General Trouble

One of the biggest items of news today is General Motors' announcement that they will close 12 factories in the next year. This hits close to home, since one of those plants is the Saturn factory in Spring Hill, Tennessee. That is where The Redhead's aunt and uncle and grandparents live. More than 30,000 people will lose their jobs as a result.

As tough as this sounds, it's absolutely necessary for the auto giant. $1,500 of every vehicle GM produces goes to worker health costs alone. That's $1,500 that other automakers don't have to worry about. I've looked into cars a lot since the loss of my dear friend, and I won't even consider a single American car right now. I need a compact car with good gas mileage that will reliable, inexpensive to maintain, and be nice to drive. And I haven't found a single American car that fits the bill. There's a Chevy dealership down the street from us, and I don't want a single car on their lot. I'm driving a Saturn part-time right now, and it drives like a bathtub on wheels. That should have been a sign to GM a long time ago that they were in trouble. I hope the company can turn things around. I'd like to drive a nice car that is made in America, but I won't settle for rubbish, either.