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Tesla Faces Off Against Car Dealers In Another State: Ohio
cartechboy writes "We've seen Tesla run into regulatory issues in Texas. And North Carolina. This time, it's Ohio, where car dealers are playing an entertainingly brazen brand of hardball. The Ohio Dealers Association is backing an anti-Tesla amendment to Ohio Senate Bill 137--which turns out to be an unrelated, uncontroversial proposal about drivers moving left when they see emergency vehicles (The bill is headed for adoption.) The sudden and subtle amendment would ban Tesla from selling its electric cars directly to customers, who place their orders online with the company after learning about the Model S in company-owned stores. A hearing on the amendment was suddenly scheduled for today; Tesla is fighting back by outlining the economic benefits to Ohio--after taking some legislators for a ride in the Model S (a Tesla tactic that has worked before)."
http://www.ohiosenate.gov/senate/index Find your Senator and tell them what you think, not that it will do any good.
...at least Texas' laws were a consequence of leftover monopoly laws preventing squeezing out car dealers.
This is just plain old greed by bought-and-paid-for politicians working for their car-dealer sponsors.
It's a new business model, and it's coming right at us! Shoot it! Shoot it now! Don't check if it's friendly! SHOOOT IT!!!!
Perhaps an Oprah style showing at the senate where Elon Musk runs in and shouts "Teslas for everyone!"
Tesla purchases are interstate commerce. Constitutionally and practically that's a matter of Federal jurisdiction.
What a shame it is that our country operates in this manner.
Regardless of which or both parties are to blame it's the publics complacency in allowing our elected leaders to behave this way.
This is supposed to be a capitalist democracy. There is supposedly a free market.
Wave goodbye to innovation when you can no longer bring it to market because it is more lucrative to stifle it.
Why is it that the people who schedule these underhanded surprise hearings go unnamed? People need to know that these guys are working for special interests in back-room deals.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
The amendment corresponds to the registrar of motor vehicles:
"The registrar of motor vehicles shall deny the application of any person for a license as a motor vehicle dealer, motor vehicle leasing dealer, or motor vehicle auction owner and refuse to issue the license if the registrar finds that the applicant:
(11) Is a manufacturer or a subsidiary, parent, or affiliated entity of a manufacturer. applying for a license to sell or lease new or used vehicles at retail. Nothing in this division shall prohibit a manufacturer from disposing of vehicles at wholesale at the termination of a consumer lease through a motor vehicle auction. This division shall not serve as a basis for termination, revocation, or non-renewal of a license granted prior to the effective date of this provision."
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
Could be the Model S is suspected of having a secret compartment
Why aren't there penalties for attempts to introduce legislation that is blatantly illegal? Tesla should request that criminal conspiracy and racketeering charges be brought against the Ohio Dealers Association. Or at the very lease, the companies behind this should get a nice ass probing with the Sherman anti-trust act...
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Why do states wish to entrench a specific business model or exclude someone from it? What does it have to do with them?
What next, banning all forms of on-line shopping to prop up the brick and mortar stores?
This just sounds like more irrational pandering to protect existing business interests -- which isn't really what legislatures should be doing (but do anyway).
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Here is a link to the bill and alternate versions.
http://openstates.org/oh/bills/130/SB137/documents/OHD00003105/
This was already passed by the senate, without the "Denial of license as motor vehicle dealer" clauses: http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/bills.cfm?ID=130_SB_137 I guess I don't understand how the bill amendment process works, but are they really considering amending it now that it has already passed?
Full-Featured GPL Web Hosting Control Panel
As I write this from Ohio and look over the Ohio River and think to myself...Kentucky doesn't look half bad.
One side adding unrelated amendments bills, the other lobbying directly with their merchandise aimed at the politicians. The latter move is almost then directly from the Simpsons with Krusty's free canyonaro. Is this really the system that you want to export to the non-democratic world. A system worth going to war for? Doesn't sound like the population at large are being considered here, just the corporation's pockets.
Now only 48 more articles on this topic.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"Donate" 5 dollars and they'll send you a bumper sticker. "Donate" 15 dollars and they'll send you a tshirt.
"Donate" 30,000 dollars and they'll send you a car.
Here in B.C. we had a stink a few years ago over privately imported vehicles from Japan. Under Canadian law you can privately import anything you like if it's over 15 years old, and in the mid-noughties a lot of interesting vehicles started to turn 15. Since they are essentially worthless in Japan, but well looked-after, they're a bargain for anybody who wants a used car. Japan has made a major industry of exporting their used cars. Unlike many other jurisdictions, cars with the steering wheel on the "wrong" side are road-legal here.
The car dealers threw a fit. They claimed that right-hand drive vehicles were the enemy of all that is free and right and holy, but were never to adequately explain why. I wondered why they were concerned about their ability to compete with 15 year old used cars. Again, they were never able to adequately explain why.
It's died down. For now. But you never know what they're going to try next.
I bought a 1992 Mitsubishi L300 Delica in 2007. I love it. A touch expensive to run, but ridiculously practical and it will go anywhere with shift-on-the-fly 4WD. It also has a delightfully quirky style.
...laura
Funny
Ford and some others sell thousands of cars directly to nationwide car rental companies in the US by the way, just in case you didn't know that.
güzel paylasmlar http://www.evdeneveildenilenakliyat.com/
It worked. http://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/tesla-model-s-scores-big-win-in-north-carolina-in-battle-over-business-practices/
I think you should read up on the Libertarian movement, because they don't want to "move everything to the state level" as you falsely claim. Don't come back with some wacko and claim that's the movement ideology.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Clearly there are some who would like to protect the good ol' boy dealer network: a couple of years ago, I was planning a purchase of a Toyota Sienna, and when I was unhappy with the treatment I was getting from our local dealer when it came time to negotiate a price, I decided to call around to dealers within a couple hours' drive to see what other options there were. One dealer two hours away returned my message, and my wife was unlucky enough to answer. He chewed her out for not "respecting" the dealer network, and how dare we call around to try to get the price, anyway? He said wouldn't sell a car to us after that, even if we wanted to pay the sticker price!
My wife was pretty shaken up about it, and I always meant to write to Toyota to complain. But in the end, we found a dealer three hours away who gave us a good price in an email quote. When I took the quote to our local dealer, they wouldn't budge on the price, so we ended up driving to the other dealer and save about $1500. They lost our sale.
Maybe if more people shopped around at different dealers, their stranglehold on the market might loosen a bit?
For years people have been wanting a very powerful government that can regulate business in the way THEY want and think is right.
Now they have their powerful government, but other people want other things, and that government listens to them too.
Wouldn't this be interfering with interstate commerce?
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
The happiest day of my life was when I moved out of that hell hole. "Inbred swine" a euphemism for Ohio politicians.
Hope is the currency of fools
I remember when a local Volvo dealer got himself elected mayor of the city his dealership was in. The city police got kitted out with new Volvos.
Mayor? This http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Beyer local Volvo dealer got himself elected Lt. Governor! But he was slick enough to get his local city's police kitted entirely in Volvos bought from his dealership years before he went in to politics.
We tend to forget that the 10th Amendment exists not just for us, but for those whom we disagree with as well. The same thing can be said for the rest of the Bill of Rights. The current state-level issues we face are a natural result of the way we've structured our society. Typically in the past, an Empire would deal with this by promoting one Imperial language, one Imperial-approved religion, etc. Since we're not an empire but a democratic republic, we don't have the luxury of tyranny to promote one culture's views over another's.
Here's to hot beer, cold women, and Glaswegian kisses for all.
Where do Tesla owners take their vehicles for service? Vehicle maintenance can get very expensive with few local people trained to service the vehicle. Distribution, service, and support can become very expensive without a local network. The same is true for any business.
Dealer logistics are expensive for the automobile suppliers. These costs are built into the vehicle price (both to independent and supplier named dealers). Auto suppliers need direct dealers, but so far have difficulty "controlling" them. Direct sales is not the issue. I am yet to find an auto I cannot "buy" online. It is the dealerships whom are too stubborn to understand their own business.
> So Ron Paul is a "wacko" now?
Ron Paul has always been - let's say "popular among the UFO set".
Wacko or at least wacky, depending on personal opinion.
Agreed, he's also been a standard bearer for libertarians. That wacky / wacko segment is one of two issues with the otherwise reasonable libertarian party. The other issue is their obsession with drugs. Occasionally I listen to a libertarian and their "logic" makes me ask "what the hell?!?! Is this guy stoned or what?!". Then I remember the answer is yes, they probably are stoned.
It's unfortunate because libertarians are right about a lot of things, but the druggie and wacko wings of the party make them all look bad.
Take the fraudulent lying car salesmen out of the picture. Let people order direct.
Why are people in government so anti-business? It seems impossible to legally conduct business in this country unless someone else in power signs off on dozens of permits and licenses.
$30K for a current-gen Tesla? Where do I sign up? Cheapest they offer now is double that.
=Smidge=
It's completely OT, but dud, I love your sig.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Damn... I need to use preview.
"dude", not "dud". Sorry.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
In ohio, those car dealers and some of the politicians can expect to come under Racketeering charges, Collusion, Conspiracy, and many of them will be charged under the RICO act.
If Tesla is not allowed to have their own stores, then neither is Apple, or Firestone, or BP or Shell Oil, etc. etc.
I'm sorry if those dealers are not happy about being left out, but they have had many decades to promote electric cars, and look what we got out of it; nothing worth mentioning, and we still pay high gas prices, on cars that have all kinds of tracing abilities and black boxes, because politicians and insurance companies want them.
No, the Ohio car dealers and politicians are going to have a serious fight.
I guess these red states are only Pro-BIG-Business. I realize Ohio is a bit purple right now except for the law makers.
Congress has been using its Constitution granted power to "regulate interstate commerce" in absurd fashion to gain more and more power over all aspects of our lives for at least 100 years. In this case there is a genuine and direct instance of states interfering with interstate commerce to attempt to ban or penalize products from being sold in the state that local business and political interests may not like. This is a legitimate instance in the since that is what the Founders actually intended. So why doesn't Congress act?
They stole everything else from the genius Tesla, now even his name. RIH
That's just it...if you make it a law then it's legal. Then you challenge the law and get it overturned...then they write a new one permitting whatever was used to overturn the old one ad infinitum until you get a constitutional challenge which this won't rise to.
Yeah, I mean, it's not like the Constitution has any language that prevents states from interfering in interstate commerce or anything....
I don't see how Telsa can possibly lose this one. If there are no commissions or deliveries then the dealership is just advertising. Unless Ohio makes advertising illegal, Telsa is good to go.
i just dont get it i thought the US is the land of the free if you told Apple they cant sell Laptop/Phones Direct to the people they would tell you to piss off
The whole "rider" thing in the USA puzzles me to no end.
How isn't this considered fraud? To attach something entirely unrelated to a law as a trick to get it passed? To me that's the definition of fraud and deceit.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Ohio: It's not illegal to sell your cars here.
Tesla: Fuck you. *sells cars*
Ohio: You can't do that! Stop it!
Tesla: Fuck you. No.
Ohio: We'll arrest you!
Tesla: On a civil matter? *snort* Good luck. And fuck you.
Ohio: We'll arrest your customers!
Elon Musk: I'll bail them out, provide them with 10 lawyers and unlimited funds for the lawsuit. Fuck you.
Ohio: You're being arrested for contempt of court!
Tesla: *lawyer power-up* (Tesla has evolved!) *supreme court power-up* (Tesla has evolved!) *social media campaign* (Tesla has evolved!) *political contributions power-up* (Tesla has evolved! Maximum evolution achieved!)
Tesla uses Intergalactic Level Supreme Court Bitchslap! Ohio is destroyed!
Elon Musk: Fuck you.
[End Of Line]
Their exit strategy is already set: someone will give them a non-voting executive office at their DC branch (or wherever the ex official wishes to live) whether they get one term's worth of graft out of them or thirty.
I HAVE listened to his speeches, and I've written for NORML, so I do understand the arguments - I wrote the arguments 20 years ago. Today, when I read what I wrote 20 years, my legalization arguments, it sounds like I was stoned when I wrote that stuff, because I was.
I didn't say Ron Paul is crazy. I said he's wacky. You said:
> except that the media does not want an alternative viewpoint
He certainly has a lot of "alternative viewpoints ", doesn't he. Occasionally, he's right, always hehe's spouting an "alternative view". Often that view isn't held by most informed people because the viewpoint is misinformed.
Whether or not you agree with my perception, that is in fact the perception created the the libertarian PR. MOST of what the federal government does is unconstitutional because it's way outside the enumerated powers. If libertarians were primarily concerned about the constitution, we'd expect to hear them making loud and clear statements about a lot of things. You talk about the government overstepping it's bounds, where were the libertarians on Obamacare? 80% of what many libertarians publish is about drugs. That obsession with drugs makes them APPEAR to be a bunch of druggies. Upon careful reading, their proposals regarding drug policy don't make any sense, as in they contradict themselves, ignore obvious facts, etc. So it looks like they don't even think clearly about the one issue they push the most.
Whether or not you agree with my perception, that is in fact the perception created the the libertarian PR.
Bullshit! The perception you have is not due to Libertarian PR, it's due to slander and libel from Media owned and controlled by the same people that own the Democratic and Republican parties.
Face facts! You have done no homework on the party or Ron Paul or you completely ignore information you read. You can't argue a single platform or value that the party stands on, you can only provide ad homimen against them. Claiming that the party or Ron Paul are huge on drugs is yet another fabricated argument from you. Ron Paul and the Libertarian party both argue much more for economic stability and anti-imperialism than they do for drugs.
You are a liar, simply put. Whether you are a shill or just an ignorant person makes no difference.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
> Claiming that the party or Ron Paul are huge on drugs is yet another fabricated argument from you.
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lp.org
88,200 results
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lp.org+drug
38,000 results
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lp.org+taxes
1,910 results
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lp.org+crime
2,820 results
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:lp.org+healthcare
1,800 results
43% of the Libertarian Party web site talks about drugs. 2% about taxes, 2% about healthcare.
So we can see the libertarian party talks about drugs 20 times as much as they talk about taxes or healthcare. It's al about the constitution, you say? 89 hits mention the fifth amendment, 2,550 the first amendment. The Libertarian party site talks about drugs hundreds to thousands of times more often than they talk about the constitutional freedoms that are being fought for.
It seems that what is "fabricated" is your idea of the party. In fact, the party spends 43% of it's web site on drugs.
Except that your methodology is absolutely broken, which you should have considered before hitting the submit button. "Drug" relates to all topics pharmaceutical in addition to legalization topics. It would also hit on Medical issues discussing prescription coverage.
Additionally, the amount of web pages related to the topic have very little to do with the party as a whole. I can express the legality of the Federal Reserve in very few web pages. I can't do the same with legalization.
How about you do things a bit more sensibly, and look at papers and speeches Ron Paul has submitted during Congress, during his campaigns, and after his retirement.
Of course that would not back your argument.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
> It would also hit on Medical issues discussing prescription coverage.
That would be the 2% that mention healthcare.
Logic failure again. It's no fun playing any more because you can't see a basic error. How many "health" articles cover "drugs"? Many of them, so your search would pull every one of those articles into both your "drug" search and your "health" search. Trying to fabricate some numbers off of general terminology is idiocy.
Hence why I stated:
How about you do things a bit more sensibly, and look at papers and speeches Ron Paul has submitted during Congress, during his campaigns, and after his retirement.
Of course that would not back your argument.
And of course you did ignore it because it would not suit your fallacy. You don't want to fix your delusional view, so have fun playing alone.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.