This, along with the millions to the unions

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is negotiate bloated hourly pay rates and pension plans.  The car manufacturers, of course, agreed.  Couple that with executive pay and bonuses, the effect has been to kill the goose that laid the golden egg. 

I believe it was a triad, the unions, executives, and government meddling that has killed the auto industry.

Let's not leave out the government's part in this - long before the bailouts, government mandates and standards for manufacturing cars other than what people wish to buy.  And since the government could not ban SUVs and trucks (apparently what many consumer wanted and still want) it attacks them in a different way. 

We've all read claims that SUVs are 'responsible for highway deaths.'  Why?  Because the SUV driver walked away and the family of four driving a roller skate did not? Look for gas prices to go back up to four bucks and stay there. That will be to force us to drive tiny death trap cars.  People were actually buying them when gas prices were high, but sales dropped when the per-gallon price got back down to two dollars. 

Maybe there will also be some kind of tax based on vehicle size or weight, either on purchase, or to scoop more of us into the governmentm maw, a federal surtax when we reregister our current cars. 

to be something we would do on a country wide basis.  I mean...what is the point if you can't leave your state because other states don't accept them.  I meant this as a country wide thing.  If the whole country recognized civil unions with the same benefits as marriage kind of thing.  I guess I wasn't specific enough. 

As it goes, same sex marriage is only accepted in the states that allow it.  I mean...you have to live in those states to have the rights of marriage...right?  Please correct me if I'm wrong on that one because I really don't know. 

are calling Obama and saying NO to his stimulus package.  I guess all his fearmongering didn't get to them!  Where are all those people who are so helpless that only Obama and his stooges can help them?   White House phone lines don't seem to correlate with his thoughts.  Interesting!   

You're right Obama, they didn't send you there to do the same thing OR to screw them over, both of which you are doing......over worse!

...slave wages overseas (you know, like MTSOs do.)

I don't understand why you condone corporate welfare/tax cheaters.  Not surprised -- just don't understand.

At first we were told the outsourcing was to cut labor costs.  Only after this campaign rhetoric took hold did the issue of taxes come up.  Now I ask you, if the reason for outsourcing is taxes, what the heck?  Didn't Bush CUT taxes.

It seems that American people have lost the reasoning side of their collective brains.  When I quit working a few months ago I was making LESS than I made in the 80s.  How is that possible?  The cost of medical care has not gone down.  The cost of medical insurance has not gone down.  I posted some time ago about a local hospital that laid off their most experienced nurses, not a few of them, ALL of them, and hired new graduate nurses to replace them at lesser wages.  What was that about?  They got away with it though.  Anything to increase the bottom line profit.

This is true in every industry.  They like to blame labor for everything.  Well, how the heck can you buy a $2+ loaf of bread and $5 gallon of milk on minimum wage, ya know?  Take gasoline for example.  Sure it has gone down the last days but is it back where it was when oil was what?  $86 a barrel or whatever?  No and it never will be.

So that car you drive.........how much do you think of the price tag is labor? 

These things are what really aggravates me.  People just can't seem to use reasoning power any more.  I'll give you an example:  After my husband lost his job in the CF fiasco, he drove for awhile for a friend who owns a trucking company.  I went with him on a trip.  He picked up a load of beef in Boonesville, AR, hauled it to Chicago, no problem.  Then they sent him somewhere in Ohio to pick up a load of vinegar to take to Florida.  Got to Ohio and I forget the reason but he couldn't pick up the vinegar. Then he was sent (empty) to Logan (?), Kentucky where he picked up 40,000 pounds of chocolate covered doughnuts which he delivered to Phoenix.  In Phoenix they told him that most of that load would be routed back to Atlanta.  Now what kind of sense does that make?  Taxes the problem?  I would say poor management is a bigger problem than taxes OR labor.

I'm sorry about your dad's experience.  People used to do things like that.  I recall my late father-in-law, worked for the fire department in Fort Worth and he said during the depression they did the same thing, worked less so the ones with less seniority could keep a job.  They all suffered but they suffered together and somehow they all made it as did your parents.

I am just horrified at the apparent digress of intelligence in this country.  It seems people believe anything the news media or anyone else tells them.  Seems they have totally lost the ability to reason and God forbid that anyone should think of anyone other than themself.

All that said, feel free to go ahead and believe that companies are outsourcing jobs because of labor costs or taxes.  The unionized workers, under Reagan, started taking wage concessions, that is taking a DECREASE in pay to keep jobs.  How did that work?  Don't believe I've heard of any of the victims of outsourcing even being offered a pay cut to keep the jobs in this country.  Certainly not the Rheem plant in Fort Smith that the other day laid off the last 600 workers.  They sent most of their production to Mexico a few years ago.  Fort Smith they say is dying because of outsourcing.  Their reason?  They say, it's "labor costs."  Well, then, how is it that people can't afford to pay their bills with all the excessive wages they're supposedly receiving. Obviously the next in vogue EXCUSE will be that taxes are lower in other countries.  B.S.!!!!!!!

Some union members are afraid to vote for better benefits or strike because management threatens to move, like the other posters stated.

Case in point: A small manufacturing shop. Union wanted higher wages or strike, and health care benefits to stay the same, both in cost and care. The union wanted a $.25 an hour raise. Owner said No. Union asked for $.15. Owner said no. Union said strike. Workers said no. They were afraid the owner would shut down and they had their jobs for 30 years.

The union steward fought for better benefits but when the workers voted against the better benefits, the company won. Two weeks later, the steward was laid off, along with a member of my family just because he was friends with the union steward. That was 3 years ago. The workers are still working for the same hourly rate this year. How's that for being fair?

I was a member of the Teamster's. When we went on strike for better wages back in the ྂs, he company threatened to move out.. We also wanted (women) equal pay for equal work because we did the same work the men did, but got paid $.25 an hour less.  They moved and 100 jobs were lost. So, you see, companies still have the upper hand, not unions. They only want your money anymore. They really don't care about the workers.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bankingfinancial-SP/idUSN0642989720071107

http://www.nndb.com/people/222/000163730/

Two husbands who were union workers.  One IBEW, one Teamster.  BOTH said there were workers who didn't carry their share of the work load...not much different than MTs who cherry pick for instance.

#1 IBEW husband said at the time or Reganomics, when Ronald Reagan, himself a card-carrying member of the actor's union, said he would break the unions, it would be the downfall of the American workers.. Regan succeeded in breaking the backs of the unions.   When union workers lost the ability to bargain, they had to start taking wage concessions......and guess what?  Union wages went down, so did non-union wages follow suit.  When union workers got better working conditions, better wages and better benefits, so did non-union workers.

#2 Teamster husband is a radical retired Teamster.  While he also complained that there were lazy workers who rode on the backs of the hard-workers, he also said that the union does not support such and more times than not the union would uphold the firing of such a person.  He has a Teamster retirement that is the envy of most people and he has retiree health care benefits even though we pay about $700 a month for that.  While he was working, his union dues were around $35 a month and that covered our insurance.   Teamster retirees today will not enjoy those benefits.

Do some research on the history of unions.  Might not hurt to watch the movie Norma Rae as well. 

Next time you make some colossal blunder at work, here's your excuse:  "I was rushed".  Apparently, that's good enough for the feds, who have sent around 10,000 checks to dead people...some of whom were never even in the Social Security system.  Wonder where they're getting the names?

Of course, we knew that the fraud, abuse and waste would be gargantuan since the government has never been able to handle our money without fraud, waste and abuse.

http://www.myfoxny.com/dpp/your_money/consumer/090514_Dead_People_Get_Stimulus_Checks

The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS: The NSA record collection program

It's the largest database ever assembled in the world, said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's goal is to create a database of every call ever made within the nation's borders, this person added.

For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.

The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying and tracking suspected terrorists, they said.

The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret.

Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to become the director of the CIA, headed the NSA from March 1999 to April 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program.

The NSA's domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call database.

In defending the previously disclosed program, Bush insisted that the NSA was focused exclusively on international calls. In other words, Bush explained, one end of the communication must be outside the United States.

As a result, domestic call records — those of calls that originate and terminate within U.S. borders — were believed to be private.

Sources, however, say that is not the case. With access to records of billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a secret window into the communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information.

Don Weber, a senior spokesman for the NSA, declined to discuss the agency's operations. Given the nature of the work we do, it would be irresponsible to comment on actual or alleged operational issues; therefore, we have no information to provide, he said. However, it is important to note that NSA takes its legal responsibilities seriously and operates within the law.

The White House would not discuss the domestic call-tracking program. There is no domestic surveillance without court approval, said Dana Perino, deputy press secretary, referring to actual eavesdropping.

She added that all national intelligence activities undertaken by the federal government are lawful, necessary and required for the pursuit of al-Qaeda and affiliated terrorists. All government-sponsored intelligence activities are carefully reviewed and monitored, Perino said. She also noted that all appropriate members of Congress have been briefed on the intelligence efforts of the United States.

The government is collecting external data on domestic phone calls but is not intercepting internals, a term for the actual content of the communication, according to a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the program. This kind of data collection from phone companies is not uncommon; it's been done before, though never on this large a scale, the official said. The data are used for social network analysis, the official said, meaning to study how terrorist networks contact each other and how they are tied together.

Carriers uniquely positioned

AT&T recently merged with SBC and kept the AT&T name. Verizon, BellSouth and AT&T are the nation's three biggest telecommunications companies; they provide local and wireless phone service to more than 200 million customers.

The three carriers control vast networks with the latest communications technologies. They provide an array of services: local and long-distance calling, wireless and high-speed broadband, including video. Their direct access to millions of homes and businesses has them uniquely positioned to help the government keep tabs on the calling habits of Americans.

Among the big telecommunications companies, only Qwest has refused to help the NSA, the sources said. According to multiple sources, Qwest declined to participate because it was uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants.

Qwest's refusal to participate has left the NSA with a hole in its database. Based in Denver, Qwest provides local phone service to 14 million customers in 14 states in the West and Northwest. But AT&T and Verizon also provide some services — primarily long-distance and wireless — to people who live in Qwest's region. Therefore, they can provide the NSA with at least some access in that area.

Created by President Truman in 1952, during the Korean War, the NSA is charged with protecting the United States from foreign security threats. The agency was considered so secret that for years the government refused to even confirm its existence. Government insiders used to joke that NSA stood for No Such Agency.

In 1975, a congressional investigation revealed that the NSA had been intercepting, without warrants, international communications for more than 20 years at the behest of the CIA and other agencies. The spy campaign, code-named Shamrock, led to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which was designed to protect Americans from illegal eavesdropping.

Enacted in 1978, FISA lays out procedures that the U.S. government must follow to conduct electronic surveillance and physical searches of people believed to be engaged in espionage or international terrorism against the United States. A special court, which has 11 members, is responsible for adjudicating requests under FISA.

Over the years, NSA code-cracking techniques have continued to improve along with technology. The agency today is considered expert in the practice of data mining — sifting through reams of information in search of patterns. Data mining is just one of many tools NSA analysts and mathematicians use to crack codes and track international communications.

Paul Butler, a former U.S. prosecutor who specialized in terrorism crimes, said FISA approval generally isn't necessary for government data-mining operations. FISA does not prohibit the government from doing data mining, said Butler, now a partner with the law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington, D.C.

The caveat, he said, is that personal identifiers — such as names, Social Security numbers and street addresses — can't be included as part of the search. That requires an additional level of probable cause, he said.

The usefulness of the NSA's domestic phone-call database as a counterterrorism tool is unclear. Also unclear is whether the database has been used for other purposes.

The NSA's domestic program raises legal questions. Historically, AT&T and the regional phone companies have required law enforcement agencies to present a court order before they would even consider turning over a customer's calling data. Part of that owed to the personality of the old Bell Telephone System, out of which those companies grew.

Ma Bell's bedrock principle — protection of the customer — guided the company for decades, said Gene Kimmelman, senior public policy director of Consumers Union. No court order, no customer information — period. That's how it was for decades, he said.

The concern for the customer was also based on law: Under Section 222 of the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, telephone companies are prohibited from giving out information regarding their customers' calling habits: whom a person calls, how often and what routes those calls take to reach their final destination. Inbound calls, as well as wireless calls, also are covered.

The financial penalties for violating Section 222, one of many privacy reinforcements that have been added to the law over the years, can be stiff. The Federal Communications Commission, the nation's top telecommunications regulatory agency, can levy fines of up to $130,000 per day per violation, with a cap of $1.325 million per violation. The FCC has no hard definition of violation. In practice, that means a single violation could cover one customer or 1 million.

In the case of the NSA's international call-tracking program, Bush signed an executive order allowing the NSA to engage in eavesdropping without a warrant. The president and his representatives have since argued that an executive order was sufficient for the agency to proceed. Some civil liberties groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, disagree.

Companies approached

The NSA's domestic program began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the sources. Right around that time, they said, NSA representatives approached the nation's biggest telecommunications companies. The agency made an urgent pitch: National security is at risk, and we need your help to protect the country from attacks.

The agency told the companies that it wanted them to turn over their call-detail records, a complete listing of the calling histories of their millions of customers. In addition, the NSA wanted the carriers to provide updates, which would enable the agency to keep tabs on the nation's calling habits.

The sources said the NSA made clear that it was willing to pay for the cooperation. AT&T, which at the time was headed by C. Michael Armstrong, agreed to help the NSA. So did BellSouth, headed by F. Duane Ackerman; SBC, headed by Ed Whitacre; and Verizon, headed by Ivan Seidenberg.

With that, the NSA's domestic program began in earnest.

AT&T, when asked about the program, replied with a comment prepared for USA TODAY: We do not comment on matters of national security, except to say that we only assist law enforcement and government agencies charged with protecting national security in strict accordance with the law.

In another prepared comment, BellSouth said: BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority.

Verizon, the USA's No. 2 telecommunications company behind AT&T, gave this statement: We do not comment on national security matters, we act in full compliance with the law and we are committed to safeguarding our customers' privacy.

Qwest spokesman Robert Charlton said: We can't talk about this. It's a classified situation.

In December, The New York Times revealed that Bush had authorized the NSA to wiretap, without warrants, international phone calls and e-mails that travel to or from the USA. The following month, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group, filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T. The lawsuit accuses the company of helping the NSA spy on U.S. phone customers.

Last month, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales alluded to that possibility. Appearing at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Gonzales was asked whether he thought the White House has the legal authority to monitor domestic traffic without a warrant. Gonzales' reply: I wouldn't rule it out. His comment marked the first time a Bush appointee publicly asserted that the White House might have that authority.

Similarities in programs

The domestic and international call-tracking programs have things in common, according to the sources. Both are being conducted without warrants and without the approval of the FISA court. The Bush administration has argued that FISA's procedures are too slow in some cases. Officials, including Gonzales, also make the case that the USA Patriot Act gives them broad authority to protect the safety of the nation's citizens.

The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., would not confirm the existence of the program. In a statement, he said, I can say generally, however, that our subcommittee has been fully briefed on all aspects of the Terrorist Surveillance Program. ... I remain convinced that the program authorized by the president is lawful and absolutely necessary to protect this nation from future attacks.

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., declined to comment.

One company differs

One major telecommunications company declined to participate in the program: Qwest.

According to sources familiar with the events, Qwest's CEO at the time, Joe Nacchio, was deeply troubled by the NSA's assertion that Qwest didn't need a court order — or approval under FISA — to proceed. Adding to the tension, Qwest was unclear about who, exactly, would have access to its customers' information and how that information might be used.

Financial implications were also a concern, the sources said. Carriers that illegally divulge calling information can be subjected to heavy fines. The NSA was asking Qwest to turn over millions of records. The fines, in the aggregate, could have been substantial.

The NSA told Qwest that other government agencies, including the FBI, CIA and DEA, also might have access to the database, the sources said. As a matter of practice, the NSA regularly shares its information — known as product in intelligence circles — with other intelligence groups. Even so, Qwest's lawyers were troubled by the expansiveness of the NSA request, the sources said.

The NSA, which needed Qwest's participation to completely cover the country, pushed back hard.

Trying to put pressure on Qwest, NSA representatives pointedly told Qwest that it was the lone holdout among the big telecommunications companies. It also tried appealing to Qwest's patriotic side: In one meeting, an NSA representative suggested that Qwest's refusal to contribute to the database could compromise national security, one person recalled.

In addition, the agency suggested that Qwest's foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more.

Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused.

The NSA's explanation did little to satisfy Qwest's lawyers. They told (Qwest) they didn't want to do that because FISA might not agree with them, one person recalled. For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest's suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general's office. A second person confirmed this version of events.

In June 2002, Nacchio resigned amid allegations that he had misled investors about Qwest's financial health. But Qwest's legal questions about the NSA request remained.

Unable to reach agreement, Nacchio's successor, Richard Notebaert, finally pulled the plug on the NSA talks in late 2004, the sources said.

Contributing: John Diamond

That makes sense.