C'mon. '87. Obama received $80,000,000 in contributions from labor. Some estimates are that $10-12mil of that amount came from UAW members. He was endorsed by the union, he favors their "open ballot" initiative and the UAW ran soft money ads for him in three states the week before the election. The GOP Congressional delegation opposes a bailout. I'm a Republican who is agnostic about it-if some fat ass desk jockey working at the Commerce Dept gets a 50k a year pension on our dime then the socialist precedent is already set-but to compare Obama's slavish devotion to the UAW with Bush is ridiculously disingenuous, inaccurate and partisan.
All the bailouts are bullshit because they all keep alive zombie firms. They force capital out of the hands of the productive and funnel it into value destroying zombie firms - i.e. failed financial institutions, overstretched consumers and the auto makers. GM and Ford have stuffed almost $500 Billion into their businesses over the past decade and they are worth only a tiny fraction of that today. What else could we have done with all that money other than flush it down a toilet in Detroit? The fired workers will have to leave the asshole UAW and get a job making cars at non-union plants for car companies that actually make cars people want to drive at prices people are willing to pay. New industry will be able to compete for labour in Michigan because it won't be so ridiculously overpriced. And we'll stop paying for people to NOT work. When buggy makers and horse whip makers went out of business because cars became more popular, the economy didn't collapse. Even if some of the former employees end up on welfare, it'll be a hell of a lot cheaper than half a trillion dollars per decade! LET THEM DIE (and the insolvent financial firms too).
Kill GM. Save Chrysler and Ford. Give them $10 billion each. Renegotiate all union contracts to be at 65% pay for 3 years, followed by 100% afterwards + bonuses if profitable. If the workers don't abide, continue to take production overseas or use non-union employees. UAW is too greedy to realize that its either a pay cut or your jobs are gone. Anyone watching the House testimony right now? I'm liking Bob Corker getting the truth out of these guys! (R-Tennessee). Rick Wagoner getting owned.
Sure give Wall street 700 billion and say No to 25 billion to autos. This could destroy what is left of our economy. This has nothing to do with fuel efficiency. They made the cars people wanted. Nobody wants a mini. If this credit crunch does not abate then yes.. it is tossin away good money after bad. But if that is the case, then the whole economy is doomed anyway. All small businesses will die, which is our future, so forget it. And .. then we wasted 700 bill not 25. The same dopes who are calling for the death of Detroit are the ones who wanted to raise rates after this crisis began. They want another great depression.
In the end it always comes down to politics. That's why so many companies have been able to rob and plunder their way through America under Bush. Haliburton did just that before running for foreign shores and accounts.
True, they made the cars some people wanted. Let's not forget that they helped kill their own commercially viable elctric car with the help of big oil. Go watch that documentary then come back and watch their testimony and see how they are just another group of lying sacks of crap that have been doing nothing but burning cash. They are a bunch of dying dinosaurs that cannot keep up with the competition if their lives depended on it, which now they do and they still can't keep up. Granted the systemic crisis we have now is hitting them extra hard from all sides but its just like Katrina. All it takes is one big disaster to rip away the layers of fluff and expose how truly broken the system is.
the really sad thing is, that these bailouts replenish power to organizations that have has a stranglehold over this country for 50 years