China’s car industry is quietly pressing Beijing for government help as it copes with a jarring slowdown, top Chinese auto executives said in interviews here on Tuesday.

This autumn, after six years of 20 percent or more annual growth, vehicle sales were flat or slightly negative, a shock to an industry that has borrowed heavily to build ever more factories for a market that had once seemed insatiable.

…China’s top three export markets for fully assembled vehicles are Russia, Ukraine and Vietnam, all of which are struggling with the global financial crisis.

Great Wall Motor has had a 40 percent plunge in its monthly exports to Russia in the last three months,

With China’s largest automakers involved in joint ventures with American automakers, and with the entire Chinese auto industry now seeking its own forms of government help as well, criticism of any bailout for Detroit has been muted. Producers elsewhere in Asia, facing declining markets at home as well, have also been hesitant to criticize.

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To quote Scooter in a letter to Judith Miller, albeit in a different context, but nonetheless relevant to worldwide debt consumption as consumers are maxed out and unable to consume more debt obligations; ”…the aspens will already be turning. They turn in clusters, because their roots connect them.”

i’ve been trying not to watch tv (although i’ve been watching some lately – charlie rose and sunday morning talking heads). and even then i try to mostly listen and not watch (same for cspan streaming). listen to lots of podcasts. don’t know why but the visual cues seem to be much more insidious (at least for me).

makes a big difference – but i’ve got years of indoctrination to overcome.

world view that is suicidal.

Try selling that concept to a large part of the modern generation. The ones who can’t wait for the next version of iPod 5 minutes after they bought the last version.

advertising is selling us not just products, but a world view that is suicidal.