GM Can Go Screw!

GM is reporting third quarter losses of around $2.5 billion. That's freaking huge! They're warning that they'll run out of cash in 2009... unless the government bails them out.

Ummm... no. I don't think so.

Gas prices went through the roof and companies like GM and Ford insisted that Americans want big cars cause that's the American way. They didn't sell. That's probably because Americans got a healthy dose of "what do you mean we can't get cheap gas?" and had to start buying more fuel efficient cars. So the SUVs and pickups and gas-guzzling V8s didn't sell and GM got stuck with a bunch, which is why you saw sales like "everyone is supposedly an employee but what we aren't telling you is our employees can't afford to buy our cars even with the discounts we allegedly give them" sales. They needed to at least get something for them. And they still didn't sell. So they started destroying them.

But now their stubborn practices and short-sightedness has them seeing billions in losses and they want us, the taxpayers, to essentially buy out their unsold inventory. No. You brought it on yourself GM. You need to suffer the consequences of your poor business choices. No more fucking corporate welfare. I'm tired of corporations planning to go belly up assuming that taxpayers will bail them out. Fail GM. And maybe if you fail other corporations will get the point that us taxpayers aren't their personal cash cows or safety nets.

If the government bails GM out, I expect a shiny new vehicle in my parking lot courtesy of GM. I'll take the damn gas guzzler overstock if I'm going to have to pay for it anyway. If I don't get that shiny new gas guzzler, I had better not be bailing GM out with my taxes!

Rediscovering Music From My Past

Last night I was YouTube-ing and started listening to some Flight of the Conchords, which is one of my recent musical discoveries. Then I sort of randomly decided I wanted to listen to some young Springsteen (you know, back when he had skinny arms and was still kinda hot). I listened to "Born To Run," and thought that it had the same sort of energy as John Cougar Mellencamp's "I Need A Lover," so I listened to that. Then I ended up thinking about how much I used to love Pat Benetar and especially the sad song "Hell Is For Children," so I listened to that. That got me so hooked back on listening to her that I had to dig out a Pat Benetar CD today and listen. I missed her music more than I realized! Then I decided I would find the video for Dream Theater's "Pull Me Under." While watching the video, I noticed singer James Labrie was wearing a Napalm Death shirt and I was just totally geeking out over that. I never realized he was into death metal, and here was a reminder of the music that I clung to so much in my adolescence and into nearly my early adulthood: thrash and death metal! I remembered listening to bands like the obvious thrash icons like Metallica (pre-sucky-black-album days) and Megadeth, but also Anthrax, Suicidal Tendencies, Mortal Sin, Slayer and Testament. Also Sepultura, though they started out more death metal. And of course death metal bands like Napalm Death, Obituary, Morbid Angel and Cannibal Corpse. So of course I YouTubed some Napalm Death and was happy until I had to shut down the computer.

A few years ago I started getting back into death metal a little more and discovered Dying Fetus, My Dying Bride, and especially Resistant Culture (which I have to say is probably my second most favorite death metal band now for their excellent blending of traditional Native American music with metal) but it wasn't quite as fanatical as the youger days when Jaegan and I would "mosh" in his living room. I've been listening to Dethklok and watching Metalocalypse a lot lately and that's reawakened my interest in thrash and death metal. It's kind of funny because the younger Gaming Club crowd have caught glimpses of my earlier metal days through Facebook or just comments I've made at club and they have remarked how they couldn't imagine me being metal and are thoroughly amused. Which of course makes me feel a bit old because I remember thrash and death metal and metal in general when it was still young (in the case of thrash and death metal more like in its infancy and it being ostracized as devil-worshipping music by politicians and televangelists). Hell, I remember when Metallica was banned from performing in Manchester, NH, because someone in the city thought the song "One" advocated suicide and God-hating! Even still, I admit it's kind of amusing to me, too, that they find my old metal self so fascinating. To me it's just part of who I am and was and is nothing all that exciting. Yeah, I headbanged. I used to bemoan not hearing thrash and death metal on the radio (except in the early days of WAAF when they were refering to themselves as untamed radio and pirate radio). Meh. It was fun when I was young. :P

I think part of why I'm just not so metal as I used to be is that I'm also just not as angry and feeling opressed as I was back then. I mean, seriously. I was obsessed with Metallica's "Dyers Eve" and regarded it as an anthem for my life at the time. It's nice to listen to