Over a year ago, the president of the United Auto Workers, Bob King, announced a campaign to ’shame’ foreign automakers with plants here in the U.S. into allowing his union to unionize them–the details of which would be released at a later point in time.

Earlier this year, when King finally released his new manifesto on what he expected the automakers to agree to, it was met with well-deserved derision.

The union was silent, though, when in June Bloomberg ran this headline: Hyundai Teaches UAW Best Factory Job Doesn’t Need a Union.

However, in early August, knowing that his union’s future is looking bleak, King stated that the union was in “confidential” talks with the foreign automakers.

“The vast majority of the assemblers here in the United States have at least agreed to confidential discussions,” UAW President Bob King said at an industry conference in Traverse City, Michigan. “We’ve had productive discussions. The last thing we want is confrontation.”

This seemed to confirm the buzz that was created in July when it was reported that the UAW was talking to the Volkswagen AG’s works council and the German union IG Metal to launch an attempt at unionizing the employees at VW’s new Tennessee plant. (more…)

And that’s the point, I guess. Watch this ad for a “clean diesel” car by Audi, and good luck getting this slightly modified version of the Cheap Trick classic “Dream Police” out of your head. I couldn’t get it out with a lobotomy. It’s been playing off and on in my brain since it first aired during the Super Bowl.

But beyond the diddy, I also can’t get the vision of a fascist “green” future out of my head — even if it’s portrayed with a heavy dollop of of “Reno: 911“-style cop-show parody. Good comedy has to have a grain of truth in it to work, and this spot has plenty. It’s not just a peek at a ridiculous future, but a look at our “be green or else” present. An overreaction? Tell that to the chief of America’s Green Police, San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom, who Tweeted:

“Ok .. That ‘green police’ Audi commercial hits home..”

(more…)