What can happen when you stop saying never

Barack Obama turned his recent bowling disaster into a joke by saying he would replace the White House bowling alley with an indoor basketball court. His first pickup game should include National Basketball Association commissioner David Stern and General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner. With his parquet pulpit, Obama should thrust the ball right at their guts like an old-school coach, hard enough to knock a little wind out of them.

"Nothing personal David, even though you supported Hillary," Obama should say. "Nothing personal Rick, even though you gave to Mitt Romney and your folks at GM gave more to Romney and even Ron Paul than me. That's not what I invited you here for.

"What I really want to ask you is, what were you thinking during the NBA Finals?

"David, you banned players from wearing giant jewelry. You've said, 'We know that our sport, indeed all sports, has an enormous opportunity to deliver important messages on a global basis.'

"Rick, you've just announced the closing of sport utility vehicle plants across North America. Gas is $4 a gallon. Yet, what was it that you advertised to millions of viewers during the Celtics-Lakers games? A Denali?"

Yes, a GMC Yukon Denali, which gets 12 miles per gallon in the city and 18 on the highway. GM ran ads that depict a starstruck arena parking attendant jabbering crazily as an all-star basketball player drives into the players' lot. "Never let up!" the attendant says. "Keep your eye on the prize!" "Hey man, you got to go for the gold. You got to be like a prospector."

At the end of one ad, a voice says, "The Yukon Denali from GMC. Engineering that happens when you never say never."

As GM mines the last of fools gold with engineering dinosaurs that are driven closer to extinction with every announcement from OPEC, and as President Bush responds to petrol prices by calling for more drilling, Japanese car makers putt-putt right past us. As GM depicted an NBA player in 5,635 pounds of bling, Honda announced the start of production of the hydrogen-powered FCX Clarity. One of the first customers will be actress Jamie Lee Curtis. "This is a must-have technology for the future of the earth," Honda president Takeo Fukui said.

Detroit is still stuck between its own promises of hybrids and electric plug-in cars and seducing buyers to live in the past. Chrysler, where sales were down 25 percent last month, compared with the same period last year, is trying to raise its vehicles from the grave by capping the price of gasoline for buyers at $2.99 a gallon. This is for a fleet that is at the bottom of Consumer Reports rankings. Honda, Toyota, and Subaru were ranked first, second, and third, respectively, while Ford, GM, and Chrysler were ranked 12th, 13th and tied for 14th, respectively.

The indecision to fully embrace a fuel-efficient future keeps costing American automakers with every passing month. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that based on May figures, Toyota's share of the US auto buyer market has more than doubled within this decade, from 9 percent to 18.6 percent. GM has fallen from about 30 percent to 19.4 percent.

So if Obama really beats John McCain, whose energy solutions are coastal drilling and 45 nuclear power plants, and if he really builds his basketball court, this should be one of his first pickup games.

Addressing fuel efficiency in a 2007 campaign stop in Las Vegas, Obama said, "If everybody here is driving an SUV, you know, getting 8 miles a gallon and then you're complaining about gas prices, I don't have that much sympathy for you ... You need a smaller car." Noting someone in the audience who looked uncomfortable, Obama joked, "I know he's got one of those Dodge Durangos you know? He's got a Denali or something."

If Obama says to Stern and Wagoner what he said to the crowd, Detroit might have a chance. We could yet see an ad from GMC introducing a new car called the Dendron (Greek for tree). "Fifty miles per gallon to save the planet. Engineering that happens when you stop saying never."