CAUGHT LOOKING THE WRONG WAY ?

As much as I hate to admit, the President of the United States and I are of the same generation. But after a week when most mainstream American media have described the mayhem in their nation's capital, and in particular the White House, as 'Pure Madness' - I am first to admit that sometimes at least, I keep my crazy to myself.

As best I can: I sympathize with how lonely it must seem being the most powerful man in the world when everyone has concluded you're an idiot. Perhaps just like the great icon of American manufacturing, Henry Ford who became increasingly dictatorial and ever more demented in the post World War II years,  Mr. Trump has convinced himself and a handful of 'believers' that America will be great again when dinner is brought to your car window on roller-skated damsels or the 'cinemascope' movie speaker hangs from the driver side window.



Unsafe at any speed !

How else to explain the delusional notion of plunging the world into a global war on trade over the manufacture of key components of the great muscle machines of the pre-Viet Nam era:  Steel and Aluminium.

From beer cans, appliances, aircraft, auto making, and God forbid gun-making (Sigh !)  more than 6 Million Americans depend directly on jobs which use manufactured steel and aluminium. Less that 100,000 Americans work in the country's ageing steel and aluminium rolling mills, mostly along the mid-Atlantic rust-belt which can't, won't and could not keep-up with domestic demand - Trade Wars are not good for America : They're wars in which.... OH WAIT !... I was going to say everyone loses.

On second thought, perhaps the one winner over yet another looming trade dispute with our bullying deranged neighbour to the south is our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, and his embattled Cabinet. Even with the many gifts and promises of more in an early Federal Budget Tuesday last; nothing deterred the country's (and much of the world's) attention away from "That India Trip !" Until "The Donald" ill advised and unplanned blurting. Until the next shoe drops, perhaps Mr. Trudeau should be thankful.

DEADWEIGHT LOSS

Why is the Federal Government ready to front the State of Michigan close to $600-Million for its share of building a second Windsor-Detroit bridge?

Michigan's economy is flat-broke and commercial interests on the Canadian side of the border are so critically important that there is virtually no other choice. Lest I digress...I say "virtually" no other choice, because the private owner of the Ambassador Bridge, Detroit billionaire and right-wing conservative Matty Moroun, is ready and willing to build his own second bridge. In fact Mr. Moroun has been running a series of "attack ads" against the government's project on American television, including Fox News.

"Thickening" of America's border with Canada and the Harper Government's efforts last winter to blunt its effect with a "Perimeter Security" arrangement have remained pretty much under the radar during the current Federal Election campaign. It may be that the issue was pretty much a non-starter despite vocal critics dubbing it at the time as an attack on Canadian sovereignty.

Since the near collapse of the American economy in the "Great Recession of 2008" there's been an interesting seesaw effect in the balance of trade between our two nations. Though it remains the most significant exchange of trade and services on the planet; business between the United-States and Canada dropped to $430-Billion in imports and exports in 2009 from a pre-recession high of about $600-Billion, and shot back up to $525-Billion in 2010. It's hard to predict just how the meteoric rise of the Canadian "Loonie" to $1.05 USD will affect trade matters through 2011; but VISA Credit Cards USA reported just last week that Canadian cross-border shoppers accounted for a multi-billion dollar increase in its bottom line since the start of the new year.

Back at the Detroit River bottle neck, a recent study published by two southwestern Ontario Universities (University of Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier University)concludes that the costs of border crossing delays can be startlingly large especially in the automobile sector. For example, it's estimated that the parts and sub-assemblies of automobiles which criss-cross the border several times during production, adds about $800 to the final cost of each automobile. In contrast imported cars from overseas only pass through Customs once; on entering the country.

When it's all put together this loss of economic efficiency known as "deadweight loss" may be sufficiently large to offset Canada's economic gains produced by the North American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The cost of border delays estimated by the study at Waterloo and Wilfrid Laurier may be as much as $30-Billion per year...and the Province of Ontario is its biggest loser. The long-term effect is that potential investors are looking elsewhere when it comes time to open businesses that rely on cross-border shipments.

National "orange surge" or not; polls and pundits predict that it will be difficult on Monday to unseat the two Windsor area N.D.P. Members of Parliament, Brian Masse (Windsor West) and Joe Comartin (Windsor-Tecumseh), both of whom are strong supporters of the Harper Government's plan to pay our share of the bridge cost, and to advance the Americans a major share of their costs. Windsor's economy and that of the neighbouring Essex Riding, held by Conservative MP Jeff Watson, have been devastated by the economic downturn in the United-States and the still very fragile recovery of the automobile assembly sector in the Detroit area.

Unless and until car parts, automobiles, lumber, oil and gas; pretty much everything else Canada produces can magically cross the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans as easily as trucks and trains cross into the United States of America; our economic fate is in American hands...a somewhat shaky prospect which may explain why "border issues" have remained off of the election trail.

THE TROJAN HORSE IN THE CLOSET

Chapter seven of Ralph Nader's ground-breaking 1965 best seller is titled: "Damn the driver and spare the car." Forty-five years later and amidst the fall-out from Toyota's unprecedented 8 million plus vehicle re-call; Nader's chapter sounds all too familiar...

Those of my generation will know, of course, that Nader's book: "Unsafe At Any Speed - The designed-in dangers of the American automobile", shocked the world just as the North American boomer generation were about the purchase their first cars. "Nader's Raiders", as the hundreds of young activists inspired by the book became known, forced North American auto makers and Governments to confess and account for their collusion, abuse of power, and lack of regard for the safety and well being of millions of drivers and their passengers.

Lest I digress; Another of the book's keystone chapters - "The one car accident" - exposed the havoc and carnage of the Chevrolet "Corvair" (1960-63). Nader's work also led to the demise of the Ford "Pinto" and most importantly to the legislated requirement for seat-belts and other standard safety devices.

Which brings me back to Toyota. If the "Corvair" problem was its one-car accident factor (The suspension made it roll-over), Toyota's acceleration issue frequently involves collision's with others, which is all the more tragic. Koua Fong Lee is spending 8 years in a Minnesota jail after his out of control "Camry" killed 3 people in a rear-end collision with an Oldsmobile. Now even the District Attorney who successfully prosecuted Mr. Lee for vehicular homicide thinks the case was a miscarriage of justice.

A long time friend and university teacher who's opinion I value described Toyota's initial intransigence and its current responses as..."the classic issues management blunder of the 21st century". Toyota representatives; officials; and executives all the way up to the founder's grandson, the current President Akio Toyota, are sticking to the company script despite growing concerns and anecdotal evidence that the problem may be related to the electronics of the fuel injection systems rather than anything mechanical. Lest we forget: Toyota's track record in diagnosing the problem(s) is less than stellar: Ten months ago it blamed the runaway cars on faulty carpets getting caught-up in the accelerator pedal.

The Toyota Motor Company, now the world's largest auto manufacturer, was about five years old when Ralph Nader wrote "Unsafe At Any Speed". It's true that some in the American Congress may be on a crusade against Japanese auto makers now that the U.S. government is essentially the largest bailout shareholder in General-Motors and Chrysler...but perhaps that may be the most compelling reason for Toyota to remain beyond reproach in its response and corrective actions. There are many who believe the Asian auto sector is not quite there yet!