The Truth Finally Comes Out American Carmakers Are Important
Mike Biras
Now the full truth about Nissan and Ghosn has come out. Remember, Ghosn made aspersions about GM's technology in comparison with Nissan's supposedly first-rate technology. (At the time Ghosn was running his mouth the Worst Car List in the United States was headed by four different models of Nissan cars and there were no GM cars on the list.)
Now in 2010, thanks to Ghosn, we are finally learning the truth. On November 19, 2009, story "Ghosn: GM would have been better off forming an alliance with Renault/Nissan" revealed that he believed GM would have been better off it had formed this alliance in 2006 with his company. Ghosn, talking during a forum with the " Council on Foreign Relations" stated, "We knew the alliance would have allowed both companies to share technology, practices and a common approach. Ghosn answered a question if he was happy that the alliance with GM fell through by saying, "When you see the disaster and the waste of energy and skills and talent nobody can be happy."
STATEMENT: Then the real reason for trying to take over GM was revealed in the next statement. WOW!! if Nissan had been successful there would be no pure American auto industry, the Japanese would have had everything.
Ghosn stated, "When General Motors was in danger, everybody was scared. We were scared. Because some of our suppliers are big suppliers of General Motors. If they go down (GM), we would not have been able to assemble any single car in the United States."
ISSUE: Imagine, Ghosn just admitted that Nissan or any Japanese company would not have been able to assemble any single car in the U.S. if GM went into bankruptcy. So why the criticism of the United States government for loaning money to GM so the car industry could continue? The answer is clear. The Japanese were after controlling the American auto industry and did not want to make it obvious to the American people.
Put this advance by Nissan against GM in prospective. Nissan had a strange way of proposing an alliance. The company attacked GM like a bulldozer with Carlos Ghosn on stage with many comments. The reason was the American auto industry is regarded as our National Defense Industry which is essential for our national security and to our military.
Rick Wagoner responded by very limited comments and the battle was on. The prize for the Japanese was taking over GM and getting full control of its suppliers. By doing this there would be control of the American carmakers because of the suppliers. Essentially if Nissan had been successful the path to having no independent American car industry would then be established and the U.S. could be relying on foreign car companies for our needs in national security, or at least a strong foreign influence.
At this time there were also discussions of GM joining with Chrysler but after a limited discussion period GM called off the talks. Chrysler was owned 80 percent by Cerberus Capital Management which included former VP Dan Quayle, former Secretary
of the Treasury John Snowe, as well as Steven Feinburg principal Chairman of Cerberus. Two of these men had been American public servants at a high government level and had pledged along with Feinberg to make Chrysler once again an all American auto company within 10 years.
At the time this was happening, Cerberus Capital Management that also owned Chrysler, in 2006 also bought a 51 percent stake in GMAC because GM was hurting for funds. At that time Cerberus promised Wagoner that he could buy GMAC back within three years. Little known was the fact that the old Nippon Credit Bank now constituted as Aozora Bank of Tokyo also had an investment of $500 million in the transaction of buying GMAC. In fact Aozora Bank immediately created at least two companies with GMAC out of the State of Delaware. At the beginning Cerberus owned 37 percent of Aozora Bank and former VP Dan Quayle was on the Board of Directors of the Japanese Bank. That ownership quickly was raised to 45 percent and is now 55 percent Cerberus ownership of the bank.
At this time Cerberus began trying to have GM take over Chrysler for the price of its 49 percent ownership of GMAC. That proposal did not work with GM so Chrysler is now under the control of the Italian company, FIAT.
Why was this fuss about GMAC important? GMAC was originally created by General Motors in 1919 to provide financing to General Motors. In 2008 it provided financing to 75 percent of the 6,450 GM dealers and operated in 40 countries around the world.
Cerberus reneged on its promise to let GM buy GMAC back sometime within three years and instead raised the leasing costs so high that no one could afford to lease or buy GM products. The story said, "They took away a big chunk of GM business." Now there was no possibility of GM to again attain ownership of GMAC. The choice was gone forever.
I would say that Cerberus ruined everything for GM if they ran the costs so high that 75 percent of the financing for GM was crippled, which it was. Cerberus had driven GM to the edge of bankruptcy and having to take U.S. government help to survive. GMAC was also in the same condition as a result of Cerberus actions. Please remember there was a Japanese bank invested in GMAC and that bank was located in Tokyo under the control of the Japanese government and their regulators which also guided Nissan and Toyota.
The ruse that Cerberus was running on GM to force them into selling their 49 percent interest in GMAC finally accomplished its goal. It was taken from them and not sold. GM was driven into bankruptcy. The percentage of its ownership in GMAC was reduced by the government. There was no choice of GM ever going back to GMAC but Cerberus was able to keep a high percentage of its investment in GMAC when it became a bank holding company. Cerberus dispersed its investment in GMAC amongst the people invested in Cerberus which included Aozora Bank and Citigroup. Steve Feinberg, Chairman of Cerberus Capital Management now had a seat on the Board of GMAC which took the name of Ally Bank. GM was reduced to 9.9 percent ownership and was required to disperse its interest to others.
THE ACTION: Now, isn't that something. A vital part of the largest American car company had been driven out of the company it created by the antics of Cerberus who were intending to handle over the company to the Japanese. Beyond that in 2008 when the real damage of taking away "a big chunk" of business from GM actually hit, Toyota then became the largest car dealer in the world and Nissan became number two in sales behind Toyota.
Both General Motors and GMAC had to go to the Federal government for help thanks to the actions of Cerberus deliberately driving up the leasing costs so no one could qualify for leasing and so took business away from GM and GMAC. What it did do was benefit the Japanese auto industry and the Japanese government. It was a perfect espionage against the American people and our auto industry and was run right out in the open with former American officials as distractions to a trusting American public.
There was nothing fair about Cerberus actions against GM. In addition Cerberus by its actions helping the Japanese left the American people really "holding the sack" because they too are financing the Japanese car companies with their American tax money through tax abatements. The Japanese companies in return for American taxpayers abatement money do not have to pay it back nor are they paying taxes. The Japanese companies are paying fees which are set by contract in lieu of taxes. For instance, in the Canton, MS plant Nissan pays only 1/3rd of the ad valorem taxes due the schools.
Who would suspect former high ranking American government officials of doing something directly to help a foreign country at the expense of the United States? They had raised their hands and sworn an oath to this country when they took office but in this instance did not remember what this country had given them. They treated it as business as usual but it was not business as usual. This is about our national security and the future of the country for the children and grandchildren we are raising. It was selling out our national defense industry to make them rich.
These former primary federal office holders deliberately scuttled the largest automobile dealer in the world and its finance company. Up front they promised all sorts of things to help Chrysler and professed their Americanism. Who would ever guess this would happen?
THE STORY: Instead of supporting the country Cerberus played "footsey:" with the Japanese government, which subsidizes the Japanese car companies ranging from $2,000 to $4,000 and $12,000 to $14,000, depending on the expert you heard.
Remember, for the Japanese industry to remain viable in Japan they need Nissan to make 74 percent of their world wide profit from the U.S., Toyota 60 percent and Honda 70 percent. (Some papers will say from North America with 2/3rds from, the U.S.) Whatever it is the Japanese auto industry needs us plus to make their car companies profitable they need the American states to "cough up the money" with tax abatements, forgiveness of taxes and a variety of Federal and state funds to help them.
The Japanese have waged an all out attack on our American unions which helped build this industry and our middle class. The Japanese companies have attacked our suppliers as did the Japanese banks which came to the U.S. and started buying up second and third level tier auto suppliers around Detroit and moving them to the south. The Japanese suppliers have also received generous American tax abatements from our American taxpayers.
In essence, the Japanese have constructed a national defense corridor through the south along the Mississippi River, which drains 60 percent of the water flow in the U.S. This is tied up with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) our nuclear facilities and with the German Steel company, KRUPPS in Alabama along with a freeport which allows importing and exporting in perpetuity with out being charged fees.
In achieving this use of federal funds Toyota was first in line in "cash for clunkers." They sold more Toyota's to the American people and second was Nissan. The cash for Clunkers was intended for the American companies but the Japanese were there with their hand out. Now that we know the problems of Toyota perhaps we should have scrapped their whole fleet for free. Their problems seem to be multiplying.
Please pay attention on how American taxpayers funds are being used to finance the Japanese automobile industry. Don't be misled if they say they donate to a college. Of course they do, and then the company shows up in the college stating they are a taxpayer and want access to our research. The Japanese companies also use our federal labs for their automobile research.
NISSAN'S STORY: In disbursing Federal funds Nissan was first in line. It was first in line for $1.5 billion of Federal Reserve TALF funds with a plan to come back for another $1.5 billion. It was also first in line for $1.5 billion of Clean Fuel Funds at the Department of Energy.
Nissan is also, according to Ghosn still shopping for a partner. Ghosn said March 3, 2010 at the Geneva Motor Show that "Obviously, we are talking to many people. The name of the game is scale, co-investment and shared technologies. You would be surprised how many people we are talking to about specific cooperations." He declined to name potential technology partners.
At this time Nissan is claiming to be the No. 2 car company just behind Toyota. I doubt that. Nissan was caught retitling a fleet of over 50 cars and putting them back in trade as new in 16 states thereby committing securities fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, odometer fraud, bank fraud, interstate fraud which is a partial listing of their crimes. They also have a RICO case and number filed against them.
Their lawyer wrote last year on letterhead stating that retitling the cars was standard practice at the time. Remember. they also rolled back the mileage on the odometers which is a violation of federal law.
I wonder if other Japanese companies practiced that same procedure. It was during this time that Nissan had problems similar to Toyota's. They had a runaway problem the company did not know how to solve.
The company had a minivan which caught fire while being driven and unfortunately the doors locked on you. There were 156 vans that were known and deaths in the vans but the records were sealed. Fortunately for the American people, or the van would have remained on the road longer, an investor in a dealership walked into a Congressional office with a video of a burned van with children's toys in it. He was very disturbed that children were at risk in these vans.
The investor saw a van at the dealership, covered with a tarp. The President of the dealership told him they were trucking it to New York to be flown at night to Japan. Just imagine Nissan flew 29 of these vans back to Japan at the cost of $20,000 a van. After the investor became involved in the issue demanding the American people and our children be protected the company was eventually pushed into buying back 30,000 vans to the tune of $231 million. It depends on who you talk to but we will agree they were driven very close to bankruptcy as a result of this poor vehicle design.
Nissan also attacked the American auto industry when we had a battle over the CAFE standards recently. The CAFE standards with the two fleet rule were intended to keep jobs in the United States. Historically, if 75 percent or more of the parts originate in the U.S. it is considered a domestic vehicle. While everyone was fighting over the CAFE standards, Nissan, with the good services of the Democratic leader Harry Reid and then former Republican Senator Ted Stevens, removed the restrictions that would keep small car production in the United States.
That meant American jobs and more importantly, it was a serious blow to our national security industry, the American auto industry. At the time Nissan had exemptions for their fleet. Their executives celebrated what they did to the American auto industry.
The Financial Times article quoted a "transplant executive” that "Americans don't always understand the economic benefits of having Toyota and other foreign investors in the U.S." He is right, Americans do not realize how much it is truly costing them and how their manufacturing and national security base is being destroyed.
CONCLUSION: That is an accurate statement. This article has revealed serious attacks against the American auto industry to actually take it over and to take jobs out of the United States. This was all done with Japanese interest in mind.
Please keep this thought in mind in considering the facts that are presented. When President Dwight Eisenhower became President in 1952 one of the first things he did was to create the National Defense Highway and fund it. While he was in the service he tried to go with a convoy from the east to San Francisco and the lack of roads and difficulties took them six weeks to make the journey. Eisenhower was determined to make this country accessible for both business and its citizens by having a good road system.
The automobile industry earned its title as the National Defense Industry with what it did to help the military prepare for battle in World War II and subsequent wars. We must not let foreign interests trivialize this major industry.
Today, the foreign transplant companies are calling themselves "good citizens" of the United States, The Financial Times again wrote in a story "Detroit Displaced as "imports" strive to become indigenous." The article quoted a Toyota executive "Don't look at us as this company that has a third eye growing out of our head. We're part of the community."
That is why Mr. Toyoda, Chairman of Toyota came from Japan where the policy is set to finally testify before the American Congress after he was threatened with a subpoena. Our trusty Webster Dictionary states indigenous means the "transplants" are originating in the region or country where they are found. Nissan came from Manchucko and Japan. The Japanese car companies repatriate their funds back to Japan to put them in trade.
America tolerates all types of opinions and free speech. We may stand up anywhere and speak, but we do stand for America and not another country. Foreign companies have been welcome to do business here but not to bastardize our system against the American principles and our freedom. They must obey the law. Remember, if you are a monster with one eye, you can do business here by obeying our laws, but a monster is still a monster and has a third eye. It is time now to stand up for America and for our grandchildren and children.
Mikd Biras : mbiras64862@mypacks.net
March 8, 2010