GM

Some truths are so obvious that they cannot be denied. But that doesn't stop General Motors and politically-motivated cheerleaders for the Chevy Volt from trying. In the case of the Volt, the truth is that this car has been a dismal failure when considering the amount of hype and taxpayer money that has been spent to produce the supposed green wonder-car. Let's review just how wrong GM CEO, Dan Akerson, has been regarding sales projections for the Volt and how he refuses to take accountability for GM's blunders. 

Three years into their forced marriage with GM, the American taxpayers have seen the value of their investment in GM deteriorate by approximately $24 billion, largely due to continuing European losses. Exposure in Europe has contributed to crushing the value of GM's stock due to its chaotic and failing Opel unit in Germany. While government, journalists and Wall Street sympathizers have given the Obama Administration and GM leadership an almost incomprehensible pass on this value destruction and massive loss (presumably due to the macro-economic nature of the crisis), it's time to call for the accountability that this new Board was supposedly going to deliver. 

NLPC Associate Fellow Mark Modica was interviewed by Gerri Willis on the Fox Business Network on August 6. Here's a transcript:

General Motors announced an increase in government purchases of 115% in July. This follows June's jump in government fleet sales of 79%. Just what's going on? GM has claimed that it is localities (mostly for police vehicles) and not federal purchases driving the increases, but aren't localities struggling with their budgets? Why do the nation's police forces all of a sudden need new vehicles? A little research uncovers that the Obama Administration is once again being generous with federal grants to localities to purchase new cars, with one of the primary end recipients of taxpayer money being GM.