Government Transformation at $800 Billion

What do we know about transformation?
What have we learned about growth?
Is living through just dumb luck?
Can we hit the targets?

I watched a motorcyclist jump onto a large trailer.
Rather, I watched him miss, and crash under it.
His was a transformative experience.
He was transformed into a saline sack of shattered fragments.
He survived to cameo a bit part in the movie.

There was more concrete data available to plan that motorcycle jump than the federal bailout.
We do not know the speed required to succeed at this jump.
State and federal government stimulus packages are largely ahistorical.
There is no known or tested or even secret formula available to propel the economy onto that distant ramp.
There is no precedent.
We have never been here.
We have never succeeded in this space before, and never failed.
We must all be great fiction writers.
The goal of such fiction is the biography of Garcia-Marquez:
Living to Tell the Tale.

I have transformed small things with that specific goal in mind.
Houses. Land. Organizations. Kids.
I can point to a few successes.
I learn more from the failures.
I have learned three lessons.

First: Praxis.
Doing nothing yields an equivalent result.
Theory must be indistinguishable from action.
Every hypothesis, every thought, must result in some perceptible pressure on the rudder.
A thousand tiny points comprise a smoother arc than one grand theory.

Second, abort failure as early as possible.
Early failure is better than late failure.
Isolated failure is better than total failure.
A course correction is preferable to any of them.

Third, transformation is positivistic.
It must be realized to be real.
A Kuhnian paradigm shift replaces more than the skin it sheds.

I have never guided the type of transformation that involves filtering hundreds of billions of dollars through the bitter and opaque filters of state and federal bureaucracies.
My credentials are the exactly same as everyone else on the planet in this regard.
I would be capable...
Of failing,
Of succeeding,
Of some interpretable outcome.

I trust myself as much as I trust those in charge.
Equally.
Good luck to them and to us.
Perhaps, in the worst case, we will all survive to cameo a bit part in the movie.

Letter from a Friend

On the far side 

A field of troubled clover grows 

The reeds are all doubled over 

A girl from Carolina sits alone 

She cries and cries and cries 

The ocean sprays its salt in the sand 

The dunes blow flattened into the sea 

Sentimental contrails banished forever 

The equality of the netherworld 

I read this post card 

I think of you 

On the far side

Who is Watching Whom

There are three invisible shadows
I cannot see the monsters
I cannot see their shadows
What if they find out
A dog is barking
A candle burns in a pumpkin
On the porch across the street
The empty lot beside it
The empty lot beside it
Someone is tying a string to a pole
The wind blows it out of his hand
Into the monster's face
I cannot see their shadows
What if they find out.

The Deceptive Practices of Folsom Lake Toyota - PostScript Second

This post is a PSS to an earlier post.

The Folsom dealership called again this morning. It was the internet / fleet salesman. He said he "has some clout" there, and "can do things the guys on the floor cannot." What did he mean by that? Did he mean that he can keep his word? Did he mean that he corners the market on honesty or integrity at Folsom Lake Toyota? One has to wonder.

Folsom Lake Toyota appear to use various unethical and dishonest bullying tactics during the sale. This approach probably works most of the time. In phase one, they jiggle the numbers, play the "four corners" game, make repeated trips to see some managerial deity behind the curtain. They ignore the agreed upon price. They try their best not even to show you the calculations - only your monthly payment. And they just wear you down.

They then have a phase-two clean-up process for cases where buyers are intelligent enough to walk out. They use this secondary "call-back" mechanism -- let's get to the real deal -- to bolster their overall probability of success. It is really a very interesting strategy, and quite well conceived. The two processes together must have an even higher success rate than just the veracity-free bullying alone. In any event, it is clearer now, after this morning's call, that Folsom Lake Toyota are not ignorant of their end-to-end processes. It would be naive to think they were.

I strongly recommend that you avoid them altogether.

The Crimes of Folsom Lake Toyota

It is hard to fathom how stupid Folsom Lake Toyota must think people are. People aren't really that stupid, are they?

I have heard of creative sales approaches. These guys are so ridiculous that unethical just barely describes it. We made an offer on a Prius. The Sales Rep told us the manager accepted our offer.

The rest of the day - 2 hours of my life that I will never get back - went something like this.

Us: we will pay $24.5 for car X with package Y

Folsom Lake Toyota Sales Rep (Mike): (Goes inside and returns):

Folsom Lake Toyota Sales Rep (Mike): Ok, the manager accepts your offer of $24.5 for car X with package Y. Let’s go inside and sign the papers. We should get you out of here quickly, 30 minutes tops.

Us: Sign forms. Drink Coffee. Watch Basketball. 45 minutes pass.

Folsom Lake Toyota Sales Rep: (Disappears to the back. Then returns.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Sales Rep: Please sign these forms for $30. These are not the final numbers. We expect you to put 30% down.

Us: These are not the real numbers. We want to see the real numbers. No need to negotiate here. We've got an agreement. By the way, no one uses a 30% down payment. That is just silly.

Folsom Lake Toyota Sales Rep: Right. Let me get the real numbers. Sorry. Be right back.

Folsom Lake Toyota: (Disappears to the back. Then returns with the Finance Rep.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep (Kerry): OK. Here are the real numbers. Please sign these forms for $30.

Us: Uh, we agreed to $24.5, not thirty.

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: Right. $24.5. Sorry. Be right back.

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: (Disappears to the back. Then returns.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: OK. So sign here.

Us: Uh? This still says $30. That's not what we agreed to. How did you calculate this figure anyway?

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: I will get the printout.

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: (Disappears to the back. Then returns with a hand printed tally sheet.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: OK, here is the breakdown. We start with some erroneously high price that you did not agree to pay. We calculate sales tax on the sticker price plus fees, and add the extra sales tax back to our originally too high price. We deduct a small portion of the agreed upon discount. We use TFS rate of 1 point higher than your bank rate, but you can change that within the next 30 days. Voila, you pay $30.

Us: This is not the price we negotiated. Fix this. Now!

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: I am just trying to help you here. (He actually said that.)

Us: You can help us by using the price we agreed upon, calculating taxes on that amount, and getting us out of here inside of the two hour window we have available to us.

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: (Disappears to the back. Then returns.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: OK, here is the new price. $30.

Us: Thank you, and good-bye.

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep: I will split the difference with you. (He actually said that, too.)

Us: Thank you, and good-bye.

Us: (Wife and son walk out the door. I pause to tell the Sale Rep thanks, and that we are leaving.)

Folsom Lake Toyota Finance Rep and Finance Manager – in unison: No! No! We fix! We fix!

Me: Why did you fail to honor our agreement?

Folsom Lake Toyota's Finance Manager (very sharply): "I'm trying to make some profit!" (I swear to God, he actually said that.)

Me: Good luck with that. (I really said that, as I spun on my heel for the door.)

Us: (Drive away in our old car -- 2 hours after we arrived.)

Us: Are people so stupid that they allow these unethical turds to pull such crap.

Is it even remotely legal to over-charge on sales tax and add the overage back into the price? Is it ethical to agree to a price, add thousands onto that price, and then just wear the customer down with the back-and-forth-with-the- manager game? Is this the fashion for all Toyota dealerships everywhere? I experienced this practice at two dodge Dodge dealerships, and two Nissan dealerships. Maybe it is ALL car dealerships. That would be so sad!

Somebody somewhere help me to believe that we have not all fallen to this level.

Update: I am told that a rebate is in fact taxable in California. This does not account for the delta in pricing this morning.

Postscript. We purchased a Prius this evening from Maita Toyota in Sacramento for less than we had offered in Folsom ($4k off sticker). Call Dave Lundgaard there (dlundgaard@maitats.dealerspace.com). Dave is the internet / fleet sales guy at Maita Toyota, and he is great.

We returned home from the dealership in Sacramento this evening to find a voice-mail message from Folsom Lake Toyota. "Mike the sales rep told me what happened to you. I'm very sorry. I think we can make it right." No thanks! (See PSS here.)

It has been three days

It has only been three days
Seems like much longer than that
I have heard toasts that took longer
Put it on my grave stone
He listened for three days
The life of an insect
A healthy tropical storm
It has only been three days
It has only been three days

What are the Republicans Rebuilding?

According to an article in the WP, "Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Tex.) suggested last week that the party is learning from the disruptive tactics of the Taliban..." (here).

Has anyone asked yet just what are the Republicans trying to rebuild?