Monroe auto supplier ceases operation

[BeatleBoot]

Source: The Toledo Blade

MONROE — Yesterday was the last regular shift for employees of the Automotive Component Holdings plant here. The plant, which had been in continuous operation since 1930, had 425 hourly and 55 salaried employees.

Long operated by Ford Motor Corp., the 1.5-million-square-foot factory made catalytic converters for the automaker and was spun off by Ford. Most hourly employees at the plant, who are represented by UAW Local 723, were given voluntary separation packages or offers to transfer to jobs at other Ford plants.



Read more: http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081127/BUSINESS02/811270295

---

Well, at least Citigroup, AIG, Lehman Bros. et al got theirs...with no questions asked....

More closures to come. The clock is ticking as Rome burns. Truly unbelievable.

[quidam56]

1. Thank you Presidebt Bush

not sure if we can stand anymore of your prosperity at the peoples expense. http://www.wisecountyissues.com

[proudAZdem]

2. ...and Thank You Car Execs!

So, Car Execs ask the US Goverment (ie. Taxpayers) for a bailout. Then, as car plants --and other businesses which depend on GM, Ford, Chrysler-- are closing the Big 3 car execs keep wasting OUR money. First Bush, now other rich guys are screwing us.

----------
Bailout Bums: Stealing YOUR Money: http://tv1.com/playlists/80

[Bandit]

14. You are incorrect

The auto makers asked for loans not a "bailout". Every company from time to time has to get interim financing (short term loans). Do you refer to all of those as "bailouts"? Loans are a necessary part of doing business. Since the financialk brokers and Insurace giants have run amok and mismanaged their companies almost out of existance they are now reluctant to put their money out there. Our Government has given these companies a "bailout" not loans of hundreds of billions of dollars in hopes the credit market would free up so companies such as Ford and GM have access to the interim financing they need to operate. Instead of providing money for these companies what the Brokerage firms and other financing giants are doing is aquiring other smaller banks and firms to enrich themselves further. Ford Motor Company had a fairly substantial Profit the first quarter of this year and has presented a very good business plan for the next decade. What sort of Plan did AIG submit?

[tabasco]

22. Then why don't they go to a bank?

Too risky for banks to loan them money = BAILOUT.

[bluesmail]

3. Thanks Dick. Thanks George. n/t

[antimatter98]

4. Citigroup got its 'over the weekend bailout' but not working Americans.

This article
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20081125_obama_chooses_wall_street_over_main_street

has a paragraph that says:
"Geithner, thanks in part to the strong recommendation of Rubin, had been appointed chairman of the New York Federal Reserve Bank after working for Rubin and Summers during the Clinton years. Once at the New York Fed, he was the main government official charged with regulating Citigroup, a task at which he obviously failed. Yet over the weekend, it was Geithner who hammered out the Citigroup bailout deal with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and a very actively involved Rubin."

OVER THE WEEKEND---last weekend---Rubin, and Geithner worked with Paulson on the Citigroup bailout,and this tells us that Obama approved because Rubin and Geithner are Obama economic guys.

Over the weekend.

Yet, Americans are being laid off in record numbers, are being foreclosed 10,000/week, and so why,
OVER THE WEEKEND did we not see Rubin and Geithner work on a rescue for workers? Because, they
don't care and never will.

The Obama economic team believea in deregulation, the banks, Wall Street, and that's all they
care about. Actual working people can go to @#$%.

I'm sure we will read that Larry Summers will eventually say something like "Main Street is not what we are concerned about, besides, those people can always sell their belongings on eBay to get cash." or "Main Street made the choice to take jobs that were vulnerable to layoff or outsourcing, its not the government's problem. People need to make better employment choices."

[Michigan-Arizona]

5. Monroe, Michigan

I'm from Monroe, Michigan & they can't afford to lose any company's.

[BeatleBoot]

12. Well, then you live Down River from me!

Scary times, no?

[Omaha Steve]

6. Please Santa

Help Main St. K&R!

[Laelth]

7. We MUST have an auto industry.

This is truly a matter of national security.

We don't need Wall Street nearly as much as we need transportation and good jobs for Americans. Please, let President Obama hear reason and do what's right.

The United States is a LIBERAL Country.

:dem:

-Laelth

[SharonAnn]

10. For national security we need US companies that can produce trucks, tanks, etc.

that we might need.

Real national security means have the means to provide what we might need.

When we have no heavy industry and all computer parts are made outside the US, what happens in a case of war? We'd be "dead ducks".

[Kolesar]

13. Wes Clark said that in an op ed in the NY Times

www.nytimes.com

[IndianaGreen]

8. While bankers and financiers are bailed out, the workers get BOHICA

Lovely capitalism!

[whistle]

9. This is republican fascism doing what it has wanted to do since Ronald Reagan

...first took office in January 1981.

<snip>
Nazi Economics: Ideology, Theory, and Policy (Hardcover)
by Avraham Barkai (Author)

Review: Goebell's newspapers, "To Overcome Capitalism", June 23, 2004

This book dissects the ludicrous meme that hoodwinks so many in academia and Hollywood, that Nazism was somehow the logical spawn of the free market. The Nazis believed in private property only insofar as it served the state, "The state should retain supervision and each property owner should consider himself appointed by the state. It is his duty not to use his property against the interests of others among his people...The 3rd Reich will always retain the right to control the owners of property." This ideology articulated in the Nazi party platform is foreign to and incompatible w/ Capitalism. Then when you look at the specifics of the job creation, unemployment was reduced entirely through public works and Gov't spending, and the price controls put in place in the mid-30s, and the capital punishment of "profiteers", well you get the picture, and there's plenty more in this book.
The Nazis and Communists were both spawned from the late 19th Century ideological crisis outlined by Nietschze, the Death of God by Darwin and Newton and all that jazz. "What is to Be Done?", to quote the Leftist manifesto that inspired Lenin, well the Nazi Party agreed -- something drastic had to be done. The Commies, the fascists, the Nazis had all lost hope in individual liberty and eternal values secured by a just God -- the cornerstones of Anglo-American "conservatism" -- and so a strong Gov't was needed to replace the absentee, dead landlord. Society was to be reorganized from the top according to either nationalist, race, or class lines. The individual was merely a clog in the machine, worthless unless in relation to the group. The differences are cosmetic, the tyrannical results and intellectual structures the same. It is morally and intellectually irresponsible to put Nazism and Sovietism as opposite ends of the spectrum, while intentionally trying to shove classical liberalism in w/ the Nazis. There is nothing in common between Friedrich Hayek and the Nazi economist Lautenbach, who outlined Keynesianism before Keynes did.

The Nazis were interventionists, Socialists, New Dealers, and eerily similair to the "Corporate" Wellfare State Capitalism of modern France and Germany. This is one of the books that proves it. Other good books, the "Logic of Evil" (which describes National Etatism more in depth) and "Heaven on Earth" by Muravchik, which describes Socialism and its fascist variant under Mussolini.

http://www.amazon.com/Nazi-Economics-Ideology-Theory-Policy/dp/0300044666

[unkachuck]

11. "...continuous operation since 1930, had 425 hourly and 55 salaried employees."

....this is fuckin' great....another UAW plant goes under....

"...continuous operation since 1930"....they survived the Great Depression of the 1930s but they couldn't survive the Greater Depression of 2008?....what the hell is wrong with the people in this country? Why the hell do we put up the scum, the absolute scum, that manages our political and economic systems then destroys our lives?....we're fuckin' idiots....

....we ought to be ashamed of ourselves....

[Nightflurry]

16. Used to be a lot more.

There were over 4,000 employees there at one time. When I started there it was about 1,200. When I got axed in July it was around 750. Monroe was pretty dependent on that factory.

Growing up, I'd say at least a third of my classmates had a parent working in the plant.

[Psephos]

15. Don't forget to thank all "progressives" who don't buy anything made by UAW labor, too n/t

[Acadia Blue]

20. Thank the rich republcons who think free trade is good for all Americans

because that is what they have been saying.
Republcons don't want us to have a car industry.
I own 2 American cars.

[Acadia Blue]

17. Most N. Louisiana rednecks all still love Bush and voted for McCain

so they should like the fruits of republican rule, like poverty and being laid off.

[Nightflurry]

18. Wrong Monroe.

This is in Monroe, Michigan.

[Acadia Blue]

19. Toledo Bend? There are 2 Toldeo bend areas and Monroes?

Toledo Bend is in N. La. too.

[Nightflurry]

21. Toledo Blade

Toledo Blade, not bend. It's Toledo, Ohio's paper.

I live here, and I worked there. I think I know what state I'm in. UAW Local 723 was my local and is in Monroe, Michigan.

[du_grad]

23. Monroe, MI is north of Toledo, OH

Toledo, OH is located at the western end of Lake Erie. We are about sixty miles south of Detroit. Monroe, MI is just over the Michigan line on the way to Detroit, just off of I-75. The whole area is very dependent on the auto industry. Look for very hard times to come in NW Ohio and SE Michigan. I have a feeling this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Toledo, when I was a kid, was the home of Prestolite and Champion Spark Plug. Those factories are long gone. We also had a lot of other heavy industry that is long gone also (Doehler Jarvis, a stamping plant, I think, closed over 10 years ago and the site is still for sale and empty). Libbey Owens Ford Plate Glass kept pumping out windshields. They have been bought out and I'm not sure whether it is even in operation any more. Jeep has a huge brand new plant here. Millions were spent. Who knows what will happen to all those jobs and this brand spanking new plant if the big three fold? Toledo's budget is already in the red, and is taking major hits. It was one of the hardest hit cities in the Great Depression and it looks as if history may repeat itself.

I am not in an auto industry related job per se, but all economy here is dependent in some way on the auto industry.

We have some of the "most affordable" housing in the country (which means that the bottom has really dropped out of the real estate market here).

Anybody want to buy a house, cheap?

[Michigan-Arizona]

24. du-grad

I'm afraid you are so right on your statement about it being the tip of the iceberg with what is happening in SE Mich. & NW Ohio. I do know that Toledo was once a very busy city with many company's & factory's. Don't have the article on hand but Chrysler is keeping the Jeep line so maybe the new plant there will be safe or at least till thing's get worse. I was one of the lucky one's to have sold our home before the market tanked there. My oldest daughter bought a foreclosed home downriver in Michigan that was mortgaged for $280,000 & she paid around $74,000.

[lib2DaBone]

25. This is so sad. When will Americans say "enough"?

I know. Obama was elected.

But he amount of hurt perpetrated by CONservatives on the world is beyond criminal.

Bush and Cheny and Rumsfeld belong in jail. If these slime are not prosecuted.. history will live to regret it.