Chrysler Auto Workers Busted

**Just Amazed** · September-23-10, 09:34 PM

Originally Posted by BagAJellyDonuts

Guess I wouldn't be hanging around any parks when there's a gray Chrysler mini van with dark tinted windows there.

Bet that's the van they shot the videos from.

HaHaHa, I guess I have to agree with you.

**Just Amazed** · September-23-10, 09:43 PM

Really guys, this is the most controversial story in a while. These guys go out and have a few beers and NOW FOX NEWS have made them out to be DRUNKS. REALLY are you sure they are uncapably of doing their job?????? I am not talking about the smoking of what I would assume to be marijuana, but talking about going out and having a few drinks for lunch and FOX NEWS is trying to make everyone think they can not do their job and are making SUBpar vehicles. I do not agree with drinking on the job, but I am sure these guys are able to do their job and DID NOT compromise their job. And I am sure this story was totally wrong to go the way it did.

**Just Amazed** · September-23-10, 09:49 PM

Originally Posted by oldredfordette

We pay avg. $15 co-pay on prescription drugs. Haven't had a dollar co-pay in a very long time.

Yeah, the $40 is pretty funny.

Geez, retire copay is $50.00 really sucks for us

Stosh · September-23-10, 09:51 PM

Originally Posted by Magnatomicflux

So, I have to be psychic to know someone is hammered? What the hell are you talking about? When a guy can't even focus on me and absolutly stinks of liquor, slurs his words and pisses his pants he's not hammered? Do you know how many times I've escorted assholes like that out of a plant? I had to put on latex gloves just so I could help the fucker down the stairs while he's fighting me the whole way and his coveralls were SATURATED with piss. Why? Because he was passed out laying in it.
And it's FoMoCo, WAP, EEP, EAP, WEP, ANNEX....I've done'em all so don't try telling me this doesn't happen as much as everyone is making it out to be.

I exagerated the perscription costs but an hourly worker here can start and 24 and work up to 35 bucks with time. A SKILLED TRADE SPECIALIST can and will earn up to $40 per hour. Unless it's the weekend, then I'm pretty sure it's double time.

Well at least it's CAW members...

Same union you belong to, I'm thinking.

http://www.cawlocal240.ca/executive.htm

You have NO room to talk anout any wages these people make.

**fryar** · September-23-10, 09:51 PM

I don't really care that these guys are auto workers, whether or not they were bailed out, and so forth, so the story is over the top. Also, the angle is wrong, to my mind. Where are the cops in all of this?

These guys are chugging 40's in their car? Purportedly on a regular basis? How they manage not to get arrested is beyond me. Or is this in one of those impoverished towns that doesn't have enough po-po around?

Thankfully, they "only" build cars, rather than flying planes or operating nuclear power plants.

**oldredfordette** · September-23-10, 10:03 PM

I'm on a retiree insurance. Where the heck do you get your scripts?

Stosh · September-23-10, 10:26 PM

Originally Posted by oldredfordette

I'm on a retiree insurance. Where the heck do you get your scripts?

50 is not out of line for a 90 day supply of a non-generic drug.

**oldredfordette** · September-23-10, 10:28 PM

I guess I'm lucky. I take asthma drugs and it's a name brand, but $15 is what I pay at CVS. I suppose it depends what you take.

**Downriviera** · September-23-10, 11:00 PM

The real victim here; The party store owner. He just lost some good customers.

**Left_For_Texas** · September-23-10, 11:31 PM

I'll give those guys kudos for being so efficient.

Lunch at 11:00 > Party Store > Park > Guzzle a 40 OZer, burn one, bull shit with the guys > back to work at 11:25!

Chrysler should be proud to have such efficient workers!

**biketech** · September-24-10, 12:32 AM

Originally Posted by Just Amazed

Really guys, this is the most contreversiarly story in a while. These guys go out and have a few beers and NOW FOX NEWS have made them out to be DRUNKS. REALLY are you sure they are uncapably of doing their job?????? I am not talking about the smoking of [[what I would assume as marijuana), but talking about going out and having a few drinks for lunch and FOX NEWS is trying to make everyone think they can not do their job and are makeing SUBpar vehicles. I do not agree with drinking on the job, but I am sure these guys are able to do their job and DID NOT compromise their job. And I am sure this story was totally wrong to go the way it did.

Are you serious?

**MrJones** · September-24-10, 01:17 AM

I'm torn on how I feel about this. A part of me even wishes in on it once in a while.
In colonial times, beer was a staple of workers' daily meals. Ben Franklin lived this way when he was a workman. On ships, their ration was like a bucketful a day. Men who drink are usually used to "maintaining", not putting lampshades on unless it's way beyond. It's a pride thing. I have to say though that chugging 40 oz in 20 minutes is a bit much in today's modern factory life.

On the other hand, why should anyone be surprised when powerless "serfs" try to get away with as much as they can while the boss is away? That's the basic human condition from time immemorial. Even millionaire sports heroes. If you have pride in your job or position, you might resist those temptations better than others do.
Even guys unemployed now, wishing for and getting one of these jobs, might find himself doing something similar before long - 91 days?

**Left_For_Texas** · September-24-10, 01:49 AM

Originally Posted by biketech

Are you serious?

He's one of the workers that got busted.

Ravine · September-24-10, 02:07 AM

Mr. J., you & I may be tracking in a similar groove.

I think it is funny, how things have changed; that which used to be commonplace, and didn't elicit any raised brows, is now thought of as being socially unacceptable [[in one way or the other,) and that which used to be socially unacceptable is now commonplace.

I should interject, here, that I acknowledge: Chugging a 40, smoking some weed, and god-knows-what-all else during a half-hour break from work is excessive. That's a whole lot of buzz in a rather short time-span.
[[And I know that for a fact; I have done it. I gradually lost my taste for weed, and I don't drink at all, anymore, but I used to be able to kill a 40-oz. Mickey's & about a quarter-pint of Kessler-- cheap whiskey, perfect for guzzling, if your stomach lining can tolerate it-- inside of 20 minutes, easily. But that's the kind of high-impact buzz-deliverance that requires, in the moments immediately afterward, a little extra caution in executing complicated motor activities... y'know, such as crossing the street.)
So Yeah, that is I mean No, you really shouldn't be doing that kind of thing in the middle of the work-day. I'm not even talking Professional Ethics, or anything like that, here; I'm stating that, from a purely practical stand-point, it's a hazardous practice.
But indeed, practice does make perfect, and if one does that sort of thing all of the time, one handles it much better than some of you may think. For the average person, it could be nearly incapacitating. For a *ahem* "seasoned" drinker & weed-smoker, after the initial rush of "Whoooohh, shit!!," you're basically OK, and you're not going to somehow burn off your eyebrows while lighting a cigarette.

Still, getting back to where I started this post, it's funny how in America Today, I can see Drs. Cuddy & House flopping nakedly around in a bed on "regular network" TV at 8:15 PM, but if I was at a fuckin' barber shop and wanted to light up my pipe, I would have to go outside.

Further, I return to the point I made, earlier: This shit has been going on, at the auto plants, forever. The fact that we have become ultra-uptight about some things, while becoming scandalously, shamelessly permissive about other things, doesn't change the nature of the things themselves, or the nature of humans in general, for that matter, and the Big Bail-Out doesn't re-define the entire issue, either, unless one would give a nod of approval to Ford workers doing the exact same thing on their lunches.
So, folks, please grit your teeth and try to excuse me for having the savage audacity to own up to my honest reaction, which, basically, is along the line of Oh Big Fucking Deal Who Cares.

If some of their co-workers objected so strenuously, that's an "inter-office" issue, I say, and calling the Problem Solvers, or whoever the hell this guy Rob is with, throws up an Ethical Yellow Flag, for me, even more than does the deed itself.

**RaumVogel** · September-24-10, 03:34 AM

Maybe this is the reason my friend is about to sue G.M. under Pennsylvania's lemon law.Her brand new $30,000 SUV has given her problems from day one. The electrical system is possesed. The radio turns itself on and then changes channels by itself. The electrical in the drivers door CAUGHT FIRE. The car will be running, then just shut itself down and drain the battery to boot. If you don't think everybody is hearing about this..you are mistaken.
Everyone who isn't afraid of being bullied for driving a foreign car will buy one because they hear stories like this. I don't like foregn cars either, I love our old big is beutiful American cars. But if this is what I'd have to go through after chucking out $30,000 of my hard earned money [[I'm not lucky enough to be union and make 25- 40 dollars per hour) I'd rather walk. Most people make 10 to 15 per hour nowadays [[especially after the white collar job hemmorage).

**Hermod** · September-24-10, 04:55 AM

Originally Posted by gazhekwe

I've been thinking about this all day. You know, not so long into the past, it used to be OK to go out and have a beer at lunch. Then came the Christian Sharia law invading our lives. Now, if someone has a beer at lunch you all want to perform career capital punishment on them. Where is the evidence that a beer for lunch is affecting these guys' job performance? Job performance is the one criterion the employer has to judge employees.

FWIW, I have never been a drinker, but I can't see why everyone is anxious to off these guys because they like having a beer for lunch.

Don't blame the Christian fundamentalists for this one. The "zero tolerance" for drinking [[and sinning) began some years ago and has "progressive" roots. Christian-initiated "blue laws" have declined significantly in the last sixty years.

I have seen it in the armed forces where many of the old officer and enlisted clubs were shut down for lack of customers with MP checkpoints [[gotta get them drunk drivers) and just general disapproval of male hi-jinks [[the feminists say it creates a hostile work environment).

Two beers with lunch and two on the way home was pretty much a standard in Detroit though many factory jobs had such short lunch hours that the "hip roof" metal lunch bucket with the thermos in the roof was standard for most blue collar guys.

Bars were where you cashed your check on payday [[unless your wife was waiting at the gate to confiscate it).

.

**ggores** · September-24-10, 07:08 AM

Originally Posted by Left_For_Texas

I'll give those guys kudos for being so efficient.

Lunch at 11:00 > Party Store > Park > Guzzle a 40 OZer, burn one, bull shit with the guys > back to work at 11:25!

Chrysler should be proud to have such efficient workers!

Yeah no shit. The only problem I see in the whole debacle is.... didn't that one guy throw his forty on the ground? That is littering. Littering is a crime.

Quite often I sneek outside and smoke a camel. If I get caught, well, you know, pretty much on my own. "But I'm an addict boss! Cut some slack!"

**Meddle** · September-24-10, 07:35 AM

are you sure they are uncapably of doing their job?

Detroit Public Schools?

**blackmath** · September-24-10, 07:38 AM

In all fairness, 95 percent of autoworkers are hardworking people who just want to put their time in and go home, pay the bills and live a good life, just like all of us do. Would this have been a news story 40 years ago, or even 10 years ago, when the Big Three really was the Big Three? It shows how far their influence in this community has fallen.

Buy American · September-24-10, 08:08 AM

The guys caught on tape drinking and smoking pot need to be fired, period...end of story. That is totally unacceptable behavior on a lunch hour, no matter where they work. The union needs to stay out of this and let the company handle the discipline. I'm a union advocate, I was a member for many years and still support them, however; when it comes to letting these guys keep their jobs, they are wrong.

**proc2000** · September-24-10, 08:15 AM

Originally Posted by Magnatomicflux

...One guy had a Mazda 6 parked in a Ford hourly lot. He came and reported that his car had been vandalized. I check it out and scratched ...to the metal, across his hood, trunk and doors was "THANKS FOR BUYING FORGEIN ASSHOLE"

Mazda....Ford...............don't one own the other?

Mazda 6's are built at the Auto Alliance Plant in Flat Rock. Its a joint venture plant [[Ford-Mazda). The Mazda 6's are built side by side with the Ford Mustang. The Mazda 6 is a helluva lot more "American" than alot of cars.

As for the guys drinking on their lunch. I guess its a matter of "quantity". If they had a burger and a beer in the bar, nobody would say anything. But 40 ouncers and burning weed? Its a bit much. However, with that said, its a "practice" that has been going on with plant workers for as long as they've been building cars.

Ravine · September-24-10, 08:38 AM

Oh, c'mon, Proc, don't you want to get all judgmental, sanctimonious, and hysterical? How do you expect to ever fit in, around here?

**proc2000** · September-24-10, 08:42 AM

Originally Posted by Ravine

Oh, c'mon, Proc, don't you want to get all judgmental, sanctimonious, and hysterical? How do you expect to ever fit in, around here?

LOL! Give me some time. I'll start with hysterical and work my way up!

Ravine · September-24-10, 09:02 AM

Originally Posted by proc2000

LOL! Give me some time. I'll start with hysterical and work my way up!

No no: start with judgmental, move on to sanctimonious, and build up to the hysteria.
Just poke around in some of the threads. You'll get the idea in no time.
I'm pretty good with the judgmental bit, myself. I can help you with that [[if I perceive you as deserving the help.) After that, you're on your own.

**GOAT** · September-24-10, 09:21 AM

Ravine, there was a time when liquid lunches were the norm for businessmen as well. But times do change. I am sure many can function while retaining their buzz but here is the issue in question.
When a company had to be bailed out because they were going bankrupt due to perceived and factual deficiencies in their vehicles [[along with bland designs) then every taxpayer has a right to be upset about the actions of the workers.

If the ship is sinking do you punch more holes in the hull or do you swim away or bail out the water and repair it?