The Prius gets a $3k tax credit and is selling like hot cakes, but I suspect that even if you removed the credit it would still be doing well. He also doesn’t mention the favorable tax treatment that SUVs are getting.

All electric drive trains have as near a zero maintenance cost as can be acheived in any over the road application. They have no pistons, hot sump lube, or ignitions. They run, as a whole, as a far more trouble free drive systems that internal combustion. Ask and maintainer of a fleet of electric golf carts. All cars need some fixing, but electric drive lines are as good as it gets. And that is really the trouble that Detroit had with the electrics – less parts and repair dollars for the repair and supply chain.

A veritable phalanx of small, entrepreneurial companies filed through the BIG 3 pitch rooms to license all manner of alternative drive line tech – this all occurred over the past 15 years or so. They all signed NDA’s and were all rebuffed.

The only thing I can say about Wagoner and his ilk is this (after seeing them testify and on the news circuit):

They have all developed a permanent squint from lying so often; even they cannot internally swallow the crap they are required to repeat ad nauseum. And as for the Union guys sitting at the job banks that have signs in the parking lot saying, “no foreign cars” — it’s your turn too (I am a CWA union ex-member) – no soup for you.

I think Green does a lousy job at making a fundamental point: how does the government know which alternative energy is the best? They have already warped the market with their ethanol subsidies (I can name poor people in a dozen third world countries who lost their staple diets to the inflation that caused), and they are still chasing the windmills of a supposed hydrogen economy that would require an entire new infrastructure to be put in place. The economy is gradually moving towards an electric economy that leverages existing power lines, but I can’t claim to know that to be the best. Would I rather have companies making limited bets and losing their shirts trying figure out the right technology or would I like a grand tax payer assisted multi trillion dollar effort chasing one wrong answer?

Without a huge investment in defense, the world’s most powerful Navy, and an implicit guarantee to keep the sea lanes open, your oil trade would be totally at risk. I don’t think I need to explain this further given current events…just a tip of the hat to the Indian Navy for starting to pick up some of the burden.

It is simple: There is no discussion of free markets when it comes to energy. There are no energy free markets. None.