Man, I hope someday we can build something like this in Seattle. I’ve joined the ECS, the Emerald City Supporters group for the Sounders FC soccer team… but we’ve got a LONG way to go before we’re like these dudes. They’re supporters of Galatasaray, in Turkey:

THAT is some passion!

So for a few days, up until yesterday afternoon/evening, we had a bunch of jerks on Fox News (it’s kind of hard to write the word “news” after “Fox”) ragging on and on about what a terrible job President Obama was doing. They were jumping on a bad situation to try and score political points for the Republican/right wing:

What they don’t tell you is a bunch of things. Like that the pirates were armed and often pointing a gun right at the captain/hostage. That it’s pretty damn tough to shoot someone from long range when you’re on a freakin BOAT. That one of the standard tactics in hostage negotiation is to wear the criminal down for a while if you can- even over a few days- so that if/when you decide to take aggressive action to end the situation, the criminal’s reaction time is much greater and he’s less effective.

No, these blowhards instead just sit around and try to reinforce the notion that Obama is just a weak weenie. You’ll also hear that it’s his fault these pirate attacks are occurring now- even though they’ve been going on, in increasing numbers, for the past few years. In fact, in October of 2008, the UN passed a resolution calling for some action against this piracy- during the Presidency of George W Bush.

Think you’ll hear that from these naysayers, these right-wing morons who’re out there publicly rooting for Obama (and the United States) to fail? Of course not. To them, this is all because he’s just too darned nice. (The undercurrent you see on the internet is that since he’s Muslim, he’s actually in league with the pirates, helping them.)

Now, do you think these guys will give proper credit to Obama for authorizing the use of force- deadly force- in a risky manner to save the captain? Of course not.

I don’t know why anyone watches Fox News and pretends that it’s at all “fair” or “balanced”. Guys like Glenn Beck should be limited to ranting on blogs (like this one!), not given TV shows. It’s a shame that people even watch that crap.

Here’s quite a statement from a recent MSNBC news item:

Also, Henderson said that unlike Wagoner, he will not work for $1 a year. He is paid $1.3 million, which was cut 30 percent as part of what he called shared sacrifices at the auto maker.

Henderson is the new CEO of General Motors.

1.3 million bucks a year is a “sacrifice”? Yeah, that’s some sacrifice, pal. Sheesh.

What a load of garbage. Yes, he’s got a nearly impossible job- come in and run this auto company that’s already received billions of dollars from the government, nobody’s buying their cars, their business processes are all screwed up, and they’re a political football.

But the guy is making over a million bucks a year and calls it a SACRIFICE!? Give me a break.

I’d be way more impressed if he came in and said “I’m going to take a salary of $250K, and nobody in the company is going to make more than that.” THAT would be a sacrifice.

Even on that salary, the head honchos could send their kids to private schools and live in $750K houses and drive the fanciest cars (GM only, please) and take vacations and everything else. But no, that’s not enough for them; they’ve got to make a million bucks a year.

No wonder these guys are doing such a lousy job.

The reality is that the car companies need to BUILD BETTER CARS. They need to quit putting all their eggs into one basket (like trucks and big SUVs) because sooner or later, the market is going to change and people are going to want different cars. They need to rein in their dealers and change the way cars are priced and sold.

But mostly… they need to build better cars.

I bought a Ford last year, an Escape Hybrid. It’s a great little SUV. It’s as good as the others in the class, and with the hybrid engine it’s a great deal. That’s why I bought it. The fact that it’s an American-built, union-built car is awesome too, but let’s face it- even a union believer like me is likely to buy a non-union car if it’s better built with comparable pricing (or even a bit more) to a different car.

Let’s see some real sacrifice by these CEOs, and let’s get them making better cars. Then we’ll see the companies get healthy.