Bush official: sorry 'bout that pro-environment (pro-Japanese) newsletter
Remember that email sent out in August by a Bush administration official that urged government employees to buy fuel-efficient vehicles? And do you recall how that list of proposed vehicles happened to not include many built by American automakers? The official. Joe Ellis, the Department of Health and Human Services' assistant secretary for administration and management, has now apologized, according to the AP.
Ellis' apology letter says that, "I deeply regret that our newsletter offended anyone, especially those Americans working in the automobile industry and the millions of people who make American automobile manufacturers successful."
Politicians, especially those from Michigan, made some hay over the email. Michigan Republican Congressman Dave Camp, for example, said the e-mail was "way out of line."
C'mon, people. What's more out of line - not making fuel-efficient vehicles of bitching and moaning when someone draws up a list of fuel-efficient vehicles that, because your cars suck gas, doesn't list your company's wares? And anyway, Ellis' original email - unless it's been changed online - does include mention of the "Ford Ranger pickup truck, Dodge Caravan 2WD minivan, and Ford Escape hybrid SUV." Still, that email does focus on foreign cars because, by and large, they're more fuel efficient. I guess killing the messenger will never go out of style.
Earlier in the story:
[Source: Ken Thomas / Associated Press]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
UH2L 5:01PM (9/21/2007)
It’s not about “shooting the messenger.” The issue is that the domestics produce many efficient vehicles in their class but they get no credit for it. If your car gets 1 or 2 mpg more or less, is it really that different, and since this is the USA, shouldn't we promote products from the companies based in our country to better support our economy?
Domestic products do not "suck gas" as you say. You can hear stories from many GM mid sized and even full-sized car owners who routinely get 30+ mpg on the highway. This isn't wasteful if you need to carry more than 2 people often. Also, just because Ford/GM/Chrysler do not offer the most efficient small vehicles doesn't make them unworthy of mention. They still use very little fuel.
When it comes to full-size trucks, GM makes the most efficient ones, better than Toyota. Sure they're not an efficient class of vehicles, but people are going to buy them whether we like it or not. Not everybody wants to or can afford to buy a hybrid either. People who run their cars into the ground don’t want to have to deal with complexity and costly repairs in 6 or 7 years time. In the segments that sell the most units and have the biggest impact, light trucks and mid-sized sedans, the Big 3 are very competitive. As for E85 vehicles, I'm willing to bet that the Michigan-based domestics offer more E85 compatible vehicles than the imports, but these models are not mentioned in the DHHS letter. A few diesels are offered by the Big 3 (and Volkswagen) as well, but these aren’t listed.
This fairness issue could have been averted if in addition to mentioning the most efficient vehicles in each class, they also mentioned the ones that were second and third (and non-hybrids), as well as some of those that are included in the diesel, E85 category.
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Don 12:42AM (9/22/2007)
Hey, not having good, fuel efficient vehicles is one thing...but our industry still has to survive and sell cars.
The letter was just plain bad.
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Chris M 1:22AM (9/22/2007)
The list that caused the squawk is just a small portion of that e-mail, and it came from "The American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy". The reason that no US made cars appeared on that list is that it only listed the top 12 most fuel efficient vehicles, and the US automakers have no one but themselves to blame for not making the list.
The list was not meant to include the most fuel efficient in every single category, though the e-mail had links to where more information could be found.
As for the hybrid reliability issue mentioned by UH2L, hybrids have been around long enough for long term reliability to be known. In the Consumers Union 2006 survey of over 6 million car owners, all models of hybrids had better than average reliability, and two models - Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrid - were in the top ten most reliable models. That does include 6 and 7 year old hybrids!
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