If only we'd had some previous inkling that this might have been the case...

Turns out dealing with the government isn’t the magical sparkling land of peppermint rivers and chocolate trees that we’ve been led to believe.

This is in today’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. I found it at Memeorandum:

A growing number of auto dealers say the process of getting paid under the government’s “cash for clunkers” plan increasingly resembles some of the wrecks accumulating on their lots as part of the program.

The slow payments coming from the federal government are reinforcing the paradoxical nature of the program for dealers: It has generated the most showroom traffic they have had in months while at the same time heaping unease, frustration and worry onto the industry’s worst-ever downturn.

So the program lowers the cost to consumers, which increases demand. But the government is bureaucratically slow to pay their share of the costs, which puts the dealers in a tough spot.

Tell me again why letting the government handle more of our health care needs is a good idea?

The solution, from the dealers’ point of view, might be to back out of the program. Good thing that’s still an option for them. So far.

Couple other interesting tidbits from the story (left sidebar):

• The Toyota Corolla is the bestselling vehicle under the program.

• Eight of the top-10-selling vehicles are made by Japanese and South Korean companies.

That right there looks like an unintended consequence.