Dear President Obama,
RE: A MANHATTAN STYLE PROJECT to RETOOL and RE-TRAIN DETROIT
I have already faxed you and emailed your team many really good ideas to help save this economy. As you are certainly aware, the credit crunch is perhaps the greatest cancer on this land we have ever faced.
IN YOUR LATEST SPEECH, you are CALLING FOR IDEAS TO SAVE and CREATE 2.5 MILLION JOBS, SO, I have a REAL SOLUTION for you.
WHEN DETROIT comes back with their plan to get the 25 BILLION, it will not be as good as the one I have put together here, I guarantee it and I THINK CONGRESS SHOULD FORCE IT ON THEM IN ORDER TO GET THE BAIL OUT. And, this is just preliminary. By Dec. 2nd, I can flesh it out in great detail if you call on me to do so.
A MANHATTAN PROJECT RETOOLING and RETRAINING, starting with this BAIL OUT money.
When faced with the emergency of World War Two, the Government put Robert Oppenheimer in charge of the Manhattan Project and we created the world’s most awesome weapon in just a couple years.
WE are in the SAME TYPE EMERGENCY and we need a New Manhattan Project to RETOOOL the INDUSTRY and RETRAIN the EXECUTIVES and the WORKERS to BUILD ALL ELECTRIC VEHICLES, but not the VOLT and NOT by 2010, but a $10,000 FULL Electric Car by the middle of 2009. IT CAN AND MUST HAPPEN.
HERE’S HOW I WOULD PROCEED with this PROJECT.
1. I’d put all their engineers, from all three companies, in a room and challenge them to COME UP WITH An ELECTRIC CAR they could start BUILDING TOMORROW.
Such a Car EXISTS, because it’s their PRESENT CARS with ONE MINOR ALTERATION. WE put two small ELECTRIC MOTORS IN THE REAR TO PUSH THE REAR WHEELS, and batteries enough to PROPEL the car, ASSISTING the Gasoline engine. THIS ALMOST DOUBLES their present fleet mileage and the technology EXISTS TODAY to do this. I have seen it.
You PLUG in your BATTERIES at NIGHT TO RECHARGE. THIS almost DOUBLES THE MILEAGE that present gas powered cars are getting. It works and is CHEAP because the electric motor is designed ONLY to help PUSH the car from the REAR WHEELS, thus assisting constantly the Gasoline Engine. The car gets AS MANY MIILES as you need to go, because you are using the Gasoline Engine MOSTLY, but the ELECTRIC MOTOR continues to PUSH thus increasing the mileage of the car, as long as the batteries last. FOR MOST CONSUMERS, ONE FULL CHARGE is all they need to get to work and back.
THIS IS ONLY A STOP-GAP MEASURE to keep them in business and COMPETE WITH THE TOYOTA PRIUS. DETROIT COULD START THIS CAR DOWN THE ASSEMBLY LINE after a TWO WEEK ADAPTATION of only PARTS of their SUPPLY CHAIN.
THIS CAR would sell, because it would be less expensive than the PRIUS, THIS COMPONENT can be added at a cost less than the HEALTH and RETIREMENT BENEFITS they are forced to pay on each car today.
Such a CAR can be mass produced in just THREE MONTHS of DESIGN and RETOOLING because it doesn’t change the BASIC CAR MANUFACTURING PROCESS in any way and that’s why I THOUGHT OF THIS. THEY NEED SOMETHING FAST that they can get to the market. THE VOLT is actually JUST A CHEAP WORK AROUND of the PRIUS because they have to pay TOYOTA FOR THE PATENTS on their design, so they were forced to come up with a PATENT WORK AROUND and it’s just a GENERATOR on wheels for the BATTERIES. ALMOST DEFUNCT ALREADY and it will NOT SAVE THEM, TRUST ME. Too expensive. What the world needs now is a $10,000 FULLY ELECTRIC CAR and we can PRODUCE THIS IN AMERICA if we just try.
FOR THIS TEMPORARY SOLUTION, however, all we need are just a few brackets designed in the rear chassis of the car to hold the Electric Motors, two of them, one for each whell and the Batteries. There is a TORGUE ARM that needs to be assembled to make the MOTOR and wheels work properly. THIS DESIGN IS ALREADY TESTED and it proves out already. So, I know what I’m talking about. THERE IS JUST NOT ENOUGH MANUFACTURING FACILITIES RIGHT NOW TO PRODUCE this car IN LARGE QUANTITIES to make a difference. This PROJECT would GET THAT GOING and it would be a great thing for many years because it meets the needs of many consumers. BUT, EVENTUALLY, we have to wean people off of gasoline entirely.
AND THAT’S THE NEXT STEP IN THE RE-TOOLING and RE-TRAINING
2. This STOP GAP CAR, in show rooms by next summer is designed to STOP the BLEEDING ONLY and preserve as many auto-workers jobs as possible, and saving the INDUSTRY.
The NEXT STEP, while we are producing this HYBRID ELECTRIC will be to design and engineer the next GENERATION – an ALL ELECTRIC CAR. CHEAP, CLEAN and QUIET.
The knowledge gained and the retooling and the SIMPLICITY of this approach, UNDER PROPER TUTELAGE, will lead to greater and greater discoveries by Detroit Engineers. They only need to CREATE A NEW BOX and then think outside of that one. This is a challenging time for the entire world, but I am convinced, as I hope you are, that the answer to the world’s economic crisis is to start manufacturing things that are LESS EXPENSIVE. This economic crisis happened because for DECADES the world has been living on borrowed time. Our cars are so expensive we need huge mortgages to buy them. Our cars are so expensive we need huge loans to buy them. Eventually, the markets realize that no one can afford to live anymore in such an expensive environment, and so now we are in the middle of the Great De-Leveraging. Something the world will study in history books for centuries.
What do we do about it? We must start a HUGE ECONOMIC REVOLUTION and the basis of that REVOLUTION has to be CONSERVATION of ENERGY, not just because it’s running out, but because we need to save the planet and the only way to do that is to find, use and operate the world on RENEWABLE and CHEAP ENERGY.
THE NEXT STEP for Detroit, being given this TEMPORARY REPRIEVE of the Hybrid Car would be to RE-TRAIN, the engineering corps of this country. They were trained during a time when OIL was cheap and it looked like we had enough in this country. That has changed and so now, the Engineering community needs their own RE-TOOLING of their minds to think of ways to get great distances out of small amounts of energy. We also need to RE-TRAIN the AUTOWORKERS too. They need to settle into far less expectations in the way of their wages and benefits. I believe a little re-training and re-tooling from both sectors, management and labor, is necessary for this industry to survive and that it can be achieved. WITH THE RIGHT INCENTIVES.
In the long run, we can do ALL OF THIS by exploiting all the technology that we know about and creating new technology that is far less demanding on the environment and therefore, less expensive. Consumers will no longer need huge loans to buy this next generation of cars and the world’s economy will slowly recover and then bloom again as the entire economy makes the necessary adjustments. We will eventually create new kinds of roads and fueling stations and even new kinds of businesses in many related ancillary fields, such as SOLAR POWER PRODUCTION because the gradual shift to electricity in transportation will force the UTILITIES to INCREASE their OUTPUT from cheap and renewable sources. WIND, SOLAR, GEOTHERMAL are all there, but under-exploited only because the DEMAND from the consumer is not yet there.
By creating this MANHATTAN-STYLE PROJECT, we would FOCUS on all of the INFRA-STRUCTURE improvements that need to be in place to make it all come into play and save the global economy. I’m convinced that the BRAIN POWER is there sitting at their desks in Detroit waiting to be UNLEASHED. There are electrical engineers employed right now to design car parts, but they ALSO have the knowledge inside them to design a new kind of TRANSFORMER for distribution of electricity that would strengthen the GRID. They may be able to design a new kind of cable, a new capacitor, a new battery that will help this all come about. I KNOW THEY CAN. I am a true believer in the power of the Human Mind. These people have great minds, but they have been trapped inside of little boxes at their companies. I WOULD UNRAVEL all of that in my first WEEK and UNLEASH this energy. There’s enough there to change the world.
You know, there’s a battery that was designed in NORWAY that is half the weight of Lithiom Ion Batteries and they get twice the power out of them. I WOULD GET HOLD OF THIS BATTERY, tear it apart in our labs and FORCE THESE GUYS to improve it even more. THIS ONE COMPONENT could revolutionize the way we all get around the planet. There are SUPER-CAPACTORS that need just a tiny bit of development to make them super batteries. There is enough research into SUPER-CONDUCTIVITY to make cars go TWICE as far on a charge of electricity.
IN SWITZERLAND, they are just now trying to uncover the GOD PARTICLE at the new HADRON ACCELERATOR in CERN. They are trying to uncover the events of the FIRST TRILLIONTH of a TRILLIONTH of a second of the BIG BANG. They use more electricity in this one machine than half of EUROPE uses in a MONTH, just for one experiment. The point I am making is that when something is important enough for us to do it, there are people around at any given time who are capable of doing it, and the ENERGY exists to do it. It’s there in the universe, just waiting for us to uncover it. We just have to have the will.
I am convinced I AM THE PERSON FOR THIS JOB. It would be my greatest honor in life to do this for the country. Please contact me at your earliest convenience to discuss the matter. On DEC 2nd, I would love to see CONGRESS SPRING THIS CONCEPT on the BIG THREE and CHALLENGE THEM TO MAKE IT HAPPEN. I don’t know these CEO’S and they may not be capable of meeting such a challenge and if they’re not, THEY SIMPLY HAVE TO GET OUT OF THE WAY. So, part of my mission would be to sit in the same room with these men and TEST THEIR METTLE to see if they could rise to the challenge and they could not fool me. I would know if they are ready in about 5 DAYS. If they did not perform to meet the challenge of leadership that I am painting here, I would FIRE THEM IN A NEW YORK MINUTE and either replace them with someone who could help or DO IT MYSELF. I’m that kind of a person and I love this country more than myself. I cannot stand to see it in such ruins. Everywhere you go today, you see closed stores and factories and lost lives littering the landscape. I am profoundly angry at the present administration for allowing this to happen. But it is only lack of leadership that did it. THIS can cease now.
I hope that you will give me a chance to bring this CHALLENGE to detroit. I have been in love with the idea of a FULL ELECTRIC VEHICLE for some time and am in the process of starting my own little Electric Car Conversion Business here in Santa Cruz, and so I have learned a great deal about this new idea and I believe I have now learned enough to MAKE IT HAPPEN on a much larger scale.
The INDUSTRIAL POWER that the BIG THREE Automakers control is AWESOME and we cannot afford to let it shut down and rust solid. WE CAN AND MUST CONVERT the muscle of this great nation into something that can change the world, just as it did for us in WORLD WAR TWO.
All we lack is the leadership. I can see it in their eyes. These men are SHELL-SHOCKED. They can all be salvaged. Much of it is only their lack of foresight and the desire to serve their country over and above their personal selves. I believe I can instill this in these men and win this war. I only lack your encouragement to do so.
ONE LAST NOTE: Honda and Toyota and Mitsubishi are currently studying with the Electric Power companies of THIS COUNTRY how to improve the grid for total Electric Car Transportation systems that THEY already have in their PIPELINE. This is our INDUSTRIAL PEARL HARBOR and we must react and react now.
This is the FIRST TRILLIONTH OF A SECOND OF THE ECONOMIC BIG BANG.
What we do FROM THIS POINT FORWARD is KEY to the understanding of the Universe. The BIG ECONOMIC BANG doesn’t END HERE, just as the Big Bang in the Universe is never ending. We must also create ways to keep the ENERGY FLOWING, but not the energy from OIL and GASOLINE, but the INFINITE and FREE ENERGY from the great and noble Human Spirit and Consciousness.
Mike Mathiesen
America 2.0, Inc. – Take Stock In America!
Stumble It!
