Washington Post Death Spiral Watch

This is the kind of thing they want us to pay to read?

Hummer, How We Need Thee: Matthew DeBord: When General Motors announced that it would subject its Hummer division to what in the automotive business is known as a "review," you could hear the tree huggers, the unreconstructed hippies, the postmodern Greens, Al Gore's organic peanut gallery, every single customer at the Pasadena Whole Foods and the United Prius Owners of America shove aside their alfalfa sprouts and commence clapping....

[I]t would be a mistake for GM, assisted by the raving grease-monkey CPAs of Citibank, to sell the brand to an upstart carmaker in India or China or to breed it as a hybrid, as some have suggested. GM desperately needs an obnoxious, attention-grabbing brand to keep from turning into a dreary shadow of its former self.... It takes a certain kind of man -- it's almost always the owner of a Y chromosome -- to take a gander at the Hummer, in all its broad, burly, paramilitary gas-guzzling glory, and see himself behind the wheel, striking fear and loathing in the hearts of ecologically sensitive motorists. Oprah does not drive a Hummer. But Arnold Schwarzenegger has been a proud owner. As has Sylvester Stallone....

GM has kept it in the portfolio because it's, well, cool. Just go to an auto show. People love to climb into Hummers and take in the sights from the driver's platform. While they're up there, indulging their visions of Norman Schwarzkopf.... [T]he Hummer is being picked to pieces by bean counters, an ignominious fate for a vehicle that's the street-legal version of the warrior class.....

[H]ere is where its symbolic fortitude is most threatened: For American life to work, the illusion of endless abundance must be maintained.... This is what GM owes us, and what the company owes itself -- a ridiculous machine crammed with emotional content, the sort of contraption that Detroit has always done well.... Here and there, the grandiose legacy of a country in love with freedom of movement must be celebrated, even as we figure out new and more efficient ways to get around. Now, more than ever, we need Hummer, in all its defiant, obnoxious, thoroughly American glory.

Comments

[Darren]

Wow. Total disconnection from reality.

[jerry]

Weird. Assuming that (name=DeBord,Matthew occupation=writer) is a relatively good uniquifier, than DeBord is perhaps a bit schizoid. Here he can be seen talking about the benefits of car sharing and driving a Honda hybrid:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-debord_17edi.ART.State.Edition1.36b9523.html

"I reserve a neat, white Honda Civic hybrid online, pick it up down the street at the appointed hour and, after my errand or outing, return it to its designated spot in a hotel parking structure. The system is smooth, impersonal and inexpensive – the antithesis of the dreary airport rental-car counter, with its yawning lines and niggling forms. "

[Ken Houghton]

Nice catch, jerry. (BDL - please pull that one up from comments.)

"While they're up there, indulging their visions of Norman Schwarzkopf..."

Ah, THERE it is? If they sell the Hummer, they may lose military contracts? Or are they fantasizing about talking about the "luckiest SOB on the planet"--who is NOT Schwarzkopf, or any Hummer driver, but some pudknocker with a subcompact who got over the bridge just before it was destroyed?

[Simon Halliday]

I think that 'obnoxious' is apt. However, I think that labeling it as 'American glory', might be taking it more than a bit far.

[Nicholas Beaudrot]

I am told that DeBord is a wine columnist for his day job, in which case, this is a brilliant piece of satire.

However, the fact that in the present time it has become difficult to distinguish satire from conservative worldview is ... problematic.

[jerry]

Ken, I probably have a different take on this than the rest of you.

I don't see what's all that wrong about DeBord's piece. He's not saying we need gas guzzlers or that Detroit needs to make gas guzzlers, he's saying "what GM owes us, and what the company owes itself -- [is] a ridiculous machine crammed with emotional content, the sort of contraption that Detroit has always done well...." Since I was born in Southern California, well, I can relate to that and understand that much as I want a highly fuel efficient, well strike that, an all electric, highly computerized, high efficient, and self-organizing mass transportation system.

Part of me wants the all electric pod car that can travel from my driveway and organize itself into a train on the skyway, but lots of me also appreciates the fuel burners and sports cars that I use to drive all around the hills of LA and Southern California.

So I can believe that DeBord, like Duncan Black and myself, appreciates and loves car sharing and other innovative approaches, and I can also believe that DeBord like me, likes to look at restored muscle cars. I pointed out a beautiful 65 red Mustang convertible to my kids as it parked in front of us at In N Out. Gorgeous car and truly galling was the pimply gangly teen that got out of it. In that neighborhood we're not talking the kid from Christine as much as the kid whose Dad worked high up at Bear Stearns.

My point of departure with DeBord is that arguably, apart from the Corvette, has GM made any car with anything interesting to say about it since oh about 1970 or so? If they had, I figure they would have a market cap greater than that of Mattel (who makes Hot Wheels).

For a company as big as GM, with as many marketeers and economists as GM, they sure have been downright stupid about market trends.

Full disclaimer: I want cars to stop sucking gasoline because I want the gasoline for airplanes! Damn you to hell gravity!

[George Smiley]

It always amazes me when men like MATTHEW DEBORD are willing to stick their necks out in highly public venues and scream, at the top of their lungs, "I HAVE A TINY, TINY PEE PEE!"

Why do they do this?

[Neil B.]

What happened in recent decades is the development and promotion (by their corporate sponsors, who think 1. they sell well to a certain immature crowd and 2. they promote usefully defiant, snotty attitudes to help corporatism and against the public interest) of an adolescent type bad-(conservative)-boy hack, the "South Park Conservative" as Andrew Sullivan calls them with unforgivable sympathy. Those are just the sort of sentiments they put forth. So maybe it can be "cute" or make a weird point about something left-handedly, whatever, they are still repulsive and destructive hacks. Jerry, if you really do care: we are in enough of a crises now, we need all the help and good serious will we can muster. Destructive Assholes like Matthew DeBord don't do any good at all, even in the so-so oblique sense you think they sort of do.

[Neil B.]

"but lots of me also appreciates the fuel burners and sports cars that I use[d] to drive all around the hills of LA and Southern California."
BTW the Hummer isn't one of the hip, cool old muscle cars anyway, that's why I said what I did about DeBord. The Hummer (in civilian use) is just wasteful, obstructive, oppressive, ungainly, an imposition of power and "imperialism" - a neocon Bushmobile.

[athEist]

Think of how many they could sell if they would put a gun turret on top(now with Supreme Court approval).

[sm]

GM could maintain a Hummer if they could also produce some practical cars for the non-obsessives.

[vtcodger]

***Ah, THERE it is? If they sell the Hummer, they may lose military contracts?*** Could be. But keep in mind that there are two Hummers. The original Hummer was a demilitarized military vehicle. The one you buy at the GM dealer today is a Chevy Suburban with Hummer like metal work and other minor changes. It is, a bit smaller, cheaper, lighter, and a smidge more fuel efficient than a Suburban.

[jerry]

I don't know. What I mainly see in the technorati search for DeBord's column http://technorati.com/search/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102535_pf.html is the workings of our liberal progressive version of the mighty wurlitzer. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/books/review/Glazer-t.html)

I am disappointed that Brad decided to play his part in that orchestra today.

I don't think DeBord is saying too much more than that he thinks that for GM to survive it can't move entirely to souless econoboxes, and I think a reading of his essay in context, and in context with other articles of his demonstrates that.

It seems more odd to me, that Brad, who has shown us in the very department he heads that he is capable of deciphering some very thick prose, seems to feel this is such an egregiously bad column.

The Mighty Wurlitzer was known to play some pretty foul notes. We should try to keep ours in better tune than that lest it start playing our children to the river.

[Fifi]

Mmmm kinda sorta agree with DeBord.

Yes of course, the Hummer is a ridiculous car and if the whole GM line-up was in kind, it would be really, really super double-plus bad. But yes, there is also a case for a niche market of FU status cars. It's ridiculous. It sells to ridiculously cost-insensitive (and everything-insensitive) owners, but there is a nice niche market. And there will be a nice niche market no matter how expensive gas is.

[Except that there isn't--and DeBord thinks GM is obligated to keep making it even if there isn't a market for it.]

As a matter of fact, the more expensive gas is, the better that kind of market.

The real problem with GM is that they cheapened the Hummer brand aka the H1, directly derived from the military M998 Hum-Vee, with those pretentious plastic ersatzes for paunchy wannabes called H2 and H3. For GM's sake, I hope they'll kill the H2 and H3 after the review and bring the H1 back for what it should be: a niche, select, stupid, crazy car for a niche, select customer base of stupid, crazy, wealthy bozos. The H1 is stupid shit but, man, it's the real shit.

Now, if GM could find a way to take all those H2 and H3 turds it already sold off the road, it would be really nice for everybody.

[save_the_rustbelt]

Out here in the sticks we have a phrase for guys who buy huge trucks to drive to the supermarket and the video store.

"Big truck, little pecker."

Big trucks aren't going away by any means, unless we want to shut down construction and agriculture. We will be seeing fewer guys buying huge trucks to drive to their jobs at 7-11.

[dilbert dogbert]

Oh Dear! I will have to take a look down there. Me with two Dodge 350 dualie diesel pickups must mean I am microscopic. At least they are paid for and the 1990 gets about 18mpg driving to the P.O., drug store and the neat little mexican grocery just over the creek in Menlo Park. The 2000 gets 10mpg most of the time and maybe close to 11mpg when hauling horses down from Tahoe to the Bay Area. The engines in these trucks will be running long after I am gone - if there is any diesel available to fuel them.

[derrida derider]

"It takes a certain kind of man -- it's almost always the owner of a *small penis* -- to take a gander at the Hummer"

Yep, what save_the_rustbelt said. But natural variation means there are always such men so there will always be a niche market for the Hummer; in fact if I was building them I'd make them even bigger, cruder, uglier and more impractical. Forget the soccer mom market - the penny is starting to drop about the drawbacks of huge unsafe trucks in that sector.

But gee you wouldn't want to base GM's corporate strategy on it.

[Fifi]

Me: It sells to ridiculously cost-insensitive (and everything-insensitive) owners, but there is a nice niche market. And there will be a nice niche market no matter how expensive gas is.

Brad: [Except that there isn't--and DeBord thinks GM is obligated to keep making it even if there isn't a market for it.]

No, no, no, Brad. I know. The Hummer H2 and H3, the rolling turds everybody loves to hate, are DEAD.

But I think we're talking at cross-purpose. The H1 is what I'm talking about, and (I think but I may overread) what DeBord is talking about.

As a brand, Hummer = H1, Ahnold The Gubernator's favorite car.

The market for the H1 was always tiny. GM sold a grand total of 11,818 H1 from 1992 to 2006, the last year of production. GM didn't even produce them. AMG did, on the same lines as the military vehicle.

See those numbers:

http://www.h1owner.com/Changes/h1.changes/production.numbers.html

But the wow factor for GM was huge. Not your kind of wow, I imagine, but huge nonetheless.

What GM did with the wow was to market it successfully into the (harfff, 'cuse me a second while I empty my stomach the wrong way) H2 and H3. That's what the customers were buying, a varnish of H1 at a discount.

GM should junk the H2 and H3 models. They are dead anyway. But it should also resurrect the H1 as a niche car for the wow factor and, at the same time, resurrect the brand at minimal expense while it still has some value to be salvaged.

The way that wacky car is designed, the H1 would also be a great platform to propose early versions of alternative "green" propulsions which are going to be all the rage in the next few years: BEV, series hybrid a la Chevy Volt, fuel cells, turbine and what nots.

That being said, if the debate at GM is how to sell some more H2s and H3s, then, OK, the Hummer brand is utterly dead, deservedly so, and will never come back.

As a end-note, Wikipedia is pretty good to understand the whole Hummer number soup and potage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummer

[Jon h]

"I don't think DeBord is saying too much more than that he thinks that for GM to survive it can't move entirely to souless econoboxes"

If you even think of the word "econobox" then you fail 21st century automaking.

Honda makes dancing robots. They don't just get their jollies making hot rods. They get off on engineering.

[Jon h]

" At least they are paid for and the 1990 gets about 18mpg driving to the P.O., drug store and the neat little mexican grocery just over the creek in Menlo Park. The 2000 gets 10mpg most of the time and maybe close to 11mpg when hauling horses down from Tahoe to the Bay Area"

It's clearly not just your ween that's small.

[jerry]

"Honda makes dancing robots. They don't just get their jollies making hot rods. They get off on engineering."

They make one of the most innovative aircraft today. They have an amazing facility just to crash cars in. I agree with you entirely about Honda and engineering.

But I think the market perception is of the Honda Accord, which is a wonderfully reliable conveyance, so easy to drive it is hardly worth calling it a car. A beautifully engineered device that it is a tragedy that it is utterly soulless.

But honestly, I think Honda has turned into one of the supreme engineering companies of our time. Just wish they would bring the price of their jet down to my level.

[jerry]

http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/1-volt-or-2-priuses/index.html

July 14, 2008, 9:04 pm
1 Volt or 2 Priuses?

By Jerry Garrett

Tags: Chevrolet, GM, hybrid, prius, volt

Let’s say that in 2010 you have $40,000-$50,000 to spend on a new hybrid car. Would you rather buy one Chevrolet Volt, or for about the same money, two Toyota Priuses?

That’s shaping up to be the value proposition, or close to it, for the Volt, when it is projected to arrive in late 2010.

General Motors calls the Volt an “extended range electric vehicle,” able to run 40 miles on its lithium-ion batteries alone before needing a recharge. Because the Volt will be equipped with a small gasoline engine to run an onboard charging system (the engine is connected only to a generator, not the wheels), by most definitions it is a hybrid.

The good news for Volt fans — and there are a lot of them — is that Rick Wagoner, chairman and chief executive of General Motors, announced on June 3 that the Volt has a green light for production. The bad news is that four weeks later, G.M.’s vice chairman, Bob Lutz, told a Seattle newspaper the Volt could cost “about $40,000.” And that even at that price G.M. would lose money on it — just what G.M. needs, more things to lose money on.

Mr. Lutz has also suggested a more “realistic price” for the Volt would be about $48,000.

When the Volt first appeared in concept car form at the 2007 Detroit auto show, its price was targeted for around $25,000 — competitive with hybrid vehicles like the Prius (which now costs $21,500) and the Honda Civic Hybrid ($22,600). Prospective buyers, G.M. said, would be willing to pay a bit more for the Volt, since it could theoretically be operated gas-free for short trips.

Later, however, the estimates for the Volt’s price began to inflate faster than that of a Pentagon hammer — first, to $30,000, then to $35,000 and of late, toward infinity and beyond. (Should we even bring up the possibility that Chevy dealers might be tempted to add their own markups to the first Volts?)

Just in case a carrot is needed to stimulate interest among early adopters and the environmental do-gooders, G.M. is now lobbying Congress for a $7,000 tax credit to help offset the Volt’s ballooning price. (Senator John McCain has said he might support $5,000 in connection with his plan to offer a $300 million cash prize to the first entity that develops a better automotive battery.)

But will incentives like tax credits — which, by the way, cannot be deducted by those paying the dreaded Alternative Minimum Tax — be enough? So far, G.M.’s track record with its current hybrids, vehicles now eligible for tax credits of $1,300-$2,200, has not been characterized by success.

Embarrassingly, G.M. has had to delay the launch of its highly promoted “mild hybrid” versions of the 2008 Saturn Aura, Saturn Vue and Chevrolet Malibu because of a battery recall. General Motors discovered the batteries already installed in 9,000 2007 model Aura and Vue hybrids were likely to fail prematurely. So a recall was launched in February, and it is still not completed. Batteries for those vehicles had to be replaced before more could be made available for the ‘08 hybrid vehicles, Tom Wilkinson, a G.M. spokesman, told The Associated Press in late June.

In the meantime, G.M.’s competition keeps moving the bar: new Honda and Toyota hybrids (including a new Prius), priced in the $20,000 range, are due to appear early next year; more fuel-sipping clean diesels are being announced; fuel-cell technology continues to advance; and increasing numbers of hydrogen-powered cars are already in the hands of test-fleet drivers.

So, by the time the 2011 model year Volt appears, a new generation of highly fuel-efficient green vehicles will have a head start in the marketplace. The $40,000-plus Volt could be the most expensive of the lot, and one wonders how much could its price, relative to other hybrids, influence its appeal?