Taking a stand for the Good Ole' Boys (Toyota that is)

In case you haven't heard it yet, you will soon. The Toyota Recall situation is... Wait for it.... Drum roll please.... Obama's fault.

Yes, that's right you heard it The Obama Administration is behind all of Toyota's current problems. Let me give you a quick rundown. Obama forced GM to sell to the Union and to the Gov't. Obama has too make sure GM survives, you know he owes the Unions and now the Unions own GM. So in order to make sure GM thrives so the Union can increase it's power and money Obama is scaring Americans away from buying Toyota's.

I am guessing I don't need to spell the complete ignorance of this. But I do find amusing is that people spouting this kind of talk are the same people who are flag flying, don't talk bad about our President in time of war, buy USA (shop Walmart) crowd. These are probably the same people that would come into the Electronics store I used to work at and complain because all we had were Hitachis, Toshibas, Sharp etc.

Although this does provide a reason to take a look at somehting that has occurred over the past 20 years. The number of plants / dealerships etc that foreign automakers have put in the USA. Additionally these automakers located in the parts of the country that have had low wages and little unionization mainly the south. Some twenty years later the foreign auto makers have developed a large network of influence through their economic investment in the south. So we have a interesting (if not hypocritical) irony development. Much of the southern population and the specifically many southern politicians are more and more willing to side with Foreign automakers over the US automakers. Those of you who can think back 20 years. Can you imagine a Southern politician standing up and defending a Japanese auto maker back in the 80's.

There is an article over at TPM that goes into detail about the roots that Toyota has developed in the USA and how that might aid them during this rough spot. (Full disclosure I drive a Toyota RAV4, a Honda Accord, and the previous car was a Mazda Protege. As you can see I have nothing against foreign autos.

The last note regarding the conspiracy theory mentioned above. It is my thought if there was a customer in the car market who was considering a Toyota but are concerned would first consider a Honda and then turn their attention to Ford. Ford seems to hitting their stride as of late. Their decision not to partake in the government assistance and their recent string of cars puts them in a much better position to take advantage of the current Toyota problems.