Entries from December 2008 ↓

“Federal fuel-economy rules allow car makers to average the fuel usage of most of their products. They could sell fuel-efficient small cars and trucks at little or no profit to make up for the high-profit, gas-hungry luxury cars and big SUVs they promoted…In recent years, GM, Ford and Chrysler made money on trucks — with profits of as much as $8,000 a vehicle — and lost money on cars.”

- Wall Street Journal

“…Freddie spent $11.7 million in lobbying in 2006 alone, with Newt Gingrich, for example, getting $300,000 that year for talking up the benefits of Freddie’s business model.”

- Wall Street Journal

“…middle-class taxpayers who don’t earn anything close to UAW wages will now be rescuing Cerberus’s rich investors.”

- Wall Street Journal

“Right now, 75% of our current health expenditures target treatment for preventable conditions caused by tobacco use, poor diet and inactivity, alcohol and drug use, motor-vehicle crashes, firearms and other risks.”

- Julie L. Gerberding, M.D., M.P.H., Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

“The money that the government spends has to come from somewhere, which means from the private economy in higher taxes or borrowing. The public works are usually less productive than the foregone private investment.”

- Wall Street Journal

“Annual U.S. income could be upwards of $500 billion higher with a move to global free trade in both merchandise and services.”

- Martin Neil Baily, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers for President Clinton

“…federal fuel-economy mandates that require them to lose tens of billions making small cars Americans don’t want in high-cost UAW factories.”
- Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.

“Between 1994 and second quarter 2008, the U.S, housing stock more than doubled in value from $7.6 trillion to $19.4 trillion. Almost three quarters of that increase was due to a speculative bubble, the root cause of which was government policies designed to increase home ownership…”
- Harvey Golub

“IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye. It won’t go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed. Without that bailout, Detroit will need to drastically restructure itself. With it, the automakers will stay the course — the suicidal course of declining market shares, insurmountable labor and retiree burdens, technology atrophy, product inferiority and never-ending job losses. Detroit needs a turnaround, not a check.”

- Mitt Romney

Sarah Palin’s facebook blog:
facebook.com/sarahpalin

Sarah Palin’s twitter account as governor:
twitter.com/AKGOVSarahPalin

Sarah Palin’s twitter account as a private citizen:
twitter.com/SarahPalinUSA