t give a damn what they cost, but
I buy groceries every day. Anyone who doesn’t have a butler doing his shopping for him knows official government inflation figures are bullshit.
I wonder if the politicians in Tennessee knew what they were getting into when they landed VW? Especially German Labor Law. Wal Mart pulled out of Germany(don’t know if they went back in), partly because Arkansas values did not work there. Of course they clashed with the unions there.
http://www.dw.de/worlds-bigges.....-2112746-1
Fuck unions, they exist only to enrich union bureaucrats and buy politicians to advance left-wing causes.
re 2: “I’d explain why, but with seattle websites, there’s too many frickin idiot activist-types who only want to argue.”
How dare they argue with wisdom received from such a font as yourself! If your hat-size is growing, there’s an obvious and apparent reason why. I’d tell you to buy a ‘Hoss’ size Stetson, but you’re such an argumentative wimp, I won’t bother.
Fuck any GOATS lately? Yes? You like that don’t you?
But be careful, GOATBOY gets really jealous.
@2 At the moment, it appears more like Seattle is going to destroy Bertha.
In any case, Seattle may well need an enema, but not a colostomy.
Geez, this site really is full of left wing perverts…ekim, you need a psychiatrist.
FYI, VW Corporate has a 300 character limit, so I only sent the first half and a link.
Brilliant minds think alike.
Before get to excited about this, shouldn’t we have law like the one Germany that all large enterprises require a worker’s council?
Boeing?
MS?
Starbucks?
Costco?
Amazon?
T-mobile?
@12 Before get to excited about this, shouldn’t we have law like the one Germany that all large enterprises require a worker’s council?
It would be nice but too many RETHUGS to get it passed.
OTOH if we got VW here to lead by example…
Who knows?
@9 “But be careful, GOATBOY gets really jealous.”
And he has a gun.