Fathers, sons, Georges, Mitts.....
Since it's become obvious with the Bush family that -- despite all hopes and prayers -- the son echoes the father, I decided to examine Mitt Romney's 'pedigree'. It appears that the blogosphere has looked in some detail at George Romney's rather brief political career, but he had a longer and more interesting career before that. Let's start back -- way back -- in Michigan in 1880. Charles W. Nash was orphaned at the age of 12. The county handed him to a farmer as a bond-servant. Nash didn't like involuntary servitude, so he escaped and made his way to Detroit, where he got a job stuffing buggy seats for Billy Durant's carriage works. He moved up quickly into management, and in 1908 when Durant pulled together several budding automobile companies to form General Motors, Nash came with him. Durant, like most of those early auto founders, was a high roller. Easy come, easy go. Buy companies, lose your shirt, start over. Nash wasn't comfortable with the wildcatter's ethic, and decided to try something different. So in 1914 he left GM, bought the Jeffery company, and applied his own name to its cars. Through the '20s and '30s, Nash became known for a belt-and-suspenders approach to both cars and business. His cars were superbly engineered, with extra main bearings and two spark plugs per cylinder. His company was superbly managed, with 'just-in-time' production methods and absolutely no borrowing. While other small auto makers, relying on debts and banks, foundered and failed in the Depression, Nash sailed through in fine form. Nash in 1934:
In the late '30s Nash handed over power to George Mason, who continued the same way of thinking. Stay in the black; keep customers and employees loyal; find a niche too small for GM but large enough for profit. Mason decided to focus on low-priced cars, with special emphasis on gas economy. In 1941 Nash introduced the '600', the first high-volume American car to use unit body-frame construction. The model number was not arbitrary: it signified 600 miles on a tank of gas. Though not quite accurate, still a clear appeal to frugality by a frugal company. It sold well, but was halted almost immediately when WW2 stopped all car production. After the war Mason knew his health was beginning to decline, so he looked around for a successor. George Romney had worked for a couple of auto companies, and was heading up the Auto Manufacturers' Assn at that time. When Mason showed Romney his big postwar idea, Romney fell in love with it, and was thus hired as the heir apparent.
The Nash Rambler became an icon of smallness and non-conformity, until the VW swept everything else aside. What's not so well remembered is that the Rambler was by no means the only American small car of that era. Willys, Hudson, and Kaiser made cars of similar size. Why was Rambler the only success? Why did it survive until 1987 in various forms? Mason's secret, carried on by Romney, was to separate smallness from cheapness, economy from austerity. The Rambler was not the cheapest car available in 1950 by a long shot. It came fully equipped with radio, heater, and fancy trim at a time when most low-priced cars had a deceptive 'base price'. When Mason died in 1954, just after buying out Hudson to form American Motors, George Romney took over full control. He wasn't as visionary as Mason, but had a talent for doing the right thing at the right time. In 1957, when Ford was blowing its wad on the Edsel, Romney understood that middle-priced cars were not the Next Big Thing. He yanked the full-sized Nash and Hudson off the market and concentrated purely on Rambler. Result: in 1960, Rambler took over the #3 sales spot from Plymouth. How did Romney manage? More like Reagan than Bush. He found the most talented people and kept them happy. A story from 1960 or so: American Motors styling director Ed Anderson strode along the hallway at AMC headquarters in Detroit with his head down in thought. He was upset because he believed others in the organization were torpedoing important styling features of his latest design. Lost in concentration, Anderson suddenly heard a voice. Looking up, he found himself face to face with AMC's legendary chairman and president, George Romney. "How's the new American coming along?" asked Romney. Anderson hesitated, then blurted out that things weren't going as well as he'd hoped. Although the program was just a re-skin of the existing Rambler platform, Anderson was trying to give the car a completely new look. He wanted to give the American a flatter, more modern roofline, but to do so he needed to reshape the windshield frame as well. Engineering vetoed that, decreeing it not worth the expense. Anderson declared, "They've got me over a barrel, George." Romney paused a moment then said, "Tell you what, Ed. You take care of the design and I'll take care of the barrel." [Anecdote is from the latest issue of Collectible Automobile magazine.] If Mitt is anything like George, he could turn out to be the right thing at the right time. We could use a leader who knows how to distinguish austerity from economy, a leader with a talent for selling and explaining.

Much later: Of course Mitt turned out to be the exact opposite of George, a ruthless business-killing robber baron. Still, my discussion of George himself was valid.
  ¶ 10:00 PM

  Bad guys drove Nashes?
My bedtime OTR listening lately has been detective shows, such as Philip Marlowe or Jack Webb's pre-Dragnet characters. Plain realism was the goal of the classic detective story, yet one unreal oddity stands out in all of these: the bad guys always drive a Nash. This may have started with Chandler, because it's definitely a constant in his stories in book form.

But it just doesn't make sense.

First problem: sometimes the bad guy is driving a Nash convertible, sometimes a sedan, sometimes a coupe. Obviously a writer wants a little variety, but Nash was exactly the wrong choice for variety. Nash made only a handful of convertibles and coupes in the '40s and none at all in the '50s. From '49 through the end of the marque in '57, the big Nash came only in sedan form.

Second problem: Nash had all the wrong qualities for a criminal. Nashes of that era were reliable, roomy, economical, and technically interesting, but they were not flashy or fast. A safety-minded family man would buy a Nash; an engineer, architect or professor would enjoy a Nash.

Your garden-variety thief, then as now, would drive whatever he could buy or steal. His preference was the Ford V8. Light and fast. Your Mafia type, then as now, wanted his wealth and power to be instantly recognizable, which meant a Caddy or Packard.

Surely the detective writers understood these facts. Was it "product placement"? Not likely. Who would pay to have their product associated with criminals?

It's a puzzle.

Early '50s TV cop shows often had both the cops and the criminals driving Nashes, which makes more sense as a product placement. But it's still wrong. Cops mostly drove Fords in that era, for the same reasons that crooks stole Fords. Common (ie anonymous), easy to repair, and fast. In the late '50s and especially the '60s, some cops switched to Dodges, which had become the best combination of speed, handling and cost.
  ¶ 9:04 AM

  Romney ramblings again......
Listening to a Romney speech on C-Span. He's talking at length about a '62 Rambler that he bought as a gift recently; telling how his grandkids instinctively grabbed for the seatbelt but didn't find one, and telling how the defroster made lots of noise but didn't work as well as modern defrosters. His point is partly valid (competition causes improvement) but it's oddly out of place when discussing Nash products.

Nash introduced optional seat belts in 1950, long before other American cars, and long before the Feds required them. It wasn't competition that put seatbelts on all cars, it was regulation.

And Nash introduced the first really good heater and defroster in 1938, leading the market by several years.



The Nash heater actually included a cleanable dust filter, visible here ... a feature that was unfortunately abandoned by Nash later, and wasn't picked up by other carmakers until the 1990s.



This picture shows the heater in place, at lower right under the unique dash-centered shift lever. You can also see the theft-proof ignition-and-steering lock, which was more effective and harder to break than the post-1970 Federal requirement. [Must admit, I included this picture mainly because of the pleasant lady driver!]

Moral: Competition is good, but it's irrelevant to the features Mitt mentions. In both cases his father's company was ahead of the competition and ahead of the regulation. And such innovative leadership is exactly what we need right now. Mitt has every right to emphasize his innovative genes, but it doesn't occur to him for some reason. His mindset is stuck in the purely quantitative bean-counting model of life and business.

= = = = =

Bit later, after more pondering: What really bothers me is not Mitt's political mindset. What really bothers me is that I, a mere dilettante and shade-tree mechanic, am more willing to defend and extol the qualities of Nash. While Mitt talks often about his father's job, he doesn't seem to understand his father's vocation, for lack of a better word.
  ¶ 7:12 PM

  GM
Polistra has written about Nash several times, at first in the context of Mitt Romney's background.

The story of Nash and its nearest competitors yields a useful example for today's discussion of welfare for GM.

I suspect Charles Nash is looking down ruefully from above. He started in the auto industry at age 12 after running away from involuntary servitude. He found a job working for Billy Durant's buggy works. When Billy bought up two small automobile companies and created GM, Charles was still there, and moved up through the ranks into management. In 1914 he quit GM and set up his own company, determined to manage things differently. Nash avoided all Wall Street practices, avoided all gambling and debt. His frugal management carried the company through the Depression with only one year of loss, and it lasted through various mergers until 1983.



As of 1930, Nash's closest competitors were Willys and Studebaker. All were middle-sized companies with middle-priced cars. All of their cars had excellent engineering and distinct qualities, which meant loyal customers. But Willys and Stude were managed by high-rolling money men who paid more attention to the stock market than to their customers. When the Depression hit, frugal Nash held steady while Willys and Stude floundered and quickly fell into a bankrupt condition.

Unlike Comrade Bush, Mr Roosevelt didn't believe in welfare for companies or welfare for poor men. Comrade Bush throws money at companies and men so they can continue to behave criminally. FDR provided government jobs for men who had no other choice, and simply ordered companies and banks to behave sensibly. So Willys and Studebaker had no bailout option; instead they passed into well-controlled bankruptcy. Courts picked new managers, who were car men instead of money men. Stude's new management cut out inefficiency and simplified the model line, leaving only the models known to be popular. The new Willys managers decided the company should abandon its existing models and switch over to a very small low-priced car that would fill a unique niche.



Both companies made it through the Depression; Studebaker held up considerably better because it continued to satisfy and expand its own family of customers, while Willys was trying to find a new breed of customers.

Bankruptcy for GM today could have the same benefit. Handing it over to new managers, after cleaning the slate of union contracts and debts, would let it serve American customers better. Even better would be a private equity buyout, if that could be arranged. A holding company wants to see actual profit, not increased share prices.

= = = = =

Later: I've changed my mind.
  ¶ 6:31 PM

  Rambler town
Polistra has often used Nash and its Rambler as a shining example of corporate 'squareness'. Charles Nash had worked his way up to CEO of GM, and got tired of the high-roller antics of GM's founder Billy Durant. Nash started his own company, vowing to run it the square way. Never borrow, always save, don't throw away workers, don't throw away designs and tooling. Over the decades, his belt-and-suspenders principles gave Nash a strong advantage. It survived 30 years longer than the other 'independents'.

Spokane is a square town. Hipsters and rich fuckheads have their special areas, but most of the city is relentlessly square, a place where the 1950's never disappeared.

Spokane was also a Rambler town. When I moved here in '91, AMC cars were notably overrepresented. Everything from 1959 Americans to 1980s Eagles were common. The Eagles made sense: a low-priced 4WD station wagon is an obvious choice in snowy country. But the dominance of earlier Ramblers didn't make sense.

I just made the connection. Square and Mormon go together. Spokane is a Mormon place. Mormons are square in the best sense. They have big families, work hard, and do innocent things. And they make it look fun.

Square and Rambler obviously go together. And of course George Romney and Rambler go together.

Romney, Mormon, Square, Rambler. Completes the square of squareness.

Back in my hippieshit years I thought I was cool. Of course I wasn't, but I kept trying. And one aspect of coolness was mocking squares, which included mocking Ramblers. Cool people drove VWs and Saabs. Squares drove Ramblers.

Well, those square Ramblers were actually a whole lot greener than our cool VWs. Consider a Gremlin. Same size as a bug. Same gas mileage as a bug. Consumed less oil than a bug. Consumed less metal than a bug, because the Gremlin's belt-and-suspenders engine lasted 3 times as long before overhaul. Drastically safer than a bug. (If you die in a crash, you won't continue being cool.) (Hmm. In a strictly thermal sense the oxygen-free lifestyle is the coolest of all alternate lifestyles, but it's a kind of cool that the chicks don't appreciate... and even if they did, you wouldn't know it.)

Wanna get political? OK. Gremlin traced its heritage to Charles Nash, a poor orphan who escaped from slavery and later started his own company to escape Wall Street trickery. VW traced its heritage to Hitler.

So why did we mock Gremlins? Because we were idiots.
  ¶ 3:06 AM

  Short short stories
How the FBI Came to Doubt the Official Story of Dillinger’s Murder

How the CIA Came to Doubt the Official Story of JFK’s Murder

How Charlie Manson Came to Doubt the Official Story of Sharon Tate’s Murder

How OJ Came to Doubt the Official Story of his Wife’s Murder

= = = = =

One of the above headlines was actually written by actual paid writers.

Granted, it's unlikely that CIA was the sole driving force behind Oswald, but we know with 100% certainty that CIA was deeply involved in watching and AP'ing Oswald. His own motives were pro-Soviet, but CIA and FBI are experts in steering internal motives toward their own criminal purposes.

How can PAID WRITERS and their PAID EDITORS be so totally insulated from all facts and reality that they can't even see the problem with their idiot story?

= = = = =

Partial answer maybe: When I tried to look up obvious and famous murders from various decades to generate more fake headlines, the search yielded very few KNOWN murders and lots of UNSOLVED murders. "Journalists" are uninterested in facts because facts don't allow you to spin a six-month-long soap opera.

Plain facts can't even support a short newspaper item.

Let's try it...

Headline: Who Killed Nicole Simpson?

Story: OJ.

When you're paid by the word or the minute of airtime, a two-letter story isn't profitable.

= = = = =

Wildly irrelevant poetic footnote: On the long headline/short story, I wanted to href the famous Ogden Nash poem about fleas. The online references to the poem agree on the actual poem (Adam had em) but disagree with my memory of the title and authorship. All online mentions say that the poem was improperly credited to Nash, but I read it in a book that was an anthology of Nash poems, published when Nash was alive and while the alleged other author was alive. Presumably the other author wouldn't have allowed the poem to be published and copyrighted in a Nash book. Most of the online refs think the title is simply 'Fleas', while others cite variations on 'Lines about Microbes' or 'Lines about Fleas'. The original title was LONG. Something like 'A disquisition on the historical prevalence and origin of Fleas'. That was the WHOLE POINT of the poem. Long title, short poem.


= = = = =

Wildly irrelevant factual footnote to the wildly irrelevant poetic footnote: Actually Adam didn't had em. Fleas don't like humans because we're hairless. We picked up fleas, along with civilization, from dogs. Seems like a small price, but then dogs always charge us a small price for instruction in love and virtue.

= = = = =

Wildly irrelevant Nashian footnote to the wildly irrelevant factual footnote to the wildly irrelevant poetic footnote: Shouldn't a footnote to a footnote be a toenote?

Labels: Age of Stings, Asked and sort of answered

  ¶ 1:52 AM

  More auto random
The latest issue of Collectible Auto mag has some good articles as usual, and some unusually good letters from readers.

One letter offers a hidden explanation for a sales pattern that already had an open explanation. Why was '55 a great year for car sales and '58 an awful year? The open explanation, which is undoubtedly part of the story, is that the '55s were distinctly better than before, and the '58s were uniformly horrible. Chevy finally got a V8 in '55, and Chrysler products finally got styling.

The hidden explanation: In '55, just in time for the model year, the Federal Reserve loosened regulations on car loans. Previously car loans were restricted to 2 years with 20% down. After the loosening, most loans were 3 or 4 years, so short-term thinkers felt that they were able to buy new cars. They weren't really more able, of course, since a longer loan costs more.

'58 was certainly a bust because of horrible cars, but it was even bustier because those short-term thinkers were still paying on their 3-year and 4-year loans. Previously they would have been able to start a new loan. This effect probably extended into '59 as well for the 4-year loans.

Another letter offered a new factoid about those mysterious Nash trucks made from '47 to '54. Previously it was thought that they all went down to Mexico in response to fleet orders. In '51 about 200 went to Scandinavia for retail sale, and at least one of them is still in active use, pictured in the letter.

Also, the trucks were rated 4 tons, not 1.5 tons as usually written. The question remains. Why did Nash go to the trouble of designing and tooling and building 5000 heavy trucks, developing plenty of new skills, then sell them only in foreign countries? It runs contrary to Nash's preservationist character. There was plenty of unsatisfied demand for trucks, and farmers would have loved those trucks. Especially in northern states where Nash's superior heater would beat the crude aftermarket heaters in other trucks.

Labels: Answered better than asked

  ¶ 4:47 PM

  Best comment of the year
For some reason ZH published a short feature on car brands that didn't last. The author listed several brands and companies, didn't really distinguish between brands and companies, got most facts wrong, and didn't draw any ECONOMIC conclusions. ZH is supposed to be about ECONOMICS above all.

There are plenty of economic lessons available. I've written about some of them, especially Nash and Willys.

Nash lesson: Nash lasted longer than other small companies because it followed Natural Law econ. Live within your means. Belt and suspenders. Save, don't borrow or gamble. Nash prospered by selling to people who had the same philosophy. The product and the corporation and the customers harmonized.

Willys lesson: Willys is still alive after several changes of ownership because it followed the basic rules of sales. Offer something distinct and useful, and keep your brand meaningful. The product should be instantly recognizable by its style AND by its basic characteristics.

Kaiser lesson: Henry Kaiser was the BEST at running government contracts. First he built dams, then boats. Both were excellent. After the war he thought he could dominate non-governmental commerce as well. Didn't work. He didn't understand the Willys lesson. His cars faded quickly, but the company was saved in '55 by purchasing Willys. For some reason Kaiser didn't force Willys to do things the government way, so Willys rescued the company. (Later Willys rescued AMC, then Chrysler.) The Kaiser story should be educational for those who think Tesla will dominate the world. Tesla's remake** of the Kaiser saga is already starting to unravel as Euro countries remove their government tax subsidies.

ZH commenters filled in many of the missing points, but one said it all:

Yeah reading this article was like eating a cheeseless cheese doodle.

Got it.


= = = = =

** Tesla's product is a remake of a different movie. Tesla manufactures autonomous weapons containing a spineless toxic worm-like creature with a brain of distilled perfect infinite evil, preprogrammed to EXTERMINATE EXTERMINATE EXTERMINATE all Deplorables. It's easy to see why the spineless toxic worm-like creatures enjoy the experience of being carried in an EXTERMINATOR, and it's easy to see why US/UK/EU governments want to subsidize such a weapon. Fortunately those spineless toxic worm-like creatures aren't common enough to support the company without the government contract.
  ¶ 12:47 AM

  Cars have genes.
Cars have DNA, or at least they did before they lost their souls to environmentalism and globalism.

I've been appreciating the entertainment value of the American Bantam for a long time. When Polistra needs to drive, she drives a Bantam.

I'm reading Patrick Foster's book on the Nash Metropolitan. The Metro had the same genes as the Bantam. Basically an Austin Seven, rebodied and rerigged for American tastes.

And the Metro stirred exactly the same entertainment senses as the Bantam. It was used by businesses who wanted a small economical CUTE vehicle. Cuteness evokes pleasant feelings.

Radio stations had used the Bantam in the '30s, and used the Metro in the '50s:



Circuses used Bantams as clown cars, and amusement parks turned Metros into rides:



Newspapers and other businesses also enjoyed Bantams and Metros for city delivery of small items. Businesses understood that the Metro was a miniature business coupe. No back seat, trunk area lockable and accessible from inside. Its size made it an ideal replacement for motorcycles in dispatch and messenger service. Carry a reporter or a report. It couldn't quite fit in the same small space as a motorcycle, but it was much safer and comfier in rain and snow, and the storage area was secure.

Nash could have done more to attract the business coupe market. Austin made bucket seats for its domestic Austin and Morris cars, so the Metro could have offered a bucket option cheaply. The business user could remove the right seat for more storage area and access, similar to panel trucks and vans. Fans of "sporty Euro" cars would also appreciate the buckets.

Emphasizing business use would also enable a more appropriate name. Metropolitan was certainly a better name than Mason's original choice, NKI for Nash-Kelvinator International. But it didn't fit with Ambassador and Statesman. Courier would suggest the business purpose and match the other names.

Nash also tried to appeal to police departments. The Metro had one unique advantage for parking patrol. Because it was built in England for sale in both countries, RHD editions were available at no extra cost.





Very few cities responded, and surprisingly Kenosha WASN'T among them. Normally the police would only buy an offbeat car to support local industries. Cops preferred Fords for good reasons.



Hmm. Is that the same '56 Chevy in both pictures?

Labels: Entertainment

  ¶ 3:52 PM

  Non-fungible non-products
Pat Foster's book on the Metropolitan was published in 1996. His daughter interviewed Evelyn Ay Sempier, who was Miss America 1954 and also the official Ambassador (heh) for the Metropolitan. She unveiled the Met at the Chicago Auto Show. In 1996 she was about 60. She died in 2008.



Transcribing the corporate part:

The relationship with Nash Motors was one of the finest relationships, and I've had a lot of commercial relationships in the 40 years since. I, as Miss America, was always treated very genuinely. I was not a 'product'.

What allowed me to see much of America [she traveled 270,000 miles in that year] was Nash. If a community had a celebration and they could not afford the small price of bringing Miss America, Nash would say 'I will bring MIss America to your community', and they would pay the fee.

I was not a product.

Good companies recognized the difference back then. Cars and cans were products. Customers and employees were people. People are different. People have genes and souls. Small towns were also important enough and distinct enough to be worth paying for an appearance.

Now we're all products. We're all fungible. We're all mass-produced and constantly inspected by online QC. We're instantly rejected if not 100.0000% compliant with all EPA and NSA and ISO and above all CDC standards.

Footnote: Gracious and generous Evelyn is the exact opposite of another celebrity who was involved in Nash promotion at the same time. Baseball star Ted Williams received a sporty prototype of the Metro as part of a peculiarly misdirected contest. He hated the car and SOLD it to another rich asshole. Ted's arrogance was properly rewarded in an appropriately peculiar afterlife.

Labels: Alternate universe, Equipoise, skill-estate

  ¶ 11:47 PM

  I knew the Rambler, and Mr Romney, you're no Rambler.
A year ago when Romney first started campaigning, Polistra liked him and wrote at some length about Romney's father and his beloved Rambler.

Mitt has recently started to tell this story, but after a longer exposure to Mitt we can see that the analogy doesn't work.

George Romney took over Nash in 1954, at a time when the Establishment (Ford and GM) were running strong, exhibiting all the worst qualities of Ruthless Desire and Reckless Greed. GM and Ford were pushing Numerical Superiority in every possible way: more length, more flash, more horsepower, more advertising, more gas usage. Worst of all, GM and Ford conspired to lower prices below cost in '54, for the specific purpose of knocking out the competition.

Romney Senior knew that Nash couldn't run the same race. He chose instead to emphasize quality over quantity, value over price. The Rambler was just large enough to hold a family comfortably; had just enough power to drive safely; had no flash whatsoever, but had a sense of firmness and solidity, combined with proven durability. These qualities kept Nash alive when the other small companies failed, and later took Rambler up to third place in the market, ahead of Plymouth in 1960-61.

Romney Junior has failed to learn the lesson, or perhaps his 'product' just isn't up to Rambler standards. In fact he's following the GM model, not the Nash model. What does he offer? Not something different, but a continuation of the same old Bush brand. He's had plenty of chances to separate himself from the Bush record, and every time he refuses. Instead, he concentrates on maximum flash, maximum advertising, maximum expenditure, and price cuts (i.e. Zero Zip Nada Taxes).

He's running on quantity, not quality.
  ¶ 2:37 PM

  Uniformity
A 1996 issue of Collectible Auto included a letter from a fellow who had written an article for some car club newsletter back in 1958. He had gone to the trouble of asking all the governors of US states and Canadian provinces about their official and personal cars.

The results show a remarkable uniformity, but not really surprising for '58. Lincoln had never been a serious maker of limos, Packard stopped around 1950, and Chrysler stopped after '54. Caddy was the only choice unless you could afford custom-built.

Official cars of governors:

Cadillac 29
Buick 5
Lincoln 4
Olds 4
Imperial 3
Chrysler 2
Ford 2
Chevy 1
Mercury 1
Packard 1
Nash 1


Personal cars of governors:

Buick 9
Caddy 4
Chevy 4
Ford 4
Chrysler 3
Olds 3
Edsel 2!!!
DeSoto 2
Imperial 2
Austin 1
Hudson 1
Lincoln 1
Mercury 1
Nash 1
Packard 1
Rambler 1
Willys 1


A couple of safe bets: The official and personal Nash were in Wisconsin. The Austin was in Canada.

Missing major brands: Studie and Pontiac and Dodge and Plymouth. Studie is understandable, but Pontiac and Dodge were both considered 'appropriate' cars. I'd expect to see them on the personal list.

Two Edsels are surprising, since it was new in '58 and immediately recognized as an undignified choice for a respectable man. Driving a cunt on wheels wasn't a reliable way to get votes. I'd like to know who owned the Willys. Was it a Jeep or an Aero?

The US govt had limos of all three major brands, Caddy, Imperial and Lincoln, because the Secret Service was willing to spend billions and liked to hedge its bets. Ike mostly used the '50 Lincoln.

Ike didn't own a personal car, but used a Crosley as a golf cart!
  ¶ 3:09 PM

  Oh, that explains it
Hadn't paid any attention to the obits for "mathematician" Nash, except to notice the accidental similarity to the name of my favorite car maker.

Paid a moment of attention to a brief obit given by Bloomberg, and now I see why "mathematician" Nash is important. According to the obit, he won a Nobel for "creating game theory" and then "descended into schizophrenia."

Aha! That explains two things at once.

"Game theory" is loony and delusional and murderous. It was obviously the product of an actively schizy mind, emphatically NOT a beautiful mind. A grotesquely ugly mind.

So: Nash was always delusional. His "descent" means that he stopped producing useful tools for starving the poor and enriching the Chosen. Instead he produced useless delusions.

Nobel Prize = delusions that enrich the Chosen

Schizophrenia = delusions that serve no purpose
  ¶ 5:26 AM

  Y no amortize?
In a recurring pattern, all carmakers propose a radical small car, then either abandon it or normalize it. In the fast-inventing '30s, both Ford and Chrysler considered rear-engine small cars. The Chrysler idea included a 5-cylinder radial air-cooled aircraft engine, which is about as radical as you can get. Ford's rear-engine idea turned into the Zephyr, with conventional engineering and a beautifully streamlined body. The Zephyr mainstreamed streamlining. Later, both Ford and Kaiser considered FWD cars and abandoned them.

Nash atypically fell into the same pattern in '49 when it was trying out ideas for the tiny Metropolitan.



This idea would have used a water-cooled boxer six, oddly tilted. The angle would have introduced a slew of unnecessary problems, and you can see from the diagram that the tilt wasn't needed anyway. The engine would have fitted horizontally without stretching the body.

Though the configuration was dumb, the engine itself was well developed and compact:



It appears to have the typical Nash manifold-less exhaust. Interesting expressions on the unidentified men. Puzzled but trying to act confident. All of them are 'looking askance' at the engine.

Why atypical? George Mason had a nearly perfect sense of direction. He deeply understood the Booker T rule. Stick to your niche, maintain your niche, develop your skills to the max, amortize to the max, don't waste energy on speculation.

Thus it's surprising that Nash didn't try to reuse and amortize this engine. It was too powerful for the Metro, and wasn't needed in the standardized Ramblers.

Where would it belong perfectly? PACER.

Labels: Alternate universe

  ¶ 7:05 PM

  Random auto history thought
Alt-history is fun, but needs to use realistic analogies.

Among the many active auto companies that failed, it's pretty easy to figure out a realistic Shoulda/Coulda for most of them.

Auto writers always assume that a company ceased to exist when it stopped making sedans.

Realism tells us that many of those "failures" simply switched from making sedans to making something else. Reo switched to trucks and lasted into the '70s. Hupp switched to HVAC equipment and lasted to the '90s. Peerless switched to beer and is still active now. Studebaker ran a holding company for a variety of products into the '70s, and its defense-contract plant is still running as AM General. Willys gave up on sedans and stuck with its own niche, and is now bigger than ever.

Packard should have switched to aircraft in '51, specializing in luxury corporate jets. In terms of unique skills and factory usage, Packard was already more of an aircraft maker than a car maker.

Nash and Studebaker should have merged. Their strengths and weaknesses were exactly complementary. In the end, Nash didn't need the Hudson merger and survived on a mix of sedans and Willys products until 1987.

But what about Hudson, which would have been left out in the cold by the Nash-Studie merger? It's hard to imagine an alternate future. Hudson never diversified, never branched out from sedans. The other independents at that time were already making a variety of products before the sedan "failure". Hudson's defense contracts were profitable but much smaller than the other independents. No aircraft or trucks or cars, just an assortment of parts and pieces. The contracts didn't add new skills or create new types of manufacturing.

Hudson had a couple chances to specialize in sporty cars, but blew both. In '33 the Terraplane was light, fast, economical and attractive. Hudson quickly eliminated the nice fast car and reapplied the name to the base trim level of big Hudsons. Around the same time, Hudson partly owned Railton, a British sports car firm that used Hudson engines. They never imported Railtons.

Labels: Alternate universe, skill-estate

  ¶ 12:53 AM

  A better alt-universe question.
In previous item I cited an interesting alt-universe question, then mentioned an unrelated alt-universe question that had been on my mind.

Let's try again with a more appropriate response to the original.

The original alt-universe question from a tech venture capitalist type:

HONEST (not sarcastic): I would LOVE to see the counterfactual world—in a parallel universe (from 1971 to today)—where the price of money, “free markets” and all capital allocation was not distorted by handful of academic decision makers.

Excellent question, gathering the whole problem into one sentence.

Did we have a realistic chance of avoiding Nixon's massive sabotage? As I mentioned in previous item, our offshoring was well under way before Nixon broke real value.

Who recognized the problem in 1958 and could have offered a solution? George Romney.

He was the only sober man in a position of power at that time. Everyone else was passed out, incapable of good judgment. Being the only sober man at a party where everyone else is unconscious has advantages.

He was also firmly committed to SAVING instead of DEBT. Mormon training helped, plus Nash tradition. Nash had made it through the '30s without failing because it avoided debt.

He also had the advantage of Mormon eldership training, which gave him an unusual ability to bring conflicting parties together. He used both his soberness and his negotiating skills to pull Nash up from 'struggling independent' to nearly part of the Big Three, almost knocking Chrysler out of the ring.

At that point someone persuaded him to go into politics. He ran for Mich governor and did the same thing there, fixing problems that nobody had fixed before.

After three terms of success, someone persuaded him to run for president. At that point his sober and accurate judgment bumped into a bigger enemy than GM. When he proposed pulling out of Vietnam, Deepstate destroyed him.

Alt-universe: What if Romney had been a little more sneaky, or had resisted Deepstate's blackmail more effectively? He would have pulled out of Vietnam, turned the country from debt to saving, and countered the threat posed by resurgent Japan and China.

Labels: Alternate universe, Asked and properly answered

  ¶ 11:49 PM

  Random auto thought
From 1950 to 2000, Jeeps were the only cars that didn't look like cars.

Since 2000, Jeeps are the only cars that look like cars. They have headlights, grilles, bumpers and fenders. All other cars are grotesque deep-sea monsters.

= = = = =

Another random auto thought. In 1954 Nash held a 'name this car' contest. They built a custom roadster using the same Austin engine as the Metropolitan, and invited entries to submit names. Did the winner get the car? NO. The car would be given to baseball star Ted Williams. Nash wasn't cheating. The ads for the contest were perfectly clear that the car would go to Williams. It wasn't fine print. But WHY? Why bother to enter a contest to give a prize to a rich dude who can afford anything he wants? Sucker Filter doesn't really fit. Nash wasn't trying to find gullible fools. In the end Williams hated the car and never drove it. He took the endorsement money without giving any value for the endorsement, then sold the car to some other rich dude, making money on both ends. Bastard.

= = = = =

A perfect opposite of Williams: Ricardo Montalban seemed to be just a paid endorser for the Chrysler Cordoba. He was a lot more. According to a stylist writing in Collectible Auto, Montalban took a proprietary interest in the car and visited the studio several times to watch the stylists at work. He wanted to know the car he was endorsing. That's impressive.

= = = = =

Separate random note: The quail are showing up this year, after several years of absence. They're fun to watch and easy to watch. Unlike Default Brown Birds, quail are confident. They don't fly away when they sense that I'm watching. Two of them have been standing on the porch for 15 minutes, just hanging out and observing the world. I've walked past the door several times, and we exchange glances every time.

Next morning, I found this on the porch:

So the quail wasn't standing on the porch, she was laying on the porch.

Undoubtedly an accident, an avian miscarriage. Still, I put it on the grass after picturing it. I don't want to be the one who forced the loss.

= = = = =

Later: The universe took revenge on Williams in a delicious way.

Labels: Asked and unanswerable, Entertainment

  ¶ 4:00 PM

  Not an oxymoron
From an NPR feature on the decline of the "two" "parties":

It may sound like an oxymoron, but Arizona's unaffiliated, independent voters are organizing themselves and banding together.

Not an oxymoron at all. Politics requires parties, just as business requires brands. The problem with American politics is not that parties as such are bad; it's just that our "two" "parties" have stopped manufacturing usable governance.

In business, a new company (or a small existing company) grows to fill the need when major brands fail. In 1958 the three big auto companies failed to provide usable cars, so Nash quickly grew to fill the need. The big three didn't start responding to the need until Nash became a meaningful threat.

Not a perfect analogy .... You CAN write in a new candidate when existing parties fail. You CAN'T build your own car when existing carmakers fail. But in practice it comes down to the same thing, because an UNORGANIZED write-in rarely works. Only a party can assemble the required components in mass-production style to get a new leader into office and maintain his support after election.
  ¶ 5:33 AM

  Where's Ogden Nash when you need him?
Email from Judicial Watch:

Little is as unnerving as trouble with the IRS, especially if you haven’t done anything wrong. That happened repeatedly during the Obama administration, as his IRS enthusiastically targeted conservative groups.

We’re now understanding why the Congress didn’t do much of anything about it.

We just released internal IRS documents revealing that Sen. John McCain’s Former Staff Director and Chief Counsel on the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee, Henry Kerner, urged top IRS officials, including then-director of exempt organizations, Lois Lerner, to “audit so many that it becomes financially ruinous.” President Trump, presumably unaware of these new facts, appointed Kerner as Special Counsel for the United States Office of Special Counsel.

Of course the participation of Infinite Traitor McCain is unsurprising and normal. He belongs in the same part of Hell as Tom Paine and Lincoln and Roy Cohn and Trump. Servants of Wall Street, total betrayers and obliterators who gain a reputation as "mavericks" or "independents" or "protectors" of "individual" "liberty" and of course "rights".

But the rest has a parodic flavor, somewhere between Dr Seuss and Kafka.

Kerner urged Lerner, who ordered Merner, who instructed Nerner, who delegated Perner to order Querner...

Special Counsel for the Office of Special Counsel.

= = = = =

Literary footnote: I was thinking of the recursive loop "We supply watchwatchmen to watch watchmen you want watched." Tried to look it up, turns out to be Thurber, not Nash.

Labels: From rights to duties

  ¶ 12:30 AM

  Hold em, fold em, AND....
Kenny sings "You got to know when to hold em, when to fold em, and when to walk away."

There's another choice: "Know when to pull an ace from your sleeve."

In cards a sleeve-ace is an excellent way to get shot, and it can also look like cheating in other contexts. But it can be the only way to survive.

The important part of the trick, of course, is thinking ahead and stashing the card. If your lifestyle or mindset doesn't allow you to stash, then there's no point in even thinking about the cheat.

Reprinting the piece about a Little Bit of Luck brought this to mind. In an overall economy of Bets and Debts, where the standard game is desperate Three-Job Monte, a saver who can get away with minimal work may look like a cheater.

Specific example from Nash, which I've often cited as the paragon of commercial frugality. In 1958 a sudden recession caught the American auto industry by surprise. The industry was on a maximally wasteful track, with huge grotesquely ugly cars that were poorly built and hard to handle. Even the Rambler had grown larger and uglier, with a model matching Chevy in size and weight. George Romney had the vision to see this, and his company's longstanding frugality gave him an ace to slap on the table. Nash had kept all the tooling and assembly jigs for the small neat durable economical 1955 Rambler. Romney simply re-installed the tooling, made a couple of small modifications (different grille, mount the same taillights upside down) and presto! The American! An effectively new car with near-zero tooling costs and zero development time. A car that looked mighty fine compared to a '58 Olds or Lincoln, and underpriced everything else without losing money. Frugality saved the company.

In the natural world, seeds and spores are obvious examples. Seeds can keep the tooling intact for thousands of years, waiting for the best opportunity to start manufacturing again. Some small invertebrates can dry up and 'seedify' to last through years of drought. More recently, biologists have found that bacteria can seed up when needed, forming special dormant Persister Cells that don't metabolize or split. They just wait till the antibiotic threat has passed, then turn back into regular growing and reproducing cells.
  ¶ 3:34 AM