Some heroic late-night wrenching — and a quick trip an hour north to Detroit — after yesterday's disastrous loss of a front wheel — has helped the #99 Celica get back on the track here at the Toledo-Detroit LeMons race. Jalopnik intern Andy Didorosi was at the helm when the Celica (and its Swedish roof) hit the track again around 6:30 AM. We're sure we'll have more details later this morning, as this Jalop was only able to make it down to the race for a quick one-hour check-in.

Jeep facility puts suppliers right on line [Detroit News]

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And Now Back to the Jeep Wrangler Unlimited [internal]

A man who's most likely seen an amount of faces numbering in the hundreds of thousands and if they had a brain in their heads, rocked them all, a.k.a. Andy Wendler, sent over a bit from the Toledo blade regarding the shutdown of America's oldest continuously-operation auto plant, Jeep Parkway. With the expansion of the also-Toledoan Stickney factory, as well as the Toledo North facility, the former Overland plant is due to shut down this week. It built Second-War-era Jeeps, 155mm shells and rockets, but over the last few years it's used for basic Wrangler construction before the vehicles were sent over to Stickney for final assembly. In fact, Stickney's new role is to be determined, although it'll remain open for the forseeable future.

Nation's longest-operating auto plant faces final days [Toledo Blade]

Related:
Jeep to Discontinue Liberty Diesel [Internal]

The Supremes, like their Motown counterparts, showed much love to Detwa automakers today. They unanimously struck down individuals' ability to challenge Ohio's elected officials in a decision granting over $300 million in tax breaks to DaimlerChrysler in a case called DaimlerChrysler v. Cuno. The incentives were provided in return for Daimler building a pretty new Jeep plant in Toledo. Many may argue that these type of targeted ED incentives are nothing more than government picking "winners and losers" and are a form of "corporate welfare," but in reality those people are just wrong.

Let's take a look at one of the best, and most widely used ED incentives around — the performance-based tax break; the exact same tax break used in this case. The incentive in Ohio, called the Manufacturing & Equipment Investment Tax Credit, is based on the Michigan Economic Growth Authority (MEGA) tax incentive created twelve years ago — and it allows a tax break to be granted to a company retaining or adding a certain number of jobs over a period of ten years. Over that period, a company may receive a specific amount of money refunded from their business taxes paid — if and only if they are able to prove they've kept or created the jobs promised. The company receiving the credit must prove it every year for the totality of the years the incentive is offered. It's pretty simple actually — you bring the jobs, you get the credit. It's a huge boon to any community — mostly because business taxes represent only one type of tax paid to government — and a credit provided there doesn't stop the huge indirect gain provided by these jobs. Good deal for all, right? Seems pretty simple.

Well there is one group who doesn't agree. The people who seem to have a problem with this are the "free trade" types — the people who believe, and rightly so, that a level playing field is the best playing field for the economic game — and in the economic game, no one should be getting a free ride or "welfare" in order to play. In theory, these folks are correct — but only in theory. The reality of the situation is that in many cases manufacturing jobs are a zero-sum game — and a zero-sum game played not only between states here within our nation's borders, who would have seen serious job losses had the Supreme Court ruled differently, but with countries as close as Canada and as far as China. In this global economy, where losers are made into winners by governmental dollars and bonding authority, tying the hands of our manufacturers does nothing to either make the playing field more level or make our nation better off.

Supreme Court in DCX case blocks Ohio taxpayer lawsuit [Freep]

Related:
DetroitWonk Defends Governor's Attempts to Keep Wixom Open [Internal]

Preprare for a spate of "smashing debut" jokes. A 2007 Dodge Nitro driven by a DaimlerChrysler employee blew a stop sign in Toledo yesterday and smashed into the back of a semi. No one was injured but the yet-to-be launched Dodge SUV, which suffered a bruised fascia, was inadvertantly outed in production trim by the TV crew that captured the aftermath on video. But worse off is likely the test driver, whom we'd imagine might find his next assignment from DCX to be hauling old Neons to the dump. (Please excuse the random ad of old people attached to the YouTube video — those Toledo TV bastards!)

2007 Dodge Nitro Makes "Accidental" Debut [WTOL TV]

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More on the Dodge Nitro [internal]

DaimlerChrysler is investing $600 million in its Toledo North Assembly Plant, which will host its first non-Jeep assembly — the Liberty-based Dodge Nitro SUV. The plant will be expanded by 160,000 square feet and get a team of 150 new robots, all in the name of increasing the plant's flexibility to multiple products can be produced at the same time. Additional improvements will be made to the Toledo South plant, where a larger Jeep Wrangler will be built.

Related:
Spy Photos: 2007 Dodge Nitro, Close to Production [internal]