Ford CEO bashes Obama

In March Senator Barack Obama lectured Detroit automakers about his belief that the US auto industry isn't making enough hybrid cars. While he was scolding the Big Three, he and Mrs. Obama were toodling around Chicago in a Hemi-powered V8 Chrysler 300C-- which is not a hybrid.

The middle child of the Big Three, Ford Motor Corporation's CEO Bill Ford, struck back on Thursday, as the Detroit News notes:

The Illinois Democrat and presidential candidate drew the ire of automakers after a speech to the Detroit Economic Club in March where he said: "Here in Detroit, three giants of American industry are hemorrhaging jobs and profits as foreign competitors answer the rising global demand for fuel-efficient cars."

Ford said Thursday he was "very disappointed" in the criticism Obama dished out to Detroit. He also criticized efforts in Congress to radically increase fuel economy.

"I would love to invite him to our Chicago assembly plant in his state and see where we make a vehicle that's more efficient than the one he's currently driving," Ford said to applause at the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference.

Ford is in the early stages of building the new Taurus sedan and Taurus X wagon at the Chicago plant, both of which are more fuel efficient than the V8 Hemi-powered Chrysler 300C that Obama used to drive. On Friday, Obama's office said he sold that vehicle a few weeks ago, and he has never visited Ford's Chicago assembly plant. The family has a Ford Escape hybrid, his office said.

That assembly plant is on Chicago's Far South Side; it's just a few blocks from the Altgeld Gardens housing projects the senator visited often during his stint as a community organizer in the 1980s--so it's been on his radar for years.

He can still drop by---it's just 10 miles from his Kenwood mansion.

And does anyone besides me feel that's it odd--and maybe even wrong--that a possible future president is picking fights with some of our largest corporations? First Wal-Mart, now the Big Three automakers.

Who is next?

Related posts:

The Obamas: The Audacity of Hypocrisy

Obama: Do as I say, not as I do

Obama and Wal-Mart

Technorati tags: Obama politics Barack Obama hybrids green detroit automobiles cars politics 2008 election Wal-Mart Ford Michigan

News to watch in June: Norman Finkelstein and DePaul

Sometime later this month a decision will be made regarding whether holocaust-minimizing Professor Norman G. Finkelstein will be granted tenure at DePaul University.

The dean of Finkelstein's college, Chuck Suchar, vetoed Finkelstein's bid for tenure at the Chicago Catholic college.

Here's what Alan M. Dershowitz wrote yesterday about Finkelstein for the Huffington Post:

Norman G. Finkelstein, a Hezbollah-supporting ideologue up for tenure at DePaul University, has repeatedly analogized Jews to Nazis and said that he "can't imagine why Israel's apologists would be offended by comparison with the Gestapo." When criticized for these and other comparisons, Finkelstein responded, "Nazis never like to hear they're being Nazis."

The far-Left, including Noam Chomsky and Peter N. Kirstein, have rallied to Finkelstein's cause. And in April the DePaul Activist Student Union held an on-campus rally for Fink, where the young woman above flashed her support for the controversial professor.

Technorati Norman Finkelstein DePaul Chicago Israel מדינת Jews Dershowitz Chomsky noam chomsky tenured

The Collapse of Europe is coming to Malibu

California, tumbles into the sea
Steely Dan, "My Old School"

California is staying put for the next 10 million years or so, but sociologically speaking, the collapse of Europe may come much sooner, in the next twenty years or so.

Or it may not.

Avi Davis, Senior Fellow, American Freedom Alliance has organized a two day conference entitled, The Collapse Of Europe, The Rise Of Islam and the Consequences for the United States. It's being held at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, and among the speakers are authors Mark Steyn, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Daniel Pipes, Ibn Warraq, Dennis Prager, and Hugh Hewitt--a very strong roster.

I can't make it, but if you'd like to register, click here. The conference will be held on June 10 and 11.

Technorati tags: Pepperdine Malibu Islam Muslims Europe Europa

Obama gives up donation from man with Rezko ties

Barack Obama's ties to Tony Rezko are causing him more headaches today. The Illinois senator today returned a $5,000 donatiion from Ali D. Ata, the former head of the Illinois Finance authority, was recently indicted in relation to a scam involving Rezko's purchase of some pizza restaurants.

From AP:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is donating to charity a $5,000 contribution to his 2004 Senate campaign from an indicted former Illinois official, a spokesman said Friday.

Ali Ata, the former executive director of the Illinois Finance Authority, was charged Thursday with trying to help entrepreneur (My note: scam artist) Antoin Rezko borrow $10 million in a fraud scheme.

Rezko has already been charged with trying to shake down investment firms that wanted to do business with the state, and his personal and financial relationship with Obama has been an issue in the Illinois senator's presidential campaign.

Related posts:

Obama can't shake Tony Rezko

Obama ties to Rezko rotten to the core

More Obama and Rezko

Obama watch: More Tony Rezko

Thanks for the link: Bill Baar's West Side

Technorati tags: Obama politics Barack Obama Illinois Chicago Tony Rezko business

Ill. horse slaughterhouse re-opens

This is a story I've been closely watching in the last two months, the Cavel International slaughterhouse in DeKalb, Illinois was closed down last week after Ill. Governor Rod Blagojevich signed a bill into law banning the slaughtering of horses for human consumption.

But Cavel sued, and the meat processing plant is open for at least ten days.

Cavel is a Belgian company, the horsemeat from the DeKalb plant is shipped overseas.

Related posts:

Bo Derek rallies horse slaughter opponents to victory in Ill. House

Horse of a different color on abandoned equines story

Abandoned horses in Eastern Kentucky

Horses reprieve from slaughterhouse only temporary: UPDATED

Hey, another horse slaughter post

Last US horse slaughterhouse shut down, unwanted horse problem will worsen

Technorati tags: horses horse law business animal activism animal rights animals Illinois slaughter politics Cavel Belgium belgique belgie DeKalb

What will Harry Reid say?

I believe I heard Bill Roggio, or perhaps someone else, discuss on a podcast that the Sunni tribesman were fed up with al-Qaida in Iraq a month or so ago.

Now even AP is taking notice...

U.S. troops battled al-Qaida in west Baghdad on Thursday after Sunni Arab residents challenged the militants and called for American help to end furious gunfire that kept students from final exams and forced people in the neighborhood to huddle indoors.

Backed by helicopter gunships, U.S. troops joined the two-day battle in the Amariyah district, according to a councilman and other residents of the Sunni district.

The fight reflects a trend that U.S. and Iraqi officials have been trumpeting recently to the west in Anbar province, once considered the heartland of the Sunni insurgency. Many Sunni tribes in the province have banded together to fight al-Qaida, claiming the terrorist group is more dangerous than American forces.

Of course Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)says we've already lost in Iraq.

Iraq is still a very violent place, and there is a lot of work, but we have not lost.

Technorati tags: politics Iraq terrorism Harry Reid democrats al Qaida