In news that took us totally by surprise, it seems that new car sales are slumping hard now that the government’s Cash for Clunkers program has ended. It’s not like a bunch of demand was essentially stolen from the future and moved to the present with the use of copious amounts of newly minted government money, right? Oh, it is?

Adding the to fears over a slow sales month are the hundreds of millions the government still has to pay back to dealers from the Clunkers program. That takes a bad financial situation and makes it worse as revenue is slow to come in and the business bank account dwindles while it awaits replenishment from Uncle Sam.

A quote in this AP story about the problem comes from a sales manager at a Toyota dealer in Ohio. He says, with seeming surprise, “The program may have just taken a lot of people out of the market.”

Really, dude? Did that just hit you?