Saturday, December 13, 2008

Albom Takes Off the Gloves

I'm really shocked. Twice in one month. (Hell, twice in one decade would be a record.) It's another Mitch Albom column I like:
"Kill the car, kill the country. Sen. Richard Shelby, Sen. Bob Corker, your names will not be forgotten. It’s amazing how you pretend to speak for America when you are only watching out for your political party, which would love to cripple unions, and your states, which house foreign auto plants.

"Corker, you’ve got Nissan there and Volkswagen coming. Shelby, you’ve got Hyundai, Honda, Mercedes-Benz and Toyota. Oh, don’t kid yourself. They didn’t come because you earned their business, a subject on which you enjoy lecturing the Detroit Big Three. No, they came because you threw billions in state tax breaks to lure them.

"And now — this is rich — you want those foreign companies, which you lured, and which get help from their governments, to dictate to American workers how much they should be paid? Tell you what. You’re so fond of the foreign model, why don’t you do what Japanese ministers do when they screw up the country’s finances?

"They cut their salaries.

"Or they resign in shame.

"When was the last time a U.S. senator resigned over the failure of his policies?

Yet you want to fire Rick Wagoner?"


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