Mitch Gann’s

I nearly did a spit-take with my morning coffee when the gang on ABC’s “This Week” began discussing how Mitch I. Gann will vote in the presidential election.

While this blog has been steadily gaining in readership, I never expected to get a mention in the mainstream media this soon.

One of the panelists — it was either Sam Donaldson or Cokie Roberts — asserted that John McCain has a good shot at taking the Mitch I. Gann vote, despite an economic situation that ought to send Mitch I. Gann securely into the Democratic camp.

First, let me say that I am doing OK economically.  True, my potential inheritance of GM stock is looking shaky.  But I never counted much on an inheritance.  The Ganns have a long history of taking it with them.

Now, as for how I will vote this fall, as any reader of this blog can tell, I am not crazy about either of the major party candidates.  Still, I can’t see wasting my ballot on some third or fourth party loon.  I think we should go with one of the loons who has a chance of being elected.

Let me list the obvious strengths of Obama and McCain:

Obama’s Strong Points

1. Democrat
2. Not another boring white guy
3. Younger than I am
4. Speaks well, and in English

McCain’s Strong Points

1. Not popular with the Christian Right
2. Strong on defense
3. Older than I am
4. Determined to win in Vietnam

As you can see, it is pretty much a toss-up. The candidate who has the courage and common sense to suspend all TV advertising until October will have an edge with me.  Failing that test, as I’m sure both will, I’ll have no choice but to study the white papers, spending hours comparing the candidates’ positions.  However, the fall is busy for me, so it may come down to the usual coin flip.

I want to make one thing clear: Mitch I. Gann cannot be bought. Rented cheaply, perhaps.  In that regard, there is plenty of ad space available on this highly influential, nationally known blog and I am running a special to November 5th  — three muckrakers for the price of two.

John McCain is running a TV ad in Michigan that blames Barack Obama for the high price of gasoline and claims that McCain is the one person who knows how to solve the problem of America’s dependence on foreign oil. McCain’s solution is simple: drill more oil wells in the USA.

I have a few issues with this ad. To begin with, Obama, as a first-term US senator, cannot be to blame for the high price of gas.  As far as I can tell, Obama has been a do-nothing senator; he seems to have spent most of his time and energy plotting a run for the White House.  Perhaps the point of the McCain ad is more that Congress is blocking action on more US drilling, and that Obama’s party is currently controlling Congress.  OK, but McCain has been in the senate a long time, much longer than Obama, and there were years when both Congress and the White House were in Republican control.  Yet the ban on drilling in certain off-shore sites and wild life reserves remained in place.

Another problem is the ad’s apparent claim that only McCain knows how to solve the crisis.  It’s exact wording is that “one man knows” the solution.  Why does it have to say that?  To me, this is part of the dangerous “cult of personality” politics that has been becoming more and more prevalent in US politics.  I don’t know how far back cult of personality politics go, but for US presidents, I’d argue it started with FDR.   Before that, we had a lot of stodgy presidents.   Of course, it is no coincidence that FDR was the first US president to exploit modern media effectively.   It was the radio then.  Now it is mostly TV and the Internet.   When we can see and hear our political leaders, we don’t want them to be stodgy or unattractive.  We don’t want thinkers because thinkers are boring and they might challenge us to think.  We want do-ers, just like in the movies.  We want heroes, or at least rock stars.  Or we want inspirational speakers.   We want that one special person who knows all the answers, who is always right.   I am not blaming John McCain or the Republicans for the cult of personality approach.  Obama is the perfect example of it.  But to suggest that only McCain has the answer is to suggest that he has some special, supernatural gift of seeing.  I don’t think so.

I especially don’t think so when McCain’s unique insight produces “drill more oil wells here” as the way to solve the energy crisis. For that idea, you need a special gift? As insights go, it falls short of messianic. Let me ask,  who will drill these dozens or hundreds or thousands of new oil wells?  From what I have read, there is not an over-abundance of drilling rigs and drilling crews ready to pock-mark America with new wells.  Quite the opposite.  Large oil companies are multi-national.  They are producing enough oil right now to satisfy the world’s needs — albeit at a high market price.  The big, multi-nationals don’t care about “America’s dependence of foreign oil.”  What they care about is producing as much crude as possible as cheaply as possible while getting it to market efficiently and earning the highest price they can. If they can earn massive profits from the wells they already operate around the world, why would they suddenly flock back to the US?  Because the new president asked them nicely?

Some independent, wild-cat companies might want to start sinking wells here and there and everywhere.  Americans would apparently go for that idea as long as “everywhere” did not include their own neighborhood and as long as the increased drilling and refining resulted in significantly reduced gas prices.  As soon as proposals for drilling and refinery-building get specific, they are apt to meet with strong local opposition. For instance, a recent poll taken in my home state found that people supported more domestic oil drilling — but not in the Great Lakes.  Not in our Great Lakes.

Go mess up some other shoreline.

However, in spite of environmental concerns, many large and small companies do pump a lot of crude from American wells still.  Domestic production is already increasing.  According to an article in our local newspaper this past weekend, oil companies are even opening up old, capped wells in southeast Michigan — including several within a 10-minute drive from my house.  It is now economically feasible to operate wells that only produce two or three barrels of oil per day.   This is because of the high price of crude on the world market.   At today’s oil prices, uncapping old, low-producing wells is an easy way to make money.  The same logic would probably lead to more drilling in currently protected areas of the United States were they to be opened up.  But would this lead to cheaper oil and gas? The whole point is that oil production is increasing in the US because the price is high.

Interestingly, the oil tycoon and Republican businessman T. Boone Pickens has come out with a plan to end America’s dependence on oil.  He has been promoting his plan on TV and the Internet.  His premise is that we cannot drill our way out of the crisis:

America uses a lot of oil. Every day 85 million barrels of oil are produced around the world. And 21 million of those are used here in the United States.

That’s 25% of the world’s oil demand. Used by just 4% of the world’s population.

Can’t we just produce more oil?

World oil production peaked in 2005. Despite growing demand and an unprecedented increase in prices, oil production has fallen over the last three years. Oil is getting more expensive to produce, harder to find and there just isn’t enough of it to keep up with demand.

The simple truth is that cheap and easy oil is gone.

(The Pickens Plan)

Pickens goes on to argue that “the United States is the Saudi Arabia of wind power.”  He also is big on natural gas, which burns cleaner than gasoline and is located in abundance in North America.  I’m not necessarily sold on all the details of the Pickens Plan, but it seems more clear headed than the McCain plan.

Pickens is not running for office, so he can afford to think.

I learned today that GM is not contributing a penny to Flint’s celebration of the corporation’s 100th birthday. GM did send an executive to give a couple speeches. The guy lives in Flushing, about five miles west of the city.

This information has soften my heart toward the event.  Yesterday, when I thought GM was footing the bill, it all seemed cold and ironic.  Today, it just seems sad and pathetic — or at best bittersweet.  I guess you can view the party as being for Flint itself.  I guess you have to view it that way since GM is not showing up.

However, GM is funding a celebration. It will be In October. In Detroit.

A couple weeks ago, it was rumored that General Motors might sell one or more of its divisions — possibly including Buick — in order to survive.  Given my family’s history, I found this disheartening.

But the corporation came up with a different plan. It is keeping Buick, but canceling my mother’s health insurance coverage at the end of the year (along with that of all other salaried retirees 65 and older).  GM announced the plan on Tuesday, and Mom received a confirmation letter from the company today.

Tomorrow, a weekend-long celebration of GM’s 100th anniversary starts in Flint.

“GM reportedly considering job cuts, brand sales” (MarketWatch):

Facing steep vehicle sales drops amid soaring gas prices and plunging consumer confidence, the Detroit giant is likely to present job cuts and other cash-raising steps to its board of directors in early August, according to the Wall Street Journal.

These potential measures are part of a broader re-evaluation aimed at returning the company to profitability in 2010, the paper reported, citing internal projections.

GM recently put its Hummer division up for sale and could soon put one of its eight remaining brands on the chopping block, saving billions in development costs for vehicles that have trouble moving off the lots, like those from Buick, Saturn and Saab.

My father worked at Buick’s Plant 10  in Flint most of his adult life.  He started out an hourly rate and ended up a foreman — a company man.  Before that, his father lost four fingers of his right hand building a Buick.   Both men died before GM shut down its Buick operations in Flint and bull-dozed the giant factory complex (which at one time included the largest factory under one roof in the world).

My parents bought a lot of GM stock over the years, and never sold any of it.  My mom kept buying Buick coupes even after Dad died and the Flint plant was razed.   If the corporation has to sell off the Buick brand in order to survive, then it should.  It’s just business.  There’s no room for sentiment.

But it makes me sick.

This evening I took a walk up the Flushing River Trail as far as the footbridge that spans the Flint River. This photo was taken from the bridge, looking south, back toward town.  It was a peaceful moment, just me and some bird song.  Then other people came along. You see an assortment of people on the trail on a pleasant summer evening. About half of them are in the company of a dog. Sometimes even two dogs.  Of those who aren’t with dog, about half are riding bikes.  Plenty of kids, too, on bikes or on foot, with or without dogs.   If you walk in the morning, you don’t encounter kids or bicyclists. Still some dogs, though. You got a dog, you gotta walk it.

Early morning, the coffee brewing and the paper waiting on the front steps.   Sunshine everywhere. Nobody else awake.