New Business Venture

[2500 HD]

A friend of mine just started his own business in Afghanistan.


He's making land mines that look like prayer mats.



It's doing well.
He says prophets are going through the roof.

[Newt]

Much better investment than Obama's plan for the taxpayers.

Shortly after he gave General Motors a $53 billion bailout in 2009, President Barack Obama said the plug-in Chevrolet Volt would be salvation of the beleaguered automaker. Consumers will buy 120,000 Volts each year from 2012 onwards, the Energy Department predicted then. But through November, only 6,142 Volts have been sold. And that pitiful figure is inflated by purchases for government fleets.

Johan de Nysschen, president of Audi of America, isn’t surprised.

“No one is going to pay a $15,000 premium for a car that competes with a (Toyota) Corolla,” he told Lawrence Ulrich of MSN Autos in 2009. “So there are not enough idiots who will buy it.”

The idiots who do, Mr. de Nysschen said, are “the intellectual elite who want to show what enlightened souls they are.”

The Volt is, in essence, the electric version of the Chevy Cruze, which sells for about $17,000. At $41,000, the Volt costs as much as a BMW335i.

The Cruze seats six; the Volt just four, because of the space taken up by the battery. The Volt has less head and leg room.

The Cruze gets an estimated 42 mpg, and can go about 500 miles on a tank of gas. The Volt can run for about 40 miles before the battery must be recharged, about 340 miles more on the gas in the gas tank. The Volt’s gas mileage (29 mpg) is significantly less than that of the Cruze, and the Volt takes only premium gas.

The Volt may not be the technological “leap forward” GM CEO Dan Akerson claims. The Roberts electric car, built in 1896, gets the same mileage per charge.

The Volt’s battery caught fire after low speed collisions in crash tests conducted by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration.

That was in June. Volt purchasers weren’t warned until late November. NHTSA “deliberately suppressed public knowledge of the safety risk,” chaarged the chairman of the House Oversight Committee.

If they take only short trips, Volt owners can go weeks without having to visit a gas station, a fact GM trumpets in its advertising. But the difference between the price of a Volt and the price of a Cruze can buy a lot of gas. And though electricity costs much less than gasoline, it isn’t free.

Purchasers of electric cars get a $7,500 tax credit. This lowers the cost to the consumer of a Volt to just under double that of the Chevy Cruze.

The average Volt owner makes $170,000 a year, according to Mr. Akerson. In an editorial in October, the Washington Post wondered “how the modest projected energy savings could justify taxpayer support for a product that people of ordinary means cannot hope to own.”

These wealthy consumers get only a small slice of pork. Mr. Obama tucked into his stimulus bill $2.4 billion in grants to electric vehicle and battery manufacturers. The Department of Energy loaned an additional $2.4 billion to build EV manufacturing plants.

Most recipients — like most of the “renewable” energy producers who got DOE loans — are in financial trouble. Two already are bankrupt.

“Like Solyndra, several of the firms receiving support had investors who were also important Obama campaign donors,” noted the Washington Post.

When all government grants, subsidies and credits are added up, each Volt sold so far has cost taxpayers nearly $250,000, estimates a Michigan think tank.

Sales of the Volt and the Nissan Leaf combined are just one tenth of one percent of all new car sales this year. Despite this, Ford and Toyota plan to introduce their own electric vehicles.

“Why would two auto manufacturers jump into a market with almost no demand and a high failure rate?” asked Ed Morrissey of Hot Air. “Could it be because they are looking for the same kind of subsidies that gives them around $250,000 per vehicle before the car is ever sold?”

It's obvious why we need to raise the debt ceiling another 1.5 trillion dollars.

[bluegrass]

It's obvious why we need to raise the debt ceiling another 1.5 trillion dollars.

ROTFLMFAO!!!!!!!!!!!

[Rabbithoundjb]

Obama is just getting his funds in order for his 2012 vacations.

[Newt]

It sounds like a good deal to me.
For $41,000.00 you can own a $250,000.00 vehicle. Wouldn't that look impressive in your driveway. That is only a good deal if you have a parking spot far enough away from your home so as not to burn your house down when it ignites.

Just shows the possibilities when unions and government are in partnership. Hope China doesn't run out of money. This world needs more innovative ideas.

I wonder if any posters of this board own a couple? They are so in sync with mother earth and Al Gore.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

YOUR STATEMENT,
ABOUT MAKING LAND MINES THAT LOOK LIKE PRAYR MATS,
-
-IS NOT FUNNY IN THE LEAST.
-
-AND,SINCE YOU IDIOT'S DON'T KNOW,THE PRESIDENT IS PAYING FOR HIS OWN VACATION.

[Rabbithoundjb]

Yea right with funds right out of the tax payers pockets.

[Newt]

YOUR STATEMENT,
ABOUT MAKING LAND MINES THAT LOOK LIKE PRAYR MATS,
-
-IS NOT FUNNY IN THE LEAST.

Neither are your jokes but we still laugh to protect your fragile psyche.
-
-AND,SINCE YOU IDIOT'S DON'T KNOW,THE PRESIDENT IS PAYING FOR HIS OWN VACATION.

You honestly believe that? Who owns the house where he is staying? Does he own that also?

I know! In the liberal mind Obama owns the country. We are just paying guests.

[bluemouse]

Obabbler has never paid for anything. Research who paid for his college eduction no trace. All obabbler is a puppet for george sosras and the far left. obabbler is inept to run this country so he goes were he is told.

[TC]

Obabbler has never paid for anything. Research who paid for his college eduction no trace. All obabbler is a puppet for george sosras and the far left. obabbler is inept to run this country so he goes were he is told.

Well NOT Everywhere he is Told!!!!

[Pine Mt Beagles]

YOU GUY'S ARE HAVING A HARD TIME,EXCEPTING THE FACT WE HAVE AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT FOR A CHANGE,SOME ONE WHO PUT'S THE AMERICAN WORKER (( YOU GUY'S )) FIRST,THE BUSH TYRANNY MESSED UP YOUR HEAD'S,YOU GUY'S THINK THAT IF THE KOCH BROTHER'S,SAY IT IT'S TRUE.

[bluemouse]

You talking about the prez that would not wear an American pin on his coat or put his hand over is heart when the National Athem or have a wife that said she was never proud of American untill her husaband got his first job ( which he sucks at) or you talking about the prez that bows to other leaders and takes up for every muslim cause that comes along. That the one you talking about. Or you talking about the prez thats played three month of golf in three years instead of doing his job or you talking about a prez that got a super committee together knowing that it would fail so he could blame someone else on his failures. Or the prez that sat in rev wright chuch for twenty years condeming american. Real American my butt.

[Pine Mt Beagles]

NO I'AM TALKING ABOUT PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA,
NOT BUSH,WHO WENT AROUND ALL DAY KISSING A SAUDI PRINCE IN THE MOUTH,AND KNEELING TO HIM,
AND COULD NOT FIND AN OPEN DOOR,
AND LIED AMERICA INTO A WAR KILLING 100'S OF AMERICAN SOILDERS AND CRIPLING 1000'S MORE.
AND DESTROYED AMERICA'S ECONOMY
DIVIDED THE AMERICAN PEOPLE MORE THAN SINCE THE CIVIL WAR
WHO PUT POLICIES IN PLACE TO ADD TRILLION'S TO THE DEBT.
JUST TO MUCH TO MENTION.

[tommyg]

NO I'AM TALKING ABOUT PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA,
NOT BUSH,WHO WENT AROUND ALL DAY KISSING A SAUDI PRINCE IN THE MOUTH,AND KNEELING TO HIM,
AND COULD NOT FIND AN OPEN DOOR,
AND LIED AMERICA INTO A WAR KILLING 100'S OF AMERICAN SOILDERS AND CRIPLING 1000'S MORE.
AND DESTROYED AMERICA'S ECONOMY
DIVIDED THE AMERICAN PEOPLE MORE THAN SINCE THE CIVIL WAR
WHO PUT POLICIES IN PLACE TO ADD TRILLION'S TO THE DEBT.
JUST TO MUCH TO MENTION.

Democrats started Walfare-Democrats Signed NAFTA-Democrats cater to Unions that cost taxpayers billions. Need More Rufus?