CBC

The gym at lunchtime at least 4 times a week. I usually lift 3 days a week and run at least 2, cardio on ellipitcal or bikes after lifting if I don't run. Started about a year ago doing a basic core routine, it is good for strength but not so much for tone. But I can get the routines done in under 30 minutes. The latest wrinkle in my work is our new dog requires a ton of walks, so I have been adding 3-5 miles a day of walking on top of that. I am down about 10 lbs since I started back at lunch this summer. Day1: Clean and press, Dunmbell overhead press, dumbell lateral raises, tri- pull down, skull crushers, tri-dumbell extensions. Day 2: Deadlifts, T-bar rows, Bent arm rows, Front Shrugs, Behind the back shrugs. Day 3: Incline or decline bench, flat bench, bent arm dumbell flys, dumbell curl, straight bar curl

Sometime this past weekend, Five Guys Burgers & Fries put a "Coming Soon" sign in the window of that former party store at Detroit and Gladys. That's encouraging...

Cortlandgirl, Thanks for the perspective. It pretty much is spot on in my perspective after interning or working for the following GM Lordstowm, Delphi Packard and as a supplier rep at Ford Lorain before changing industries. I think your dad's point that the heads of the big three are no different than AIG or Lehman or NCB, is spot on too. Excellent post.. I will be forwarding it around...

One world... Bah!

Not related to the actual bailout but it keeps driving me nuts that the stock video footage for an assembly plant that is being used by CNN/HL appears to be from the Saturn plant in 1996. Back on topic..

There is no bias against car companies here right? 8-) :lol: I would like to see GM suffer for killing the street car companies in order to drive bus sales and fueling growth in exurbs and SUVs (although Ford really is to blame for that with the Explorer) and blocking public trans and the list is endless... However.. If it wouldn't have huge ripples across the already weak economy, I agree and would say let them die. But it will and it will be ugly, ugly and ugly. Plus the taxpayer will end up picking up the tab anyway in unemployment, Medicaid, loss taxes,etc...Save the drama and try and control the effects.

A couple of articles/op-ed pieces out there today for anybody who wants to read them. The first is from cnn.com and it puts numbers to what would happen to the auto industry and the economy too if GM was to collapse. Not a pretty picture. GM still has 22% of the US market and is the single largest seller. The havoc on the supplier chain has huge ripple effects and the supply vacuum would hit the other remaining companies quite hard driving consumer prices up 10-15%. http://money.cnn.com/2008/11/19/news/companies/gm_failure_consumers/index.htm Mitt Romney weighs in on the situation in this NY Times op-ed. He says to let them go bankrupt, but a highly controlled bankrupt with backing from fed guaranteed loans. And he toots his family's horn just for kicks. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/opinion/19romney.html?ref=opinion At this point the sane options are basically the same, bailout money with huge restructuring/management change clauses attached or controlled bankruptcy with huge restructuring/management changes. I am for the first one because it would give the suppliers a better chance to reorg with out the banks freezing what ever credit they have left.

8 in a row...

If it is a beachtown, you need to have a 60 year old skinny guy with long gray hair and wrap around shades, roller blading everyday up and down the boardwalk in a bodypaint and a color coordinated speedo, like there used to be at PB (Pacific Beach) in San Diego when I went out there fairly regular about 10 years ago. I was out there at New Years and he had a football field painted on his front and back with a green speedo for the Bowl games.

I know that is probably true but I can't figure out how that would happen if Ford or GM went bankrupt, without killing the entire industry. It's like saying we can save you by amputating your torso, but your head, arms and legs will be fine. It just doesn't work. I can see a merger working but even that is going to require a huge flow of cash from somebody, be it the feds or private investors.

Where do the benefits come in priority of being paid out in bankruptcy liquidization in Chapter 7. it just seems to me that there isn't any real chance of there being enough value in GM to pay their debtors and benefits obligation. It seems to me that these costs are going to be borne by the taxpayers one way or another. Do I want to see the same bloated structure of GM come out on the otherside of this debacle? No. But I would like to see a streamlined competitive smaller GM or baby-GMs not a complete blow up ofthe company leaving no trace behind. Also throw in a public tar and feathering of any past surviving GM executives or UAW leaders for good measure. :-D Disclosure: I grew up 5 miles from GM Lordstown, but no direct family members worked there, lots of friends parents though.

Good examples with the steel mills. And if GM goes into bankruptcy how does that not happen?

Part of the problem with the auto makers is that in order to appease to unions during negotiations and not affect the bottom line in the near term is they made a lot of longterm promises in the healthcare and retirement arenas, who's bill is now due. There is also the combined problems of a shrinking workforce, due to increased efficiency and modularization in which suppliers build sub assembly, and the unique situation of a union having a relationship with only 3 or 4 companies that controlled the whole auto industry up until the 80's. There is no other industry that I can think of that has nearly a 1 to 1 relationship of employer to union. Everyother industry (other than steel in the 50s, maybe?)had the influence of the unions spread out over a much larger pool of companies. The combined result of all of these results in astronomical cost per current employee today.

but even the pharmacy at the plant ties directly into the fact that GM has 4 to 1 retires to current employees. That would work where GM has current plants and employees but I am guessing that the medication needs dwarf the medication needs of the current workforce. Edit: What truth is there to the claim that the UAW has historically one of the fiercest opponents to socialized medicine?

LMAO. That is some funny stuff. Please tell me that you made it up, that is one scary train of thought.

Good article on why Bankruptcy of GM may not work. I am not so much for a bail out of the Big three as I am against the chaos that will be heaped upon the us economy if they do go under. Yes they have been mismanaged and have brought much ill upon themselves but their entire business model of parts on credit and paying after the fact(which has worked for 80 years) came crashing down during this credit freeze. GM had something like 25 billion in cash on hand at the beginning of the year. The article touches on the fact that even the better car companies depend on an incestous web of 1st, 2nd and 3rd tier suppliers who a GM's bankruptcy will cause a few of these suppliers cards to pulled out causing the whole house to come crashing down. I know that when I interned for Delphi in the 90's they supplied parts to every car company except Honda. Delphi's biggest buyer is GM, GM goes under then Delphi goes under and the Toyota plant in Alabama or wherever grinds to a halt. So my position is kickout the management, bring in a crack team who may even split up GM, but the bailout would probably be best because it doesn't look like the money will be there to restructure in bankruptcy. http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1858702,00.html Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008 Is General Motors Worth Saving? By Bill Saporito For months, General Motors had been telling everyone who would listen that bankruptcy was not an option. It had a $30 billion cash pile and plans to restructure the company as the economy rebounded and 2007 U.S. auto sales topped 16 million units.

Red paint, angry young Republicans at Dennis being Dennis.. Blue paint, angry Democrats for Dennis not ending the war yet.. But Orange paint? No ideas..

I think that this project is toast until the US retail landscape recovers from this glut of oversupply. Even if there was credit available, getting commitment for retail tenants would be nearly impossible.

(sigh) Depressing, definitely, surprising? No, not at all. With what seems to be half of the retailers in this country going into bankruptcy or closing down stores left and right to stay afloat.... Does Stark currently own anything besides that corner parcel that his building is on? Maybe we will get something out of him, even if it just a new building on Lakeside with residential and office space.

They need to move forward on this pronto. Pull the trigger and go with the current convention center. The land behind Tower City will still be a parking lot and it will still be used, as opposed to the problem of an empty building/convention center in the middle of downtown . With the current economic climate and the suspension of the East Bank project, they have a half of Billion dollar project that has funding sitting there. A project of this scale will put idled workers to work and do a ton for the collective state of mind of Cleveland. Costs of raw materials are plummeting and maybe if we are lucky we will be able to get this built for what they have collected in sales tax and have enough left over to buy everyone in the county an ice cream cone. Also with fingers crossed, if we start now this project would be opening just as the world economy is picking up steam again and those companies that had been delaying purchasing medical equipment due to budget constraints will be looking to buy. Hopefully they are willing to fly to Cleveland to listen to sales pitches, browse and check things out before purchasing.

Pats and Indy win again, both against good teams...because they are winners... Bah, the Browns are currently not winners... I am not a naysayer who will say they will never be winners, but this current formula is not a winning team. Is Jamal Lewis's beef with Winslow? Anybody know the origins of his comments regarding the packing it in on Thursday night?

I believe that the US is the only country out of Japan and Europe to currently have a birthrate higher than the replacement rate and I think that is being supported by immigration and immigrants higher birthrates, too. My point being is the population problem for future cities here will not be too many people but rather competition for resources abroad.The population timebomb is in developing countries where technology has given just enough rope to hang themselves, so to speak. Advances in healthcare have lead to population explosion, but not enough resources to support such huge populations. The problem that I have been trying to wrap my head around is how can a US city be as dense as it was say in the 20's when you have such dramatically smaller households? I live in Lakewood, which is a "streetcar suburb" of Cleveland which was built out mostly from 1900 to 1930. Population peaked I believe sometime in the 60's at around 70,000 to 75,000, the housing stock and occupancy rate has been for the most part static and it is believed that Lakewood will drop below 50,000 in the next census for the first time in nearly 100 years. How do we get more dense when people are having fewer children and for the most part later?

I want to rant but that takes too much energy... Good for Quinn. I liked DA but once it was apparent that he wasn't making progress in leadership, evening out his game and maintaining his composure I didn't think that it was going to work out. I'll take an even quarter back that is good for 200 plus yds on almost any day. Perhaps the Browns should switch to Hockey since they can only play for three periods?

Word.. I almost always have voted in favor of casinos but I even voted no on issue 6 because it was for amending the constitution for one casino? WTF was that? What does it take to get an issue on the ballot to establish an Ohio Casino board that would have authority to auction off initally 5 licenses for franchise rights for the 5 regions of Ohio (NE, NW,SW,SE & central)? I could support that!!

(click, click, click, snap!) Nope still nothing happening....