Today, the news posted a glimpse of the promise of Obama's green economic initiatives:
From the Detroit Free Press: http://www.freep.com/...
Granholm's remarks on the rescue came after her announcement that state tax breaks for 20 business projects will net the state $2.3 billion in new investments.
That will ultimately produce 7,400 new jobs, directly and indirectly, according to the Michigan Economic Development Corp. (MEDC).
Among the ventures is a company that makes wind turbines and a firm that will make a lightweight bus that gets three times the gas mileage of conventional buses.
Such a vision might transform manufacturing in the midwest and bring new prosperity to the long suffering rust belt... Except that this initiatives is very close to failing, if... if... (more over the break)
...if General Motors fails.
People who live outside the former Northwest Territories don't seem to really understand the tangled web of manufacturing that binds, and sometimes suffocates, this part of the country.
Rural and urban are all alike. Whereas you may see massive auto plants in Flint, Michigan, perhaps.... you are equally likely to see a wheel axle plant in the absolute middle of nowhere. Huge, majestic... out rising from the corn like some ancient pyramid.
GM buys from practically all of them.... whether it be a giant manufacturing plant that employs several thousand, or some small 10 person machine shop that makes specialty springs... They all need GM to keep them going.
And if GM's 35,000 suppliers (that includes all the little guys that feed up to GM's main suppliers) from all over the country don't get paid and go under...
Well, Michigan won't be building those wind turbines to power the country will they? They won't be building those fuel efficient buses, either...
No one in America will... the manufacturing base will be gone... the facilities permanently closed, their skilled labor scattered... and Obama's Green Economy will be outsourced to China like everything else.
Do we really want that?
Support America. Save GM. Save the green economy.