UPDATE: Looks like pretty much everyone else has had the same thought.
Well, this time it's the auto industry with hat in hand, asking for a gov't bailout. And Dems are inclined to give it to them.
Automakers already want an additional $50 billion in loans from Congress to help them survive tough economic conditions and pay for health care obligations for retirees. The companies are seeking the loans as part of an economic aid plan that is now more likely to come together early next year rather than in a postelection session of Congress this month.
In and of itself, I'm not sure it's a terrible idea. The auto industry is still a vast employer, in a region that does indeed need the help.
But no bailout should be a blank check. If you get the government's money, you should accept some conditions about how it gets used. The US auto industry needs a full overhaul, not just a new pile of money to light on fire, doing the same old thing.
We need to use the leverage of a bailout to green the auto industry: Higher mileage cars. A dedication to vastly expanding the fleet of plug-in hybrids. Electric cars. And so forth. If they want the money, they can accept the challenge.
This will be good business. The US auto companies have suffered, not just because of the circumstances of a weak economy. Rather, it's because they put out cars of consistently worse quality than the Japanese makers; they have resisted making fuel-efficient models, long banking on a return to SUV-profitability*; and they have refused to innovate, not treating themselves like the high-tech industry they should be. If they want to make money again, they ought to make better cars. In this crisis, I'm OK with the government helping them to do so.
And … politically, they should be brought on board a larger coalition dedicated to controlling the cost of health care. Not just shifting costs, but actually reforming the obscenely wasteful way we spend our health care dollars.
*Yes, gas has gotten cheaper. It will get more expensive if and when the global economy picks up again.
I wonder if we shouldn’t buy into them, instead of just give out loans, like we’ve done with some of the banks.
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p>Emptywheel had a fantastic blog about it, which I love most of all, honestly, for the many insightful comments littered thereafter.
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p>We need to invest in new battery technology, key for plug-ins and beyond – that’s every bit as important as increasing gas mileage.
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p>We also need to think what we’re going to do with all these cars that are in production, or finished, now. Let them rot on the lots? The parts that comprise these cars, in many cases, are actually worth more than the cars themselves.
Despite this horrid market, companies like Honda are still making a profit, albeit a smaller one. Detroit is its own worst enemy – from design to market strategy to advertising. Like the failing Wall Street firms, many of their execs need to be kept far away from the steering wheel, sans a golden parachute, if we’re to hand over the loot to save the jobs and industry (which I fully think we should do).
and tell me why people aren’t buying American. The only thing thing the Aveo is comparable to besides price is having a funny name.
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p>This meltdown isn’t sudden. The American auto industry systematically ruined it’s reputation by producing inferior cars for too long. While Saturn and some Chevy models are fighting back, the pendulum is pretty far off right now.
For every $5 billion, you agree to beat the mpg requirements by 1 mpg. In each class. For the next 25 years.
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p>I don’t care if they get there through hybrids, electric, smaller and lighter vehicles, or operating them on magic pixie dust. Just do it.
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p>Hell, I’d settle for them agreeing to never ever use a professional driver for an advertisement. No off-road. No speeding through turns. No cool spin outs. No massive steel structures threatening to smash the vehicle if it wasn’t so dang good at starting and stopping. I believe that just restricting that silly advertising would help people move away from overpowered over-consuming vehicles, be they oversized pickups, sedans with 0-60 times that rival hot rods of the 70s, or SUVs with obscured safety records.
Taxpayer bailout money should come with lots of strings attached, not the least of which is the resignation of the senior executives and perhaps the entire board of directors of the companies involved. I’m not at all convinced we’ll ever get greener car companies with the current leadership. With all due respect to Rick Waggoner, he has been part of the problem, along with his executive team at GM. Bob Lutz, GM’s head of product development, is famous for his 2004 comment that there is no business case for hybrids. Now he’s in charge of developing the electric car for GM.
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p>What I fail to understand is why we as taxpayers are supposed to hand over our (and our children and grandchildren’s) money to the same people who were blindingly clueless in running these businesses into the ground. Honda and Toyota started work on greener cars years ago-it’s not as though people inside and outside the industry couldn’t see trouble coming.
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p>The automakers desperately need new leadership, preferably from the outside of the industry, to remake themselves. Current leadership should be made to resign in disgrace. (I would add AIG and others to my list, as well). I have no confidence that the same business leaders who created this mess have the ability to lead their companies out of it.
Financial industry is a special case. It’s like the circulation system. If it goes, whole body goes.
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p>Auto industry is like a foot. Won’t be pleasant, but no bailout. Amputate.
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p>GM and Ford cannot compete with Toyota and Honda, they are simply not good at making cars that Americans (or others in the world) want to buy. If they fail, there’s no risk of us not having cars to buy.
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p>I share your desire for higher mileage cars, plug-in hybrids, etc….to do that you need to let the old behemoths fail so new companies, with different missions and no legacy costs, start.
The car companies have made most of their money financing the purchase of their cars. With recent inflation, from 2005-2008, lenders are hurt because they are unexpectedly paid back in dollars worth less than those they lent out. So the problem for car companies is part of the systemic financial problem.
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p>If you are not going to change the systemic issues hurting lenders, then you are going to have to keep redistributing to keep them alive. In our case we are talking about taxing the farmers and oilmen who made a killing off inflation and redistributing that to the lenders.
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p>As for the price of gas, you can watch what will happen to it by watching swings in the gold price. Gas follows by up to 6 months. At $400/oz of gold, gas will be $1.50/gallon. At $1000/oz of gold, gas will be $4/gallon. At our present $750/oz, gas should be just below $3/gallon, and may be a little low because of low demand right now.
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p>Essentially the runup in gas prices has had very little to do with supply and everything to do with the value of the dollar. This was true in the 1970s and it’s true now.
a huge proportion of GM’s business is GMAC, their financial arm. GMAC was so huge that it even gave out mortgages. So you can’t separate the car industry from the financial industry; they are the financial industry too.
Ford and GM make cars across the world that people buy and love. They just don’t bring them here to America; that’s the problem.
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p>Also, you underestimate the effects closing the American car companies would mean. You’re talking millions of jobs, which in turn effect tens of millions of others… and so on and so forth. These companies should be saved at a very high cost, we should be given insurances that we’ll get out money back (and then some) and, finally, we should be able to dictate new terms in which these companies operate, if we’re going to be the ones who keep them afloat.
GM has assets of about $130 billion and liabilities of $190 billion. Or did as of June 30.
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p>They’re a company worth negative $60 billion.
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p>Its stock price is 3 bucks. If you had $2 billion today, you could buy one of two companies — GM or Akamai, the tech company in Cambridge Center. The market is trying to tell you something.
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p>This company worth negative $60 billion employs a ton of people. It’s true. It will be really horrible for those people, and for the economy as a whole, when those people lose their job. Like steel mills in the 1970s.
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p>Bail them out and prepare to set up the revolving door. Airlines. Agribusiness. Heavy machinery. Home builders like Toll Bros.
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p>All bailout money taken away from education, health, scientific research, defense. Medicare, Social Security, and debt service are locked in.
Akamai will never employ even a tiny fraction of the people GM does. The actual value of a company tells very little about its total worth to a country’s economy. We need companies that may not make a huge profit margin, but employ lots of people and produces big shit, because that’s an integral part of any economy. Plus, it’s a national security risk to depend on other countries for, well, everything – never mind leaving aside the fact that our financial-based economy, recently proven to be largely smoke and mirrors, leaves this country in a weak position if things go poorly. We need to produce stuff to make the other aspects of our economy to work. We need to have massive employers like GM so there’s people making decent paychecks to buy the high-tech stuff Akamai makes.
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p>Also, just because GM’s tanking right now, doesn’t mean it can’t become a very profitable company in the future. Car companies will never have software company profit margins, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be good companies for this country and even for investors.
Heck, it’s only taxpayer money.
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p>Of course they want a bailout. Five years from now they’ll want another. Enjoying super bonuses all the time.
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p>Does anyone find it absurd that Toyota is given credit for the Hybrid auto technology when GM championed the technology in the 1930’s with diesel-electric locomotives (but never went anywhere else with it)? Is it because the dinosaurs that run these companies are too tied in with the status quo?
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p>The problem is not with the workers. Many foreign companies manufacture in the US and still make excellent product that the public will buy. So what’s wrong with the Big Three? A lack of desire to appeal to the American public.
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p>Bankruptcy doesn’t mean everything disappears. Some companies do well after the shake up of bankruptcy. Let the courts resolve the debt issues and give others the opportunity to rebuild a manufacturing industry. This happened in the UK in the ’70s and while there is no real ownership of the auto companies over there, they still make cars under the name of Ford, BMW, etc.
the UK example helps your case.
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p>And in this economic climate, we can’t afford to lose the 6 million or so good jobs we’re talking about here. You’re literally forcing many of these people to be destitute, which will only place further strain on this country’s teetering economy, increasing foreclosures, the unemployment rate and the further decline of our industry. This is more than an economic issue, it really crosses the line into national security.
The purpose of sustaining an industry should be focused more on the jobs that industry supplies to support the economy, rather than the profits it may generate for the corporation.
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p>In all the discussion of bailing out GM, Ford and Chrysler, we should not forget the US jobs that such a bailout may preserve. In doing so, we should consider the following excerpt from the FTC:
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The US auto companies have behaved very stupidly and short-shortsightedly over the years. Of course, so have the auto Unions.
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p>Bankruptcy courts exist for a reason.
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p>There are a few things that I would add to a bailout package, if it had to happen:
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p>Fuel efficiency
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– Eliminate the disparity between truck and car gas mileage standards.
– End the disparity in how SUVs are treated. Are they cars or trucks? Count SUVs as trucks for weight standards. They are often too large / heavy for certain classes of roads. Taxes should be adjusted by vehicle type due to increased wear on roads, etc. but that’s is a state issue.
http://articles.latimes.com/20…
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p>Executive compensation
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– Anyone who gets paid more than three or four times US median salary (which for 2007 was $50,233.00) gets capped at $100k.
– Any executive “golden parachute” or whatnot is canceled.
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p>Automobile types
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– Ramp down producing SUVs and trucks and focus production on smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles. Make them nice and not just some crap-mobile.
– Conduct education and advertising campaigns about fuel efficiency and the environmental costs of larger vehicles.
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p>These would be “voluntary” in that if an automaker agreed to be bailed out, they would have to accept those terms.
The American cars that are built in America are built with union jobs. The Toyota, Nissan and Honda factories in America are not union jobs. That’s why it’s so important to protect the American auto companies.
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p>Stripping many of the incentives to ship jobs overseas can of course be a part of our bargain for handing out tens of billions to keep these companies afloat for the next 12-24 months.
if we were to subsidize union companies to be competitive with non-union shops. I’d rather see workplace rules and fair wages be included in the criteria for helping, and if that amounted to support of the union companies, so be it. More importantly, though, would be the US jobs that were preserved or increased.
we’re subsidizing American companies, like we subsidies AIG and dozens of others. They’re the companies in need of a bailout; Honda and Toyota aren’t there yet. If and when they are, we’ll have to see what Japan does before making any rash decisions.
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p>Also, you put words into my mouth. I wasn’t talking about trade agreements or anything of the like; I was talking about bailouts. It is not our government’s responsibility to bail out the firms of other countries, especially when those companies aren’t in any need of a bailout. If and when they are, we’ll have to see what those countries do. I’d probably be willing to do something if they needed it, but there’d have to be promises that the American jobs impacted would be then unionized.
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p>Free trade alone has done nothing to help this country; fair trade would be a very good thing. But that’s a different discussion for a different day, all moot within the context of this discussion because Honda and Toyota are still profitable.
Look I agree that the US auto industry is solely at fault no doubt about it. Still this being true to lose this key industry is not with out far reaching ramifications. Just look at the number of jobs to be lost, you risk doubling unemployment with the single syllable utterance of No. 13% by weeks end as they shut down and all the support industry shuts down then the small businesses that sell services to those people working in that industry shut down then the workers fall further behind on mortgages credit cards and more foreclosures followed by increases in crime as people try to survive, lost taxes to the federal government, states cities and towns. I hope you get the big picture this is not the closing of a McDonalds down the street. What you would also see would be a huge increase in our trade deficit with most autos made overseas or in this country by foreign corporations who take their profits home with them.
Also what about the military and their vehicles? If GM is gone so goes the key production of our military vehicles as well. Iraq maybe over and we are soon to leave but what about the next world flare up or another 9-11 and our need to respond will we have the equipment and parts to do it? What about finishing the job of getting Bin Laden.
This is a real 50 state issue don’t forget, look at almost every city and town and see a Ford, Chrysler or GM dealership with sales people, mechanics and a host of support staff out of work how about the local taxes from the building equipment? All gone, here again the bail out is only necessary because of the big picture the financial meltdown the car companies are as much a victim of the wolves on Wall Street as we are in that they rely on Americans having access to credit to buy their (albeit inferior) products.
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p>Detroit car companies just stupid
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p>Bail out $50 billion little choice
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p>Green technology required, limits on salaries of the top 10% of the company, no golden parachutes, Country holds preferred stock, 60 MPG cars, Hybrids, other alternatives
PRICELESS!
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p>Yes bail them out but do so under our terms.
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p>Sadly I doubt Bush will do it correctly and forget about ale Hank Paulson he’s more likely to just give them the money to help out George and Dicks friends in the oil companies so we’ll get stuck with gas guzzling Titanics and a return to $4.00 a gallon gasoline and the oil companies record massive profits.
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p>Maybe you should call your Congressman or US Senator and say enough bailout on our conditions not theirs take it or leave it.
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p>In the words of Arlo Guthrie “If 3 or more people do it could become a real movement”
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p>As Usual just my Opinions
We have a system in this country for businesses in trouble. Airlines have used it to great effect. What’s the problem?
The American auto industry has been making poor business decisions and producing vehicles that the public does not want (witness their sales) for years and years. This is not a new problem.
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p>When typewriters (or commodore computers or TI99 computers or widgets or choose your example) were no longer what the public wanted those companies either went away, losing lots of jobs, or they started producing something else that the public actually wanted. Detroit has been producing something the public doesn’t want to buy and wasn’t smart enough to change their product. We should bail them out for their stupidity?
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p>If we should bail out the automakers because they’re going to lose jobs does that mean we should bail out the dog race tracks now that we’ve taken their work away from them? (I supported question 3 and stand by that decision in large part for the same arguments here.)
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p>The American auto industry is a dying breed producing a product nobody wants. That’s their fault, not my child’s or grandchild’s fault.
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p>No. We should bail them out for jobs, duh. And make sure, in the process, that they legally aren’t able to be so stupid in the future.
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p>Absurd comparison. One industry has 6 million + jobs, the other had around 300. One industry is still a major chunk of the American economy, the other was never a major part of even the Massachusetts economy. Every single congressional district in this country would face severe consequences if Ford, GM and Chrysler went under. We aren’t just talking the industrial jobs. Every district has dozens of car dealerships in this country, all of which provide good jobs to dozens of mechanics and even sales (in good times).
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p>With a little ingenuity, the American auto industry could still be a shining beacon providing good jobs to your child or grandchild or their friends and family, while doing a lot to be a part of the solution on global warming, if we make them. The track industry would never provide a lot of good, full-time jobs for your grand children or children, and it would never have been a morally acceptable industry, either.
The American auto industry can bounce back but it shouldn’t be because of my tax dollars. When a company fails another steps in to fill the gap. Capitalism abhors a vaccuum, and there is no shortage of green automakers out there waiting for a chance to fill that void.
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p>Just how far would you regulate automakers in order to receive a bailout? From what you’re saying above it appears you’d like to regulate them to be, basically, a foreign automaker. Remember that CAFE standards go across all automakers, not just American. If the government insists that automakers must accept higher standards who is to say that the European automakers won’t continue lobbying against them?
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p>I cannot fathom how one might regulate stupidity.
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p>I do not think the automaker dog comparison is as absurd as you suggest, though I should have made clear I was suggesting that if the Feds bailout Detroit perhaps some think that MA should bailout the dog tracks.
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p>As for the number of jobs at each I have no idea where you came up with 6 million Detroit auto employees. I just went looking for a number and couldn’t find any accurate numbers. The race tracks had, according to all I heard, between 600-1000. Whatever.
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p>More to the point I have every reason to believe that Americans will continue to purchase cars, even if not from failed American motor companies, such as American Motor Company. Salespeople will still sell cars. Mechanics will still be needed to fix them. The industry isn’t going away, just the failed manufacturers.
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For starters, by making them go greener. Additionally, we could target some of our loans to be spent on important technology investment, such as improving battery technology, which would allow drivers to drive most if not all of their daily commutes using batteries instead of gas. The technology for doing this effectively is just a few years away – and we can already do it to some extent today.
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p>Yes, but they’re neither American nor union jobs. At some point, pure capitalism stops being good policy. We’ve already crossed that point with the extent that we’ve shipped jobs overseas; we can’t afford to do it further. The importance of these jobs to our economy is actually a national security issue, because a country with little to no industrial base is at the mercy of every country it needs to import its goods.
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p>Tell that to the millions of them who will lose their jobs, with no adequate jobs to replace them. The union jobs in this industry is going away, as well as 5-6 million American jobs, if we allow these companies to go belly up. Your argument is not only weak, but naive.
I think we’ve got a disconnect here in part because there are many more green automakers than Toyota. As the owner of a Prius, I might even argue that Toyota is not a green company but that is a thread for another time.
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p>Tesla, Vectrix, Fisker, Aptera and many others are all building cars of today – electrics, hybrids, plug-ins, etc.
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p>We also seem to have a disconnect at the point where you say “make them greener” and suggest that we can somehow force them to study/invent better batteries. They had their chance to do this and failed. Toyota, Honda and others filled that niche. Others, mentioned above, also want to fill that niche and have been working on these things for years. Should we suddenly say ‘screw you’ to the companies that have been working on this for so long by giving money to the big three to do exactly what these others have already spent capital to do? How fair is that to the workers there?
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p>Regarding the union jobs – show me somewhere that proves the jobs at the above named manufacturers are bad jobs with poor wages, bad facilities, etc. I believe that union jobs are good, but not the only good jobs in America.
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p>As for the uninformed insult you just tossed at me I will place my knowledge about the auto industry, environmentally friendly vehicles, CAFE standards, the history behind all three, SUV information, auto tax breaks and more up against you at any time Ryan, just drop me a line. Just because we disagree does not make either of us ignorant.
We can absolutely tie funds that we give them for specific purposes. If companies want our money, it’s on our terms. If they don’t, they can go on their own way and face bankruptcy. We’re dealing in such a position of strength, that we have an opportunity to truly give Europe and Japan a run for its money on things like emission standards and gas mileage within a few years.
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p>I did not intend for my “ignorant” remark to be taken as a clear insult; I only thought you were naive on the legislative process if you thought we can’t attach strings to our money. Indeed, tying cash to regulations is one of the most common ways we get federal regulations. Cash to state highways is why 18 year olds can’t buy liquor in Massachusetts and why states are now instituting their own MCAS-like test en mass (for better or worse). So this would be nothing unusual or out of the ordinary.
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p>The important part is to make sure that the strings we attach to our money are strong enough and do enough to make sure the American auto companies will be viable in the future. That Congress and Obama will bailout the auto industry is now next to inevitable, so even if you don’t think they should, it would be a more effective use of your time to lobby congress to create the right kind of strings to attach to bailout funds. With your specific expertise, you’d be in a unique position to argue for specific policy that we need our auto companies to embrace if they’re to be successful and a part of the solution.
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p>Really? From about 1992-2001, they made exactly what we wanted. Highly profitable, not particularly safe SUVs. They did really well financially on those guys.
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p>Trouble is, they were lured down the SUV path by favorable tax structures, favorable regulations, and America’s trends. When the trends changed and the price of gas changed, they’re stuck long down a path that doesn’t easily adapt. Now they have to decide if they’ll chase it with more money [Cadillac Escalade hybrid] or go in a new direction [Chevy Volt].
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p>I have faith in Detroit. I think they are moving in the right direction, and the best way we as a society can help them is to change the rules so that manufacturing high mpg vehicles is preferred, and by buying high mpg vehicles as individuals. The faster the transition away from SUVs and V8 engines is, the sooner Detroit will just let go.
At some point we have to say NO! What happens when the world stops running on Dunkin? Does the world really stop? I say no..Let me see..I need a bailout too! My mortgage is due, I have a child in private school and a 7,000 extra-curricular bill. Can I get a bail out with the taxpayer dollars? I have always owned American cars since I could drive. Thee truth is they don’t hold their value and just don’t last as long. So do I think they should be bailed out for selling an inferior product..Hell to the Nawh!
your kid out of private school. You refuse the help the government’s already giving you, so I’m having a hard time buying it should be giving you – in particular – much more. Instead of taking the $10,000+ they’d give your child for going to public school, you decided to spend additional thousands to send them to private school – which usually isn’t as good as public in academics anyway. So your complaints are truly falling on deaf ears. Note: I’m not telling you to not send your kid to private school, that’s your choice. I’m just saying that if you do and then complain about your mortgage, it’s not passing the laugh test.
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p>Onto the matter at hand:
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p>Of course we can’t bail out everyone and everything, including the car companies. And the government’s not – just ask the lehman brothers. The car companies are facing a few bad months with a bad economy; if they survive it, especially if we tie mandated improvements to our loans, they’ll be fine later on. This is a basic safety net feature that the government should apply to everyone, just corporations. If you were laid off tomorrow, you’d get unemployment. As soon as Obama is in, those unemployment benefits will be increased and extended, as well. So the government IS addressing your concerns, being more responsive to people, making your entire point moot.
… bankruptcy is off the table. It’s an excellent tool for a failing company to try and get back on its feet.
but there are consequences to bankruptcy that ought to be avoided if possible. I don’t think bankruptcy is a solution, because restructuring the companies in the short term alone won’t save it. They don’t really need layoffs, they need a complete and fundamental change in focus, design… and a bridge to a better economic period, where even the well-run companies are struggling (even if they’re still afloat).
… but it is a tool of last resort, unless you can talk the government into something better. I agree that they need a fundamental change, but isn’t sheltering them from their creditors a great place to start?
should apply to everyone, not* just corporations.
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p>Once this bad period ends, we can better address whether and if further loans should be given to the industry in the future. But once they’re gone, they can’t be brought back, so without fully analyzing the consequences, we shouldn’t let it happen easily.
Ryan, I was being facetious in regards to my comment about needing a bailout. I thought that was evident, but I guess it wasn’t. Obviously, I made the choice to send my child to private school for various reasons. Oh and for the record your public vs. private school comment was uncalled for. You have no idea where I live, what the district is like or the needs of my child, but if you must be that way, then suit yourself.
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p>In any case, I was simply attempting to disagree with the notion that somehow the taxpayers must bear the burden of bailing out the auto industry. The auto industry is a private entity, as is Dunkin Donouts, Star Bucks, Home Depot etc. What would happen if Honey Farms began selling a coffee that taste better than DD, cost less and stayed hot longer? Well there is a good chance that people might begin going to Honey Farms enmasse. Then what would happen? Would we say, DD is too important to fail, thousands of jobs will be loss etc.? My point is this, when does the government say No? The point I was attempting to make is this..times are hard for a lot of people, places and businesses, at some point we have to draw the line and say enough. I wasn’t insenuating that the government hasn’t met my needs in some way or another, in fact I went to college on financial aid and subsidized loans. However, the majority of middleclass folks I know, qualify for little to nothing from the government in terms of support (thus the middle class being forgotten and the corporations getting breaks, wasn’t that all we heard this campaign season?) So with that said, I may not be as eloquent in my speech, but I do get common sense stuff. I still say no to the auto industry bailout. The world will not stop running, as it did or would have during the credit crisis and market turmoil. As I stated, American cars are not up to par, which is why growth has been stagnate.
By and large, schools that don’t perform well as much of suburbia has less to do with the quality of education and more to do with the infrastructure those children have at home. Whether you live in Lawrence or Lexington, your kid is more often than not going to be better off in public school.
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p>Any bailout should be done in a way that, in the long term, we get our money back – and preferably plus some. So, I don’t necessarily disagree with this premise.
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p>However, I disagree with the next point you try to make.
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p>That’s not necessarily the problem here. Honda hasn’t made a car that uses no gas and gets you anywhere on earth in twenty minutes or less. They were just better positioned to deal with the current economic crisis because it takes time to get new vehicles into production. Don’t for a second think, though, that if the economy continues to dip that we may not see the potential end of all car companies, should governments not intervene.
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p>In decent economic times, Ford and GM are profitable. In good economic times, they’re very profitable. Of course, they never had a good long-term strategy and became too dependent on large trucks and SUVs, which were the fad of the day (or should I say decade?), but for a long time their sales of those vehicles – even in the 2000s – made them the best selling car companies in America. So while they didn’t have enough foresight, it’s not a complete stretch to see why they lacked that foresight.
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p>The good news: Their cars in the rest of the world are comparable to the Hondas of the world. The problem is there’s just a disconnect between their strategies in America and the rest of the world. Yet, that disconnect is finally ending and we can kill it once and for all by linking reason and logic to any bailout. If we don’t pass the bailout, the world will not end – in that you are correct – but it will be a much worse place and could even spur on the further collapse of not only the entire car sector, but the economy of this country. It’s already a house of cards built on the half-imaginary finance sector which produces nothing, let’s not put a fan on the table.
http://vps28478.inmotionhosting.com/~bluema24/s…
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p>I support Ryans comments and suggestions